Tuesday's Tip/Searching on Find A Grave

     I've found Find a Grave can be a little frustrating when I'm searching for someone whose last name could be spelled in various ways, or if the person in question has married and I'm not sure of the correct spelling of her married name.  They can be a little persnickety about spelling, and you can't search by the deceased's first name alone, which with well over one million burials isn't really feasible anyway.  There is a back door however, if you have an idea where the burial may have taken place.

     Select "Search for a cemetery" on the home page. Now you can select a specific state and county.  At this point, a list of cemeteries will appear which you can whittle down further by village or town.  Once you have selected a cemetery, you will be able to search by first name alone.  Granted this works best in smaller cemeteries or if the first name is an unusual one like say, Wentworth, but if you've been unable to find the burial the traditional way it may be worth a try.

Wednesday's Website/Civil War Prison Database

     Now that I've proven my ancestor Mary Augusta Vincent married George W. Matteson, I'm naturally curious about their courtship.  George enlisted in 1861, five years before the couple married in July of 1865.  Did they know each other when he enlisted, did they meet while he was home on a furlough?  Their homes were one hundred miles apart in 1865, how did they meet?  George mustered out of the army in early March of 1865, only four months before the marriage, it seems to me they must have been acquainted, perhaps even engaged, for at least part of his service.

     I'm not too hopeful I'll find the answers I seek, but nonetheless I've been reading histories of the 76th regiment and pouring over letters from men in George's Company F.  One bit of information that turned up was that George was captured at the Battle of the Wilderness, 5 May 1864 and held prisoner for seven months.  Some of the regimental histories mentioned their soldiers being sent to the notorious pow camp at Andersonville Georgia; was that where George was taken after his capture?  If he spent seven months in that prison he was lucky to have survived, many died within much shorter time spans.  A young soldier named Price who was taken prisoner the same time as George lasted only three months in it's confines.

     Surfing around trying to find some lists of prisoners I stumbled upon this site: http://www.civilwarprisoners.com/index.php
containing searchable databases of Andersonville and Cahaba prisons along with the prisoners aboard the Sultana, a ship which exploded as it was carrying prisoners from those two places to freedom.  I selected Andersonville's database and typed George's name into the search fields, immediately this popped up--

     He had been taken to that terrible place!  There's no telling what shape he was in when he was released, but it couldn't have been good.  By the time of his capture the prisoner exchange program had been halted leaving growing numbers of Union prisoners trapped in Confederate prisons which had insufficient resources to care for or feed them.  This leaves me wondering even more, was Mary Augusta engaged to George in 1864?  Did she know of his capture and where he was?  Maybe someday I'll find out.

Finding Mary Matteson

     

George Washington Matteson

     Work here has continued apace in my attempt to find more proof of the identity of the wife of George W. Matteson.  An earlier post  outlined all the circumstantial evidence I've amassed on that topic, which points to my ancestor Mary Augusta Vincent being the bride. I'm pleased to say I've now found the evidence that settles the matter. 

     To review, my ancestor Mary Vincent, was  born to my third great-grandparents Thomas and Matilda Taylor Vincent in 1838 and was last seen living with her sister Louisa Vincent Hurd in Cohocton, Steuben County, NY in 1865.  After 1865 she either died, was married, or she joined the underground.  Several family trees posted on Ancestry showed two different Mary A. Vincent's, (along with two different sets of parents) as the wife of George Matteson,  I managed to rule both those young women out by determining who they really had married.  The funny thing was, there weren't that many women named Mary Vincent or Mary A. Vincent born in New York around 1838.  Further evidence that the woman who married George was indeed my relative was the name she chose for her first daughter.  It was Frances, probably in honor of Mary's recently deceased sister Frances Amelia Vincent Coons.

     A few days ago I took a trip to the Rochester, NY library to view a book I'd found in their online catalog containing marriages extracted from Steuben County newspapers, including the time period of the wedding.  Surely this book would provide some answers, I was running out of options.  The results were very disappointing--no results.  Last night while looking through my notes I remembered a tree on Ancestry that listed no parents for Mary Vincent, (or was it the wrong parents?) , either way it had her marriage taking place in Steuben County, the source being "US Pension Office".  If the marriage had indeed occurred in Steuben County that would be fabulous; I was reasonably certain my Mary Vincent born in1838 was the only Mary Vincent circa 1838 living in Steuben County in 1865.

