Bypassing "Go"

 

Remember that old game, Monopoly, where if you drew the "go to jail" ticket, the instructions told you "do not pass Go; do not collect $200." If the game I've been playing this month were called "Geneapoly," that's exactly the card I'd be dealt now. I don't seem to be able to move anywhere. I'm stuck in genealogy jail.

Since I haven't been able to push back time far enough to find my fourth great-grandfather Job Tyson in records before his arrival in Georgia at the beginning of the 1800s, I thought of a way to bypass "Go"—I could try one other variation on the F.A.N. Club concept. I could look deeper into his wife's family history.

Job's first wife, Sidnah—also called Sidney—Sheffield, was said to have been born in North Carolina. That location was the same as the place where Job Tyson may have originated. Granted, I've tried two different times to locate any mention of Job in North Carolina—and failed. But I'm willing to enter this playing field from yet another angle.

I already have seen mention of Sidnah's father, West Sheffield, being from North Carolina. In fact, he was said to have been a Patriot by the Daughters of the American Revolution. Not that the applications for his eligible descendants all perfectly documented that assertion; even there, the D.A.R. has found problems. 

No matter. That organization also pointed out one other detail of interest: that West Sheffield's father was also listed as a Patriot. Sure enough, looking at the D.A.R. website, I found an entry for John Sheffield, West Sheffield's