The Slow Trip Down the Path to the Past

 

The verdict is in: spending weeks reading legal documents can slow down one's research progress. At least in the case of my family history goal for this month, the numbers have not sported their usual robust appearance. The path to Thomas Firth Rainey's parents may have finally yielded some of its previously-hidden answers, but that path has also led through some messy probate files. I am far from gathering all the details needed to take the next step.

All told, I did add 104 names to my mother's side of the family tree, mostly by working my way through the lines of descent from the collateral lines associated with these Rainey and Firth ancestors, and by examining DNA matches who tie into those same ancestral families. Granted, that was not bad for two weeks' research efforts—but I have seen better results. Right now, that family tree has a total of 41,908 documented individuals gleaned after well over a decade's work.

On the other side of the family, my in-laws' tree has stayed frozen in position for most of the past six months, now at 41,793 individuals. However, in less than a week, we will shift our focus to my mother-in-law's side of the family and begin work on that tree for April's research goal—though again, we will be working on ancestors removed from our current times by well over a century.

In the last few days of this month, we'll need to wrap up what can be finished of the court records regarding Isham Rainey and George Mealer and see whether any further details will add to this tally. Then, it will be time to draw up a summary report of what's been accomplished and use that to create a to-do list for the next time I tackle the Rainey and Firth family lines back in the Virginia colony where they first were found before the close of the eighteenth century. 

Good Bedtime Reading for the Insomniac

 

One last time this month—at least for this puzzle regarding my fourth great-grandfather Isham Rainey—I've headed back to those DNA matches that Ancestry.com's ThruLines tool has hypothesized are my cousins from that same line. This means, too, that I'll need to revisit the probate records concerning the estate Isham left behind for his family to resolve.

Did I mention messy? As in perfect bedtime reading for the insomniac? 

As if sorting through the intestate Isham Rainey's belongings weren't sleep-inducing enough, there is the question of George Mealer. George, it appears from some records, was Isham's son-in-law, through marriage to his daughter Sarah Rainey. And yet, when I read through the 1845 court records in Monroe County, Mississippi, about the administration of Isham's estate there, the mention of someone named George Mealer pops up.

But wait! The George Mealer married to Isham's daughter was back in Georgia, where Isham himself once lived. In fact, it appeared that George Mealer died there, perhaps late in 1831—intestate, what else?—in Oglethorpe County, himself. So who was this other George Mealer? And were court listings of Mealer relatives reliable indicators of our Rainey kin? Or not?

Through the wearying catalog of legal documents contained in the two various cases, it was possible to glean a listing of the children of George Mealer, son-in-law of Isham Rainey—enough to launch me into a more recent time period where it might be possible to trace those Mealer children and their descendants through to a time period known for more well-documented records. That, in turn, may help determine how some mystery DNA cousins are related to me. All that stands between me and at least the discovery of one set of Isham Rainey's grandchildren is a huge stack of reading material in the form of mind-numbing legalese.

I'll let you know how it goes, tomorrow morning.

Overextending

 

Having hopes of discovering whatever became of the siblings of a fourth great-grandfather, even if his name was as unusual as Isham, may have been a bit overextending. There is, after all, only so much that can be found about an average resident of late 1700s Virginia.

There is, however, a number of loose ends to tie up regarding this Rainey family before the month comes to a close. Grateful to have achieved my goal of discovering not only my third great-grandfather Thomas Firth Rainey's parents, but grandparents as well, I'd like to see which of his siblings may have left a genealogical paper trail. After all, though Thomas' sisters had likely married in the early 1800s, they had at least made their appearance in court documentation owing to the fact that their father had died intestate. This is a record source that could be useful to revisit.

At the time of Isham Rainey's 1843 death in Mississippi, both his daughters had spoken up to make sure they were included in the distributions of their father's estate, should there have been a residue. One daughter, Sarah, had married someone in Oglethorpe County, Georgia, by the name of George Mealer. The other daughter, Elizabeth, had identified herself in letters to the probate court in Mississippi as Elizabeth Arnold.

Returning to FamilySearch.org's Full Text Search, it may be possible to discover more about the family of George and Sarah Mealer. From that point, if any other indicators surface, we may also be able to wrap up this month's research project with information on the identity of Sarah's sister Elizabeth Arnold and her unnamed husband.

The end game here will be to identify whether either sister had children for one purpose: to locate any DNA matches for these lines that might have been descendants of this Rainey line.

