War of 1812 Final Payment Vouchers on Footnote.com

One of the databases recently updated on www.Footnote.com is the War of 1812 Final Payment Vouchers Index for Military Pensions, 1818-1864. There are 65,770 entries in this index, which is 95% complete. The database description says:

"Pension payment records are not typically found in pension application files. These cards were created as an index for the final payments made to either the veteran or his widow. They provide additional details on where a family may have moved in the early- to mid-19th century, death dates of veterans, widows, or dependent children, and sometimes the maiden name of a widow."

The page for this database looks like this:




I put "Seaver" in the search field and received 8 matches. One of them is for Obed Seaver of Rhode Island (not my ancestor, but a distant cousin!). His card is:



As you can see, it lists his date of death as 13 November 1843.

I looked for cards for my known War of 1812 soldier, Amos Underhill, and didn't find him. Oh well.

(Not So) Wordless Wednesday - Post 112: Brother and Sister?

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I'm posting family photographs from my collection on Wednesdays, but they won't be Wordless Wednesday posts like others do - I simply am incapable of having a wordless post.

I managed to scan about 100 family photographs in the Scanfest in January, and have converted the scanned TIF files to smaller JPGs, cropped and rotated as best I can. Many of these were "new" to my digital photograph collection.

Here is a photograph from the Carringer family collection handed down by my mother in the 1988 to 2002 time period:

There is no information on the front or back of this photograph. I do not know who these children are, where this photo was taken, or when it was taken. It was in the Smith-Carringer-Auble photo collection, so it could be from the 1870 to 1910 time period in Cloud County, Kansas (Smith), Red Willow County, Nebraska (Smith), Boulder County, Colorado (Carringer) or Cook County, Illinois (Auble).

There is a small studio logo in the lower right-hand corner of this photo, but I don't have the "tools" to bring it up clearly.

These children are probably brother and sister, with an older girl (perhaps age 10-15) and a younger boy (perhaps age 8 to 12).

I looked at other photos in my collection, and the girl's face and hair is similar to that of Carlie Brown-Smith in Post 89 of this series.

Over 2,000 School Yearbooks on WorldVitalRecords.com

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Doing my weekly due diligence on subscription websites, I noted that the http://www.worldvitalrecords.com/ site has added school yearbooks from over 2,000 schools, universities and naval ships. They are from the http://www.e-yearbook.com/ collection. The list of yearbooks is currently on the list of recently added databases here, but may age off in the next month or so.

In most cases, there are only two or three years for each school or ship in this collection, but if they are the "right" years, then you may find a "genealogy jewel" about your parents, siblings, friends, or even yourself.

The San Diego area yearbooks I noted included:

* Bonita High School - 1976, 1978

* Coronado High School - 1940,1942,1944 - 1945,1950,1952

* Point Loma High School - 1950

* San Diego High School - 1924, 1929

* San Diego Junior College - 1955

* San Diego State College - 1933, 1946, 1949

When you think that some of these schools have published decades worth of yearbooks, the overall collection (every year) is humongous.

Unfortunately, I didn't find any yearbooks for the years when my grandfather, my mother, myself, my wife, my children or my siblings attended these schools.

Have you checked out Genlighten's services recently?

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One of the most intriguing genealogy success stories (at least in my view) is Genlighten, the brainchild of Dean Richardson (who also writes the Genlighten blog).

Genlighten is a commercial genealogy research service (and there are others). Dean has enlisted many genealogy researchers to perform lookups or research in specific repositories or for specific records. The process is described in the FAQ page here. Genlighten receives a portion of the fees for connecting the client with the provider.

Occasionally, Dean highlights one of the providers in a blog post. Today, that person is Michael Hait from the Washington DC area. As part of the interview with Michael, he lists the specific research services that Michael provides. It's an impressive list:

* Maryland Death Certificates, 1875-1982
* Colonial Maryland probate records, 1635-1777
* Search of Maryland County Deed Indexes, 1635-present
* 1867 Texas Voter Registration List (all counties), 1867
* Prince George’s County, Maryland, Wills, 1696-1963

* Maryland Land Patents, 1637-2000
* Prince George’s County, Maryland Marriage Licenses/Records, 1777-1886
* 1783 Maryland Tax Assessment, 1783
* 1776 Maryland State Census, 1776
* Civil War pension files - Union, 1865-1950

Some of those really intrigued me, because my wife has Maryland and DC ancestry (McKnew, Pickrell, Prather, others).