     The owner of said tree had never responded to my polite inquiry as to the exact wording of the source, which meant I had to somehow get a look at George's Civil War Pension file-- documents which I've been led to believe are not yet digitized--another dead end.  Just for the heck of it I typed all the following into the Google search box--"Civil War"  "George W. Matteson"  "New York", and hit enter.   The first two hits were for Ancestry searches which for some reason had the location as California, not New York.  The third hit was my own blog, then Find A Grave, next a WorldCat link for the wrong George Matteson; the sixth hit was different, this one's heading was, "Archive Grid-Sager brothers Civil War Letters", with "George Matteson 76th" in small type underneath.  That was at least the right George who I knew had served in the 76th so I clicked it, maybe George was mentioned in the letters?  I next did a "find on page" search for Matteson and there, highlighted in the sidebar, was another link titled, "George W. Matteson 76th New York Infantry", from the Allen County Library...so I clicked that too.

     Up came a page with details that read, "1 online resource-- twenty four unnumbered pages-- Military Service, Affidavit, Pension record, etc. etc..."  What?  Could it be?  I hardly dared believe my good fortune, but there it was, George's pension file!   I started through the pages hoping against hope that the tree at Ancestry had been right about the marriage information being contained in this document.  There was mention of the name Mary A. Matteson, a cause of death for George, pension amounts... I kept going and finally, there on the next to last page I found it, "married Mary A. Vincent July 2nd 1865 at Bloods Corners, Steuben County, New York!"  Another search revealed that Bloods, today called Atlanta, was a small hamlet in the Town of Cohocton. The marriage place was not just Steuben County, it was the exact township where my Mary was residing in 1865. This clinches the deal for me, I have the right name, right age, and right wedding place.  

     I'm still amazed I found this, there are only a few hundred pension files on the site, out of tens of thousands that exist.  What were the odds the one I needed would be there?  And yet it was, sometimes if you're persistent you just get lucky.

Tuesday's Tip On Thursday

     I just figured this one out, and couldn't wait five more days to share it with you.  Especially since those holiday gifts of DNA kits will be making their appearance on Ancestry.com in the coming weeks.
  
     You know how you open your DNA page and find a promising match to your kit only to discover the other person has no family tree to compare with yours?  Sometimes there is a way around that.  Click on the kit anyway, and the box below will appear--

     Just because the match has no tree attached to their DNA kit doesn't necessarily mean they don't have one floating around somewhere on Ancestry which they have neglected to attach.  That's not always true, but in some cases it is.  See the blue box above?  If there is a tree, you can find it by clicking there.  If there isn't, the box will be green and prompt you to suggest to the other party they add one.  Slick advertising huh?

     Wishing everyone a wonderful, discovery filled New Year and many DNA matches!

When It All Comes Together

    

George & Mary A. Vincent Matteson With Children

     We here at Ellie's Ancestors Headquarters in snowy upstate New York are hard at work sorting out the children of my 3rd great-grandparents Thomas Vincent and Matilda Taylor.  I'm pleased to say another child has been accounted for, I'm 99% sure.  Best of all, there are tons of pictures of this person online!  I never find pictures, this is very exciting.

     Mary Augusta Vincent, born in 1838 was the seventh child in her family; she can be found with her mother Matilda and step-father Rockwell Rood in 1850 and 1855.  I cannot locate her in 1860, but in 1865 she is living with her sister Louisa Hurd and her family in Cohocton, Steuben County, New York.  After that the lady vanishes.  I searched census returns, Find A Grave, cemetery records, newspapers, all the data I have on her siblings--there was no trace of Mary Augusta after 1865.

     I ran broad searches on Ancestry.com and Family Search.org with very little in the way of results, except in Ancestry Family Trees.  There, in several trees I found a woman of the right age named Mary A. Vincent who married George Washington Matteson and went homesteading in Nebraska.  Many of the trees said her parents were Abram and Mahala Vincent of Brant, Erie County, New York while a few claimed a David Vincent from England and his wife from Ireland were Mary's parents.  All available census records for Mary Vincent Matteson say her parents were both born in New York -- that ruled out David from England.  There was indeed a Vincent family in Brant, NY headed by Abram Vincent, with him were Mahala and a daughter Mary A. born in 1835. This was certainly the family indicated in the Ancestry trees, but was this Mary A.Vincent really the future wife of George W. Matteson?