Vanishing Into the Gap

 

As exciting as it was yesterday to find mention of the paternal grandfather of my brick wall third great grandfather Thomas Firth Rainey, it barely took one more day for me to realize that finding anything more on this Rainey family may take far longer than just another evening's research. Wills may be the go-to resource for discovering more about our distant ancestors from the 1700s, but it takes a couple more generations before widespread documentation can carry us through the ages. What's happened with that Rainey family line—poof! In just a moment—is that it has vanished into the document gap between the earliest years of our nation and the 1850 census.

So far this month, we've discovered that Thomas Firth Rainey, my third great-grandfather, was son of Isham Rainey. Isham, in turn, was son of William Rainey of Brunswick County, Virginia. Finding William Rainey's 1812 will yesterday opened up new research possibilities for me by revealing the names of Isham's siblings: Mary, Martha, Elizabeth, William, Jesse, Herbert, and Zebulon.

Now that I've found those names, you know I've begun the search for those collateral lines of descent. After all, I have potential DNA cousins to place in the right family group. But do you think I've found any actual documentation for these siblings? Sadly, no—with the exception of some marriage records from the 1790s. Other than that, it seems like the entire family, other than Isham, has disappeared.

The problem that has presented itself at this point in the research is two-fold. On the one hand, there are researchers out there who have been puzzling over this family for decades. They have not been shy about sharing their speculations. And others have been more than willing to help themselves to those theories by pasting them into their public family trees, despite lack of documentation.

On the other hand, there is that gap I mentioned. Unless I can find where the (possibly) wandering Rainey descendants moved, I can't with certainty say I've found a will for any of the brothers. If any of those siblings died before the advent of the 1850 census with its listing of every resident in a household, I'll have no way to know that those are the right descendants for my Rainey line. It's that gap between the early 1800s and the 1850 census which has suddenly brought me to a standstill.

There is, however, one encouraging sign. In William Rainey's 1812 will, he mentioned several grandchildren, providing us a token sign that there were indeed marriages and families continuing the Rainey legacy. But other than one specific grandson, there is no mention of names for any of the others among his grandchildren. 

One, however, is better than none, so it will be worth our while to learn a bit about Benjamin L. Rainey to see if information gleaned there can lead us to any others in the extended Rainey family.   

Back to the Beginning

 

Sometimes, genealogy research seems to gain lightning speed, even after having been stymied for months, even years. That's what happened this month, with the discovery not only of Thomas Firth Rainey's parents, but then the revelation of his maternal grandparents and their children. Then, progress can just as quickly turn in the other direction, and that is where I'm stuck right now, unable to push back through that maternal Firth generation any farther.

Since I'm stuck on that detour to what was once the research path of least resistance, it may be a good time to turn back to the beginning of this month's research goal. After all, the goal for my Twelve Most Wanted for March was to find the parents of my third great-grandfather Thomas Firth Rainey. What about pushing further back on his paternal side?

We've already discovered that Thomas' father gifted us with an unusual given name, Isham. Also knowing that the Rainey and Firth families originated in Brunswick County, Virginia, I decided to see whether Isham himself might have been mentioned in the will of any other Raineys in Brunswick County.

Once again, FamilySearch.org's Full Text Search came to the rescue. There in Brunswick County, the will book contained a document signed by one William Rainey on September 30, 1812. In his testament, which was presented in court on April 24, 1815, William Rainey named his wife Mary, along with his daughter, also named Mary; another daughter, Martha; a married daughter, Elizabeth Edmunds; his sons William, Jesse, Herbert, Zebulon, and, of course, Isham. In addition, the will acknowledged several grandchildren.

If we've gone back to the point at which we started this month, we now have plenty to work with in also pushing Thomas Firth Rainey's paternal line back two more generations. Not bad for one month's exploration.

Hinting About Marriage

 

There will always be complications encountered by those pushing back through the generations in search of their family's history. That, at least, has become the case with Polly Firth, sister of my fourth great-grandmother Sally Firth. If she wasn't married twice, as one record I just found seems to indicate, then she has a name twin. I need to determine which one is the case for my ancestral line.

No sooner had I located a marriage record for Polly in her home county of Brunswick in Virginia than up popped an alternate proposal. On its face, it seemed likely that Polly Firth might have been married twice. A closer look, however, steers me clear of such an assumption. Here's what showed up as I searched for details on Polly's life.

First was a hint at Ancestry.com, indicating that Polly was married to someone named John Burch. To top that off, the record supposedly also contained the clincher that Polly was daughter of someone named Thomas Firth. Yes, I agreed, both my fourth great-grandmother Sally and her sister Polly were daughters of someone named Thomas Firth.