For instance, a lookup in the Prince George's County Wills costs $5 if the index search is unsuccessful, and $15 if the records are found and provided.

What about the Union Civil War pension files? Michael charges $6 for an unsuccessful index search, and $50 for obtaining and providing the complete pension file. That's a real bargain - it costs at least $75 to obtain the file from NARA by mail.

What research needs do you have? Have you checked the Genlighten provider list, and the genealogy services and documents they can provide for a reasonable cost to you?

The list of services and providers is here. Is there something on this list that you need? You can select a specific country and see the services offered for that country. The Genlighten Overview for Lookup Clients is here.

Do you want to be a Genlighten lookup provider? You can be - the Genlighten Lookup Provider FAQ is here.

I'm tempted! I need to check for records in Dodge County, Wisconsin and Hillsborough County, NH, Mercer County, PA, and Jefferson County, NY.

Disclosure: I am not an employee, contractor or affiliate of Genlighten, and have received no remuneration for writing this blog post. I do know and enjoy the company of Dean Richardson, and appreciate his efforts to bring affordable research services to the genealogy world.

Tombstone Tuesday - Happy

It's Tombstone Tuesday, and because I ran out of my own gravestone photographs several months ago, I'm posting photos of "interesting" and "different" tombstones gathered over the years.

Today's photograph is of two tombstones with only the name "Happy" on one side of them (I don't know what's on the other side!).







I cannot find out where these gravestones are located. I checked all of the photographs for the "Happy" surname on www.FindAGrave.com and Googled a number of search terms without success. There were 180 entries for the surname Happy on Find-A-Grave, but not all of them had photographs.

Does any reader know where these stones are located, and who they commemorate?

I am glad that these two persons are Happy together in death. I hope that they were happy together in life also.

England Beginning Research Series on FamilySearch.org

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A friend asked me "how can I learn about genealogy records and doing research in England?" I told her that the LDS FamilySearch "Online Classes" site had a number of easy-to-use informational and educational videos available.

They are on http://www.familysearch.org/ - you can get to them by clicking on "Research Helps" and selecting "Online Classes." There is also a "Free Online Classes" link on the http://www.familysearch.org/ home page.

The page looks like this:

There are quite a few video series now available on this site. The five English classes include:

Lesson 1: Research Overview (30 minutes) - Video ; Class outline (pdf)

Lesson 2: Census Records (25 minutes) - Video ; Class outline (pdf)

Lesson 3: Civil Registration (35 minutes) - Video ; Class outline (pdf)

Lesson 4: Church Records (25 minutes) - Video ; Class outline (pdf)

Lesson 5: Find Your Ancestors (35 minutes) - Video ; Class outline (pdf)

There are also class handouts that cover the entire series - see Finding Records of Your Ancestors England (pdf) and England Beginning Research Series Web Sites (pdf)

I found the videos and class outlines to be pretty basic, but that's what is needed for beginning researchers. I found an easy way to watch the videos and see the larger class outline simultaneously - open two windows. This does require changing the slides manually, but it kept me focused:

Or, if you don't want to listen to the speaker, you can just page through the class outline and read the information that she talks about on the slides.

If you are looking for a good beginning course on England, Ireland, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Poland, Russia or US genealogy research, Reading Handwritten Records (in a number of languages), or Research Principles and Tools, these free online classes are pretty good.

They provide an excellent balance between offline research and online research methods and tools.

Randy's Speaking in the OC on Wednesday, 21 July

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I am making a presentation titled "Finding Your Elusive Ancestors: Doing a Reasonably Exhaustive Search" at the Genealogical Society of North Orange County, California (GSNOCC) on Wednesday, 21 July at 7 p.m. in Yorba Linda, California. The meeting is at the Yorba Linda Community Center (4501 Casa Loma Avenue, near Imperial Highway (see map here).

