Finally Figured Out My Charles C. Knapp Problem

Ever since about 1990, I have had a Charles C. Knapp, born in about 1813 in New Jersey, in my family tree database, the son of William and Sarah (Cutter) Knapp of Newton, Sussex County, New Jersey.  He was not my ancestor, so over the years I collected records and added them to this person in my tree.

There were two marriage records in the "Newspaper Clippings from the Sussex Register" database on Ancestry.com for:

*  Charles Knapp and Sarah M. Robbins, on 7 February 1835. in Newton, Sussex County, N.J.
*  Charles Knapp and Sarah Smith, on 28 March 1842, in Newton, Sussex County, N.J.

There were two marriage records in the "New Jersey Marriages, 1670-1965" database on Ancestry.com for:

*  Charles Knapp and Sarah Smith, on 3 March 1842, in Newton, Sussex County, N.J.
*  Charles C. Knapp and Susan Beach, on 28 January 1841, in Morris County, N.J.

Then there were U.S. census records for 1850 that showed Charles and Sarah Knapp in Newton, Sussex, New Jersey with three children.  I thought "That must be the son of William and Sarah Knapp, because they're in the right place at the right time."

In the 1880 U.S. census, there was Charles C. and Susan B. Knapp in Vigo County, Indiana without any children.  Vigo County is where several of Charles Knapp's siblings, and nieces (including my 2nd great-grandmother, Sarah (Knapp) Auble), ended up in the 1860s, so "That had to be the right one."

Until last week, that was pretty much all I knew about, or cared about, this Charles C. Knapp.  I performed a search on Ancestry last week for Charles Knapp, born in 1813, and found that there were several more records:

*  An 1850 U.S. census record for Charles C. and Susan Knapp in Harrison, Vigo County, Indiana, with two small Auble Knapp children (and two Beach children).

Note that there are no birth places on the record, and the search results showed no birthplace either.  I had searched with a birthplace.  A lesson learned there.

*  An 1860 U.S. census record for Charles and Sarah Knapp in Wilton, Muscatine County, Iowa with five children, three of whom are the same as the 1850 census.

*  An 1870 U.S. census record for Charles and Sarah Knapp in Wilton, Muscatine County, Iowa, with the same five children.

*  A Find A Grave memorial for Charles Knapp (1813-1892) in Wilton, Muscatine County, Iowa, and one for Sarah Knapp (1814-1896) also.

*  A Find A Grave memorial for Charles C. Knapp (1813-1888) in Terre Haute, Vigo County, Indiana   And his wife Susan B. Knapp (1802-1882).

So I had a classic case of "Same name, same place, wrong connection."  I finally realized it when I found the second 1850 U.S. census record and the two Find A Grave memorials last week.  Bzzzzt, red light, wrong way.  It happens to all of us, especially for collateral lines that we haven't thoroughly researched.

Charles C. Knapp (1813-1888) is the son of William and Sarah (Cutter) Knapp, who married Mrs. Susan Beach in 1841 in Morris County, N.J. and appeared in the 1850 census (with two Beach children and two Knapp children) in Vigo County, Indiana, and then they are not in the census records until the 1880 U.S. Census in Vigo County, Indiana.  I can find no record of the two Knapp children after the 1850 census record in Indiana.  They both died in Terre Haute, Indiana.

Charles Knapp (1813-1892) was born in New York, to unknown-to-me parents.  He married (1) Sarah M. Robbins in 1835 in Newton, N.J. (who died in Newton in 1840) and (2) in 1842 to Sarah Smith in Newton, N.J.  They appeared in the 1850 census in Newton, N.J., and in the 1860 and 1870 census in Muscatine County, Iowa.  They both died in Muscatine County, Iowa.  He is not the same person as Charles C. Knapp.

"Pobody's nerfect," I always say.  God knows I am not.

So I corrected the problem in my RootsMagic database - two separate Charles Knapp persons.  And in my new Ancestry Member Tree.  And in the FamilySearch Family Tree (that was complex!).  I still need to fix them in my other Ancestry trees, my MyHeritage tree, and probably other trees.  I wonder if other researchers have used my erroneous data to connect the wrong Charles Knapp to William and Sarah (Cutter) Knapp?

I'm sure none of my society colleagues or blog readers have made a mistake like this.  Sometimes they take decades to figure out.

=============================================

The URL for this post is:

Copyright (c) 2017, Randall J. Seaver

Please comment on this post on the website by clicking the URL above and then the "Comments" link at the bottom of each post.  Share it on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ or Pinterest using the icons below.  Or contact me by email at randy.seaver@gmail.com.