Following that hint was another. This time, the resource was a page gleaned from a book called Related Royal Families. This two-volume genealogy was compiled by Marilu Burch Smallwood and published in 1966. The book can be found at the FamilySearch Library. As a copy of the book was also scanned by the University of Virginia and can be digitally searched through Hathi Trust, it is fairly easy to access.

The Ancestry hint dropped me squarely at the top of page 154, where the first sentence asserts: "John Burch Jr. born 1758 died 1796 married Polly Firth." The entry goes on to explain that a transcription of Brunswick County marriage records had indicated that Polly Firth, daughter of Thomas, had been married to John Burch on May 30, 1782.

Indeed, there were other Ancestry hints providing transcriptions of this same assertion. Fortunately, some of those hints included the "FHL Film Number" which could lead me directly to a digitized copy of that same Brunswick County record from 1782. Naturally, I wanted to check that out.

Copying the film number, I logged on to my account at FamilySearch.org, clicked the "Search" tab to select "Records" from the drop-down menu, scrolled down the page to select "More Options." That opened up a new dialog box, where I zoomed straight to the option near the bottom, "Add Record Options." I selected the wordiest choice, "film/fiche/image group number (DGS)," and pasted the FHL Film Number I had gleaned from the Ancestry hint.

Up came an option, into which I entered the names I was seeking. Sure enough, it led me to a May 30, 1782, marriage record for John Burch and Polly Firth. And Polly's father was entered as Thomas Firth, just as the Ancestry hint had noted.

But could this be right? Could this actually be our Polly Firth, daughter of Thomas? How many father-daughter pairs of the same name could there be in a county of, at the time, twelve thousand people?

I couldn't say why, but something seemed off about this record. I decided to retrace my steps and review all the information I had gleaned about Polly and the Firth family. After all, despite lack of all the usual documentation we rely on for finding family later in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, what little I had already found included a few pertinent details.

The first record was the 1794 will of Polly's father, Thomas Firth. In that will, as I've already noted, all the Firth daughters were listed by their maiden names with the exception of one: Betsey Rawlings. If Polly had married John Burch in 1782, her father would have listed her by her married name, since he drew up his will subsequent to that wedding—even if her husband had died before her father's wishes were set to writing. She was, however, entered simply as Polly B. Firth.

There was, however, a second issue which surfaced as I reviewed the documents I had found. In the later marriage record for Polly, in which she was married to Howell Duggar in December of 1795, a note inserted in the record stated that on that date, Polly was twenty one years of age. If so, that would fix her year of birth at about 1774. Someone born during that year would only have been eight years of age in 1782, when our Polly supposedly married this John Burch. If, jumping back to the Smallwood genealogy, John Burch's wife had a son named Bazell in 1786, our Polly as his mother would have been twelve years of age—an unlikely scenario.

What seemed like an easy-to-accept suggestion from Ancestry turns out to be, at best, the case of name twins. Yes, finding two daughters in the same locale named Polly claiming a dad named Thomas Firth may seem to be a stretch, but apparently in Brunswick County, Virginia, it is far more likely that that was so, than that an eight year old child was given in marriage, even if it was to a descendant of royalty.

Digging Into the Duggars

 

After finding a document regarding an exchange of property which named several children of Thomas Firth, my fifth great-grandfather, I was curious about one couple who didn't seem to fit into that profile. That couple was Howell Duggar and his wife Mary. Based on the pattern which seemed to be emerging from the connections in that document, I wondered about the possibility that Howell Duggar's wife might be another one of Thomas Firth's daughters.

Admittedly, contained among the signatures at the bottom of the indenture was one woman who signed her name as Polly Duggar, not Mary, as was named in the text of the legal record. Since Polly has traditionally been used as a nickname for Mary, regardless of the variance, I thought that was still a promising sign. 

Thanks to FamilySearch.org's Full Text Search, it didn't take long to uncover a marriage record from the Firth family's home location, Brunswick County, Virginia. The date on that record was December 21, 1795—about a year and a half after Thomas Firth had signed his own last will naming Polly Firth as one of his daughters.

The marriage register indicated specifically—and in quotes—that by the point of her marriage, Polly was "21 years of age."  On that December day in 1795, Polly was to become the wife of Howell Duggar, revealing the connection that had later included his name in the property exchange we had seen yesterday.

In 1799, as Thomas Firth's executor, Aaron Brown, wrapped up distributions from the Firth estate, Howell Duggar's name was once again mentioned, along with the husbands of Thomas' other daughters. And yet, as clear as those records may seem to be, there was one problem caused by these discoveries: there are other indicators showing that Polly Firth, daughter of Thomas, had been married before this point to someone by a different name.

Guess that means it's time to take a closer look at those other documents.