A program announcement is provided on the GSNOCC Musings blog titled July Program - Randy Seaver. The program description says:

"The first element of the Genealogical Proof Standard [GPS] is 'to do a reasonably exhaustive search.' In this presentation, Randy Seaver will explain the GPS, take us on a whirlwind tour through traditional and online resources that should be included in a search, discuss his favorite search strategies and techniques, and introduce several case studies of his still elusive ancestors."

And to top it off, this is the Ice Cream Social evening for GSNOCC. I'm really looking forward to the evening.

If you have a free evening in the Los Angeles and Orange County area, please come to this meeting and enjoy a genealogical talk (really interesting?) and ice cream (really good!).

Amanuensis Monday - Josiah Sawtell 1804 NH Deed

Genea-blogger John Newmark (who writes the excellent TransylvanianDutch blog) started his own Monday blog theme many months ago called Amanuensis Monday. What does "amanuensis" mean? John offers this definition:

"A person employed to write what another dictates or to copy what has been written by another."

My subject today is a land deed found last week by Martin Hollick, and sent to me via email in an intentional act of genealogical kindness! Martin writes the excellent The Slovak Yankee blog.

In the deed, Josiah "Sawtel" of "Townshend" in Middlesex County, Massachusetts sold a plot of 20 acres of land in Brookline in Hillsborough County, New Hampshire to Samuel Hale of Pepperrell (in Middlesex County, Massachusetts) for the sum of $160.86 on 20 February 1804. The deed was recorded on 21 Februaryu 1804, and is in the Hillsborough County [New Hampshire] Deed Records, Volume 61, Page 114-115. The deed reads:

"Sawtel to Hale [in margin]

"Know all men by these presents that I Josiah Sawtel of Townshend in the county of Middlesex and commonwealth of Massachusetts husbandman that for the consideration of one hundred and sixty dollars and eighty six cents to me in hand paid by Samuel Hale of Pepperill in county and commonwealth aforesaid merchant The receipt whereof I do hereby acknowledge do hereby give grant sell and convey to the said Samuel a certain piece of land situated in the southwesterly part of Brookline in the county of Hillsborough and state of New hampshire containing about twenty acres be the same more or less bounded as follows (viz.) beginning at the northwesterly corner of the premises at the south west corner of Samuel Russels land in the east line of the corner of Mason thence southerly on said Mason Line about fifty three rods to land of Nathaniel Patten thence easterly by said Pattens land about fifty rods to the road thence northerly by said road to said Russels land thence west about fourty rods to said Russels land to the place of beginning

"To have and to hold the same with all the privileges and appurtenances thereto belonging to him the said Samuel his heirs and assigns forever and I the said Josiah Sawtell do for myself my heirs executors and administrators covenant with the said Samuel his heirs executors and administrators that I am lawfully seized of the above granted premises in fee simple and that the[y] are free of all incumbrances and that I have good right to sell and convey the same to the said Samuel in manner aforesaid and that [I] and my heirs executors and administrators will warrant and defend the same to the said Samuel his heirs and assigns against the lawful claims and demands of all persons forever. In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal together with my wife as a token of her relinquishing her right of Dower and power of thirds in the premises this twentieth day of February in the year of our Lord Eighteen hundred and Four Signed sealed and delivered in presence of
Shobal C. Allen .............................................. Josiah Sawtel {seal}
Jno. Barnard ................................................ Hannah Sawtel {seal}
Middlesex Ss Feb'y 20th 1804.

"Personally appeared the within named Josiah Sawtell and acknowledged the within instrument by him subscribed to be his fee act and deed before me -- Daniel Adams Just peace

"Rec.d & recorded 21 Feb'y 45 min. past 6 O'Clock A.M. 1804 & exam.d by Isaac Brooks, Reg.r"

Josiah must have been in a hurry to sell this land - the deed was written on 20 February 1804 and he appeared at 6:45 AM the next morning to register the deed with the Clerk.

This plot of land was right up against the town line of Mason, which is just to the west of Brookline town. So now I have a location, and need to check for additional deeds for Josiah Sawtell - both in the Grantor and Grantee indexes - in hopes that they will shed more light on the records of Josiah and Hannah (Smith) Sawtell.

