So I mentioned several months ago that I'd joined forces with my mother-in-law to help with her genealogy project, and that we'd ordered microfilms of Edinburgh parish records to see if we could back up what's been passed around as information gleaned from a family Bible that burned in a house fire decades ago. The results weren't as helpful as we'd hoped, but we have other avenues to try.
Nowhere in the marriage registers for Edinburgh could we find the 1661 marriage of Ian Esom Farris and Emily Jane Cameron that we were hoping to, but we're not giving up. Ian supposedly came from Rutherglen, so there are always those records to try, and that just might require a 'research' trip to Scotland. It's a rough job, but someone has to do it, right? Damned shame it has to be us. Yes, I know that didn't sound remotely convincing. It wasn't meant to.
What I was able to find for my MIL was copies of land grants, bills-of-sale for land, maps, and such for one of the Farris ancestors and surprised her with all of them on a CD. We may be temporarily stuck on Ian, but this is where my German-Celtic tenacity comes in. I WILL find the information, damn it!
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
To Beu Or Not To Beu: The Remix
This past Saturday, the new hubby and I were summoned to Oma and Pop-pop's house to de-leaf their front yard after the oak forest attacked. What does that have to do with genealogy, you may ask? The reason for the leaf-blower counter-attack was that my mother's cousin Barbara was coming to visit, Barbara being Oma's niece. Apparently, she's always wanted to find about her dad's side of the family, her dad being Oma's brother Rudi (more frequently known in the family as He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named), and my mother eagerly passed on what of my research she remembered and summoned me to show her the rest. As Rudi was four years older than Oma and had the advantage of going back to Ribnitz while Oma stayed home, he had more memories of their dad's family and I figured we could pool resources. The sheer amount of information seemed to take her aback, and while it debunked a few pieces of family lore, it backed up much more of it, and the exchange of stories got more and more interesting...
Barbara told me that her dad remembered meeting his step-siblings, supposedly from a marriage that Gustav had made in Germany, which he then ended before coming to the States. I have the passenger list for Gustav and Rudi coming back from Germany in 1927, when they went over to settle Hermann's affairs (as the oldest son, Gustav had to approve selling the lumber mill and the house), and being eight or nine while they were in Ribnitz, that's most likely the meeting with his step-siblings he would recall. It was the first I'd heard of a possible third marriage for Gustav, though certainly not out-of-character for a man who failed to divorce my great-grandmother Emma and remarried in Florida, only to have his bigamy discovered when he died. 1876 began the switch of vital records from churches to the government, so it requires getting in touch with the Ribnitz civil records archive, but it means I can find out what exactly happened and if Gustav had another family still in Germany. My search for Old World cousins is taking on more and more unexpected twists and turns, but isn't that what makes the search so much fun? I certainly think so.
Barbara told me that her dad remembered meeting his step-siblings, supposedly from a marriage that Gustav had made in Germany, which he then ended before coming to the States. I have the passenger list for Gustav and Rudi coming back from Germany in 1927, when they went over to settle Hermann's affairs (as the oldest son, Gustav had to approve selling the lumber mill and the house), and being eight or nine while they were in Ribnitz, that's most likely the meeting with his step-siblings he would recall. It was the first I'd heard of a possible third marriage for Gustav, though certainly not out-of-character for a man who failed to divorce my great-grandmother Emma and remarried in Florida, only to have his bigamy discovered when he died. 1876 began the switch of vital records from churches to the government, so it requires getting in touch with the Ribnitz civil records archive, but it means I can find out what exactly happened and if Gustav had another family still in Germany. My search for Old World cousins is taking on more and more unexpected twists and turns, but isn't that what makes the search so much fun? I certainly think so.
A Is For Apologies
It's not a good feeling to go back to your blog, see how long it's been since your last post, and cringe. I'm sure the poor folks at the FHL are convinced I've fallen off the face of the planet, so in the very near future, I need to go back, if nothing else to assure them I'm still alive. Oops...
So a lot has happened since my last post, and topping the list is getting married. Yes, that's right, according to the government and the Catholic Church, I'm a Ferrell now, and I'm rather all right with that. Okay, more than all right, just don't tell my husband. On the less happy side of the news is Oma's health taking another downward turn, and we think the dementia might be getting worse. She had to have her leg amputated well above the knee, but she's still feisty and raring to go, which is probably due in no small part to being 100% German. What can I say? We're tough cookies. It makes me really glad I started asking the questions when I did, however, and now that I'm back in touch with another source on that side of the family, I think my research is going to get interesting yet again...what? You want me to explain? Then read on to the next entry!
So a lot has happened since my last post, and topping the list is getting married. Yes, that's right, according to the government and the Catholic Church, I'm a Ferrell now, and I'm rather all right with that. Okay, more than all right, just don't tell my husband. On the less happy side of the news is Oma's health taking another downward turn, and we think the dementia might be getting worse. She had to have her leg amputated well above the knee, but she's still feisty and raring to go, which is probably due in no small part to being 100% German. What can I say? We're tough cookies. It makes me really glad I started asking the questions when I did, however, and now that I'm back in touch with another source on that side of the family, I think my research is going to get interesting yet again...what? You want me to explain? Then read on to the next entry!
Monday, January 31, 2011
If At First., You Don't Succeed...
...start on another line. When I made it through the last parish and didn't find Jan, I decided to add a field to the database that accounted for search the entirety of 1866 and 1867 in each parish, and thus get to go through them each again. Thankfully, the vast majority of parishes have an index book that I can search through, which is how I found 1866 Jan in the first place. He's still looking to be my best match, and as 1866 matches up with the rest of my census records, that may well be him. Radobytce, the village 1866 Jan is from, is just under 11 miles from Písek, well within the district, and even close enough to justify Písek being named as the closest town on his passenger list. All in all, I have a plan to move forward from here, but it was still time for a break.
For quite a while now, Jamie and I have been trying to get his mother out to the Family History Library, as she's been tracing back her side of their family. There's one particular line that's proving elusive, their descent from a Ian Esom Farris, originally of the Rutherglen and Edinburgh areas of Scotland, but who emigrated to what is now North Carolina in the 1660s. A lot of people seem to be looking for this particular ancestor, but all the information is what was gleaned from a family Bible that burned in a house fire several decades ago. What I'm setting out to do is verify what I can, see what else I can uncover, and determine if there's a way to get the line further back. It's a challenge that will give me a much-needed break from the Vanicek line, and get me brownie points with the future MIL at the same time. What can I say? I love adventure.
For quite a while now, Jamie and I have been trying to get his mother out to the Family History Library, as she's been tracing back her side of their family. There's one particular line that's proving elusive, their descent from a Ian Esom Farris, originally of the Rutherglen and Edinburgh areas of Scotland, but who emigrated to what is now North Carolina in the 1660s. A lot of people seem to be looking for this particular ancestor, but all the information is what was gleaned from a family Bible that burned in a house fire several decades ago. What I'm setting out to do is verify what I can, see what else I can uncover, and determine if there's a way to get the line further back. It's a challenge that will give me a much-needed break from the Vanicek line, and get me brownie points with the future MIL at the same time. What can I say? I love adventure.
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Trouble In Trebon, Part Two
Sixteen parishes searched, and I have a potential match. This Jan Vanĕček was born on 31 July 1866, which is six months before the date the census gives, but I'm not ruling it out yet. Also, there's a notation with the record that has me puzzled: 'lev lit. 13 března 1869' (13 March 1869). I have no idea what the 'lev lit.' is referring to, but I'll be asking the Czech genealogy mailing list, that's for sure. In case it was a death date, I checked that book as well, and didn't find anything. I'm still looking, as that census was a bit too precise to be ignored, but for now, I at least have a good lead. Optimism has its benefits after all.
Trouble In Trebon, Part One
Armed with my all-powerful database and a whole lot of determination (and caffeine), I've started making my way through the Písek parishes in search of Johann Vanicek, born January 1867. I'm currently at twelve out of thirty-seven parishes searched, roughly one-third of the way, and still no luck. Now, I know I still have twenty-five to go, I'm just worried that I won't find him, and I have no further clues to go on. I don't do well with dead-ends, as I'm convinced they're just a matter of mindset and can be gotten around, but if this doesn't pan out, I don't have a back-up plan. I don't know where else to search from here. If this were Oma's side, I could step back and say, 'All right, I did my best, I can walk away,' but this is Pop-pop's side. He's the one who got me hooked on history, and I know being able to find this out would mean a lot to him. That means even if I could talk myself into giving up for my own reasons, I have to figure this out for his sake. Time for my usual eternal optimist to make a comeback, and convince myself that I'll find him in the other two-thirds of the parishes.
Thursday, January 27, 2011
Pillaging The Pilsen Archives, Part Two
The first thing I did once I got home from my grandparents' was to pull up my Neuhaus Lihls file and see just how much of the work I'd already done. Needless to say, I was rather proud of myself when it turned out I had Johann, his parents Simon Lihl and Johanna Lorenz, and Simon's parents Johann Lihl and Barbara Heidler. I'm in the process of pulling up exact dates, as well as trying to decipher hometowns in the parish records, but I currently have the line back to 1763 and am hoping to take it back beyond that. That's assuming I can continue to read the Old German script, however, and considering it's take a considerable amount of help and practise so far, we'll see how it goes.
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