     One way to prove she wasn't, (and help prove Mary Augusta was), was to figure out what had became of Abe & Mahala's Mary.  To do that I spent hours searching for clues.  I found that Mary Vincent of Brant did not appear in any census in New York after 1855.  Where was she in 1860?  The online trees all said Mary and George were married in July of 1865 and that seemed right, their first child was born in 1866.  I did find George Matteson in NY State's 1865 census taken in June, a month before his wedding, living with his parents in Cortland County.  If Mary of Brant had really married George in '65 she should have been in the 1860 census under her maiden name.  On the other hand, I couldn't find Mary Augusta that year either.  Two of the trees said the marriage occurred in Steuben Country, the sources being a pension record and a church record although neither was provided with the tree.  Still, remember who was living in Steuben County in 1865... Mary Augusta!

     Now, hoping that Mary of Brant had married and stayed local, I did a search of the 1860 census of Brant for any woman named Mary, no last name, born 1835 +/- 5 years.  Surprisingly, there were only a few after weeding out the ones who were still living with their parents.  I was able to narrow it down to three possibilities.  Two of them didn't pan out, but Mary the wife of James Stevens was another story.  I found the couple in Brant in 1860, then in Evans, Town of Angola just a few miles away for following censuses.  Find A Grave gave me her death date and the tantalizing clue, "Mary V. Stevens",  V for Vincent?  I discovered her children's names, obituaries and other articles, but nothing to indicate who Mary Steven's parents were, though her obituary in an Angola newspaper contained what would prove to be the break I needed.

Mrs. Mary Stevens, widow of James Stevens, died at the home of her daughter Mrs. Jesse Stone in Conneaut, Ohio at age 90...

      Using this information I was able to find her daughter Rachel Stone's death notice that indicated her passing took place in Ohio in 1940, which led me to Ohio Death Records at FamilySearch.org--

     There, near the bottom, Mother-- Mary Vincent born at Brant, New York.  Proving that Mary A. Vincent, daughter of Abram and Mahala Vincent of Brant, NY did not marry George Matteson and the censuses over the years prove she did not move to Nebraska.

     Adding all these facts to others; like Mary A. Vincent Matteson naming her first daughter Frances (Mary Augusta's sister Frances had recently died), and naming her youngest daughter Ella Augusta, and not least-- there just weren't all that many women named Mary Vincent born about 1838 in New York; especially when one considers she married a bit later than most women, at age 26, and many of her contemporaries bearing the same name were Vincents only by marriage.  The NYS census of 1865 lists only ten women named Mary Vincent in the entire state who were born between 1835 and 1839.  Of that number, five are wives, one is a daughter with her parents, one is of mixed race and one is Mary Augusta.  The other two are unlikely due to location.  Given all this evidence, I do think I've finally found Mary Augusta!  Or, Mary Augusta Vincent Matteson!

Tuesday's Tip/Another Way To Research

     

     Hello!  It's been awhile since I posted here, I've been engrossed in my Vincent research and meeting new cousins!  The tip I want to share today has to do with research.  As I've been amassing data on this family, I've found that I needed someplace to organize it all but I didn't want to put my theories into my personal genealogy software just yet, since they are only unproven theories, and because what if tomorrow all the un-filed photographs, folders, documents, and stacks of books that have built up on my desk were to suddenly collapse and crush me?  I wouldn't want my survivors looking at that software and being led down the wrong genealogical path.  (I think about stuff like that)

     My solution was Ancestry Family Trees.  I created a Vincent tree and unlike my other trees on Ancestry, I made this one private since it contains large amounts of unproven information.  The benefit of this is twofold -- firstly, everything is organized in one place and secondly, Ancestry looks at my tree and sends me hints.  Including birth and death certificates, census records, marriage records, military records, photos, fellow researcher's trees, and family stories so far.  As new databases are added to the site, Ancestry will automatically search them for my persons of interest.  I can tweak the tree, adding and changing names to see if more tips pop up, and then change it back. The tree needn't be detailed; names, approximate dates and a location if you have one will do.  And I can delete the tree at any time or make it public.