These land records are also available on microfilm through the LDS Family History Library Catalog. Volume 61 of the Hillsborough County Deed Records (1771-1901) is on FHL Microfilm 0,015,961. I could check the Deed Index for Sawtell and Smith in the Grantee Index, S-Z 1771-1849 (FHL Microfilm 0,015,926) and Grantor Index S-Z 1771-1849 (FHL Microfilm 0,015,917).

Since the deed register starts in 1771, there may be earlier deeds for the Hillsborough County area in records for New Hampshire Colony, since Hillsborough County was created in 1771 from Colonial lands.

Martin apparently saw my Surname Saturday post about my SMITH family of New Hampshire from 11 July, and tried to help me find records for the family. He noted that he looked in the microfilms at NEHGS in hopes that Josiah Sawtell sold land that was formerly the property of Hannah (Smith) Sawtell's parents. It wasn't, but that's the breaks, as they say. Thank you, Martin Hollick!

CGSSD Meeting Summary - Steve Morse Presentations

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Dr. Stephen P. Morse, PhD, provided three hours of lecture and presentation on the Steve Morse One-Step Webpages at the Computer Genealogy Society of San Diego meeting on Saturday, 17 July. There were over 90 in attendance. Steve's biography and curriculum vitae are provided in the meeting announcement here.

Steve's first talk, two hours, was titled "A Potpourri of Genealogical Search Tools" and the second, one hour, talk was titled "A Hodgepodge of Lesser-Known Gems." There were two four-page handouts that covered many of the topics presented.

The Steve Morse One-Step Webpages site is http://www.stevemorse.org/. Don't go to http://www.stevemorse.com/. In the presentations, he demonstrated how to use many of his web pages, especially those used for genealogy research. Steve usually used a well-known historical person to illustrate how to navigate the different search tools, and the graphics were often very funny. You can read much of the first presentation in his webpage A One-Step Portal for On-Line Genealogy.

Some of the Search Tool categories demonstrated were, for example:

* Ellis Island Search Forms and Ship Arrivals
* Castle Garden years (1855-1891) plus other New York Arrivals
* Other Ports of Immigration
* US Census and Soundex (1790-1940)
* Canadian and British Census
* Births, Deaths, and other Vital Records
* Calendar, Sunrise/Sunset, Maps
* Dealing with Characters in Foreign Alphabets
* Creating your own Search Applications
* Last-Minute Bidding and Bid History on eBay.

Within each category above, there are a number of different search tools that can be used to search databases with Steve's tools. His search results often find matches faster and with less confusion than using the specialized websites like http://www.ellisisland.org/, http://www.castlegarden.org/, http://www.ancestry.com/ and many others. If the specialized website is a subscription site, then the user has to have a subscription. Users at a library or FHC can use Ancestry Library Edition or Ancestry Institution.

Some of the things I learned and will pursue using the One-Step Webpages include:

* Many of the One-Step Webpages searches can use first and last names with options of: "starts with," "is exactly," "contains" or "sounds like." This is very useful on the free Ellis Island and Castle Garden sites, and is similar to what Ancestry.com uses on their Old Search pages for immigration and census records.

* There are some ships manifests that are not complete, or have bad links from the index to the record, on some of the sites. There are ways to work around that - see Ship Lists and Missing Manifests on the A One-Step Portal for On-Line Genealogy page.

* The Census ED Finder and using the 1930 Census to find the ED for the 1920 and 1940 census is very useful if you know where your family lived in those years, but cannot find them in the census records. You can use the Census ED Finder to determine the ED and then use that information to browse the census page by page.

* The demonstration of how to find a living person's birth date was interesting -- the process is in the Vital Records section of the A One-Step Portal for On-Line Genealogy page.

* The Relationship Calculator looks very useful - its also on the A One-Step Portal for On-Line Genealogy page.

* The Where's Grandpa link is classic - some attendees thought that it was a real site. Steve's user's email comments to him were classic - he only showed the clean ones, I think.

This was a fantastic presentation by Steve Morse - I enjoyed every minute of it. I tried to guess who most of his historical figures were before he revealed them, and was right about most of them. The descriptions I heard most when I talked to colleagues was "fantastic" and "overwhelming."

I've used Steve's Webpages only occasionally (mainly because I don't search for immigration records very often, and am fairly adept at searching Ancestry.com), but will try some of these tools out - especially the living people tool, the date translation tool and the geographical tools.

If you ever have a chance to hear Steve speak in person, I encourage you to attend and take good notes.

UPDATED 7/19: Removed links for categories - they didn't work. The categories are broad, with many topics in them, so go to www.SteveMorse.org and click on individual search tool links.

Best of the Genea-Blogs - 11-17 July 2010

Hundreds of genealogy and family history bloggers write thousands of posts every week about their research, their families, and their interests. I appreciate each one of them and their efforts.

My criteria for "Best of ..." are pretty simple - I pick posts that advance knowledge about genealogy and family history, address current genealogy issues, provide personal family history, are funny or are poignant. I don't list posts destined for the genealogy carnivals, or other meme submissions (but I do include summaries of them), or my own posts.

Here are my picks for great reads from the genealogy blogs for this past week:

* Doc, transcription & analysis in sheet protectors by Pat Richley on the DearMYRTLE's Genealogy Blog. Pat recaps her recent activities, and has suggestions for preserving documents, transcriptions and photos.

* The Holy Grail: New Genealogists by Marian Pierre-Louis on the Roots & Rambles blog. Marian analyzed recent NEHGS survey results, and came up with advice on how to attract new genealogists - for bloggers, societies, conferences, vendors, publishers, etc.

* IGI on FamilySearch beta/pilot Websites by the writer of The Ancestry Insider blog. Mr. AI answered a recent question of mine - thanks! It's what I thought - they aren't all there, yet.

* Twice Told Tuesday - Men's Under-Clothing by footnoteMaven on he Shades of the Departed blog. fM has a fascinating piece this week - men's underwear and shoes. I can hardly wait for the followup on women's underclothing!

* IAJGS 2010: Sunday, July 11 Opening, IAJGS 2010: Breakfast with the bloggers, IAJGS 2010: Persian Jewish genetic disorders by Schelly Talalay Dardashti on the Tracing the Tribe: The Jewish Genealogy Blog. Schelly shared her experiences at the IAJGS conference in Los Angeles last week. Neat picture of Thomas, Schelly and Lisa too!

* Preserving Your Research For Posterity by Linda McCauley on the Documenting the Details blog. Linda ponders how to preserve her research, and raises issues that we all need to think through.

* We did it! Reuniting a MIA American soldier's dog tags with family by Lorine McGinnis Schulze on the Olive Tree Genealogy Blog. Another wonderful story of reuniting a family with the dog tags of their World War II loved one - great work, Lorine!

* The GeneaTweets: 16/07/2010 by Robert on the MyHeritage Blog. Robert collects funny, weird and intriguing tweets from Twitter with a genealogy, ancestry or relatives theme. Some are really funny!

* A Festival of Postcards (8th Ed.) - GEO by Evelyn Yvonne Theriault on the A Canadian Family blog. This postcard carnival has over 30 entries on the theme of geography. A fascinating collection!

* Sojourn in Slovakia: Day 4 (Part 2) and Sojourn in Slovakia: Day 4 (Part 3) by Lisa A. Alzo on The Accidental Genealogist blog. Lisa's Slovakia trip summaries continue, with many family and food highlights!

Other "Best of..." weekly pick posts are here:

* Weekly Genealogy Picks by John Newmark on the TransylvanianDutch blog. John also links to other weekly pick posts.

* Follow Friday - 16 July 2010 by Greta Koehl on Greta's Genealogy Bog.

I encourage you to go to the blogs listed above and read their articles, and add their blog to your Favorites, Bloglines, reader, feed or email if you like what you read. Please make a comment to them also - all bloggers appreciate feedback on what they write.

Did I miss a great genealogy blog post? Tell me! I am currently reading posts from over 650 genealogy bloggers using Bloglines, but I still miss quite a few it seems.

Read past Best of the Genea-Blogs posts here.