Finding Your Pre-1850 Ancestors
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| William McBee (Mackbey) with Louisa Smith, and at bottom, their daughter Martha Jane, with other relatives. ✪ |
Why is 1850 so important in US research? Because this is the first year each person in the US Census was named, and both age and birthplace usually noted. From 1790 through 1840, the US Census named only free heads of household, usually (but not always) the oldest man. The rest are divided by age groups and assigned tick marks. Before 1870, enslaved and some other non-White persons were also noted separately.
Good News!
Is this a terrible obstacle? Fortunately not, because as we travel up the tree from the present to the past, clues are found in many records which can lead to finding the parents, even when men married multiple women with the same name. Fortunately, most of us are already using the best strategy to find more distant ancestors, but we will need to focus on details to get the most out of our work.
There is an excellent talk by Julia Anderson, MA, AG®,AGL™ "Beyond the Brick Wall: Strategies for Pre-1850 U.S." on youtube for FamilySearch. One of the reasons we dread this research, is that we will eventually have to rely on record sets we use less frequently in modern research. We will be consulting tax lists, land, probate, church and court records more frequently. Fortunately, digitization and machine learning/AI is helping us find and use these records more easily than ever before. Let's wring every bit of help possible from the research we have already done.
Before digging in, a bit of philosophy. Long ago, René Descartes said, I think, therefore, I am. The longer I do genealogy research, the more I realize that the implications. I must notice what is known to discover the unknown.
Most of the genealogy trees we find riddled with errors are a result of trying to rush back into the past before analyzing all the details of what they have already found. When we research the siblings, inlaws, all the children, witnesses to baptisms, marriages, wills, contracts, the neighbors, lodgers and other members of the FAN club (Friends, Family, Associates, Neighbors) we have them as cheerleaders urging us towards truths of the past.
Notice Every Clue
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| Magnifying Glass, courtesy of PickPik |
One of the reasons it is best practice to take note of each fact presented in every record is that these clues can lead to the answers we seek. Some records note military service, including some sneaky columns to the right of the census page, often overlooked. Draft registrations mention not only where the man worked and lived, but also nearest relative or other contact. Researching who is mentioned can sometimes lead to much more information. If military service is noted in a census or obituary, service records may be discovered. Immigrants reported their year of entry to the US, and sometimes their country of birth. If the name of the country changes over time, that's a clue as well.
If such details were overlooked before, as the search for the next generation begins, start tracking documents. Note what has already been found, and begin creating good citations for each record, and note those tiny details. You may want to create a locality guide if you will be researching in a place new to you. Start with the FamilySearch Wiki, and expand your own personal guide as you head back in time.
Create a timeline for the family, keyed to the records. Note other incidents, such as wars, epidemics and other disasters. Were your ancestors affected by crime, accidents, drought? Look in the newspapers where they lived, to see what was happening. Did the family stay together, or did the adult children move? When a child died, are the parents noted on the death record? Who was the informant? Were there death notices or obituaries in more than one newspaper? Find all you can, and note differing accounts of both life, death, and surviving family. As records are found, always note the FAN club members.
Divide and Conquer
Anderson says that we should divide our research into the three phases of ancestral couple's lives: birth to marriage, marriage to death, ending with the death of their last living child. Researching the children is where we usually begin; there are more records, and we are more familiar with those record types. Once we have the children's names, and places and years of birth from 1850, we have a map to those tick marks, and can even predict what we'll see. Put the data into tables, and note any discrepancies. This will help us search for and find more records; from marriages of the children to burials for those who died young. In addition, we'll know where to search for the land transactions, which newspapers to search, which counties and courts. We now have a puzzle with a key, which is much easier to solve. Jumping back to try to find the parents' births without all the preliminary work done is much more difficult and prone to error.
Making Sense
✪The top image of this post is my second-great-grandparents William and Louisa Smith McBee living in 1850 Greene County, Illinois. Before seeing this record, I knew nothing about them but their names, from their son's death certificate. I have not yet puzzled out who all the people in their 1850 household are, but finding out is key to learning even more about their lives. They were living next to William's parents, George Henry and Martha Willis McBee and more of his siblings. His sister Angeline was listed with them, solving a long-time mystery about her parentage. I have many DNA matches who trace their descent through her, which finally made sense!
To read more about pre-1850 records, see Clifford, Karen, AG©, Digging Deeper: Using the Essential Pre-1850 Records, Genealogy Research Associates, South Jordan, Utah, 2011. For a survey of American records, see Greenwood, Val D., The Researcher's Guide to American Genealogy, 4th Edition Genealogical Publishing Company, 2017.
DNA Records
Once the "paper" records have been found, analyzed and correlated, DNA data becomes a multi-faceted tool to lead us to our ancestors and their stories. You might say, DNA is not reliable for distant ancestors. It is true that autosomal small matches are not suitable for proof, but that is only one type of DNA test. Both Y & mitochondrial DNA shine like a laser through the paternal and maternal lines; autosomal is more like a light bulb, illuminating our entire ancestry a few generations.
Remember that there are some testers who are much closer to the ancestor in question than we are. I have a friend whose grandfather was born during the civil war, the youngest child in a large family; her parent was also the last child born, and she is an only child, born late in her parents' marriage. First recruiting the testers closest to the focus ancestor is best practice.
Successful use of DNA in a research project may include targeted testing, and the use of autosomal along with Y and mitochondrial DNA. Even X DNA helps focus research. Many researchers use more than one testing company and have "DNA trees" in many sites. Once you manage kits for multiple people, it's critical to track of account information, communication with your cousin matches, match data, and a system for regular checks for new matches, then correlating the data.
For those needing more information about DNA and what testing can accomplish, a great book is Genetic Genealogy in Practice, by Blaine T. Bettinger and Debbie Parker Wayne, published in 2016 by the National Genealogical Society. Research Like a Pro with DNA: A Genealogist's Guide to Finding and Confirming Ancestors with DNA Evidence by Diana Elder, Nicole Dyer and Robin Wirthlin, published by Family Locket Books, 2021, introduces the reader to a comprehensive research project guide, from start to report.
When you have found your ancestor and their story, remember to send it along to us for publication here!
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| Valorie Zimmmerman |
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