     It's made documenting this family and storing what I find much easier and quicker than searching Ancestry's mountain of databases manually, though I wouldn't rely on it entirely since oddball spellings do pop up.  

Mary Is Maria And That S Is An L

     

     We've heard it a million times-- don't assume online trees are correct.  Nor should you believe family histories published, bound and sitting on a shelf in your local library are free from error.  I've even written about that very subject, so why did I assume the book about my family was right?  Not only was it NOT right, it really hampered my research since for a long time I believed that it was right.

     I've been trying to sort out the children of my third great-grandparents Thomas Vincent and Matilda Taylor of Halfmoon in Saratoga County, New York.  I'd already discovered that the information about that couple contained in the book was not correct and neither I've found, is alot of it about their children.  For instance, the book's "Mary S. Vincent" born in July of 1827 was not named Mary and her middle initial wasn't S.  She was in fact Maria L.Vincent, though the date of July 1827 was right.  How did I come to that conclusion?  First of all, I could find absolutely no mention of Mary S. anywhere except in the book which made me suspicious.  Granted, she would have been difficult to trace since she would not have appeared in any census under her own name until 1850, by which time she most likely would have been married and/or possibly deceased.  But to leave no trace at all?  That does happen, but it was too soon to give up on her.

     Whilst pondering this, I ran a search among the matches to my DNA test at Ancestry using the surname VINCENT as a filter.  One hit was for an individual with a "Maria LeCresia Vincent" born in Cayuga County, New York in their tree.  At first glance I discounted the possibility of them being related, this Maria's father was James of Dutchess and Greene Counties and her mother Mary Bullis.  None of that sounded particularly familiar, and yet...that Cayuga County birthplace gave me pause.  Cayuga County is where Thomas and Matilda Taylor Vincent were living at the time of his death in 1842.  Taking a closer look at Maria LeCresia, I saw that the online tree said she had married Isaac Corwin Price in Dix, New York.  Dix? That is where Matilda Taylor and her second husband lived following Thomas Vincent's death in Cayuga County.

     Now my curiosity was really piqued so I took a look at the New York State Census of 1855.  This is a great census, it not only gives the individual's county of birth if that birthplace was in New York State, but it also gives the individual's relationship to the head of household.  That useful bit of information doesn't show up in federal censuses until 1880.  Maria L. Price told the enumerator she was born in Saratoga County, home county of Thomas and Matilda before they moved westward in New York!  I located a news article confirming her marriage  in Dix, "Maria Louisa Vincent" was the name used.

     Following the Price family through the years I tracked their move to Farmington, Tioga, Pennsylvania; just 36 miles from Dix, New York and the births and sadly, deaths of children of Maria. Several of them with names that matched names in her Vincent family, as did Maria's name--her father Thomas had a younger sister named Maria.  The 1900 census confirmed her birth date as July 1827, but the coup de grace was the death certificate of Maria Price. Father's name?  Thomas Vincent!  The document appears to have been filled in by a barely literate person, (it was Sarah Price Bailey, daughter of Maria L.), but the name Thomas Vincent is quite clear.  Either Sarah didn't know where her mother and grandparents were born, or more likely had no idea how to spell it as she simply replied "don't know" to those questions.  She writes Maria L's mother Matilda's name as something resembling M~a even though the form asked for Matilda's maiden name and not her first.  

     Later death certificates for Maria's adult children variously  give her birthplace as Wolcott, New York, Cayuga County, New York and Montour Falls, New York.  The only document giving Maria's place of birth as Saratoga County is the 1855 census, which is the one time she herself gave the information.  I can see why the Ancestry tree got that wrong, but it does suggest she spent some time in Cayuga County, very close to Wolcott, in her youth, while Montour Falls is only eight miles from the Beaver Dams neighborhood in the Town of Dix where her mother Matilda lived.

     I'm not sure where the online tree got the names James Vincent and Mary Bullis as Maria L's parents, or the middle name of LeCresia.  I tend to think the name was probably Louisa as in the news article about her marriage, but newspapers often get that sort of thing wrong so I'm withholding final judgement on that.  I am however, convinced  I've finally found Thomas and Matilda's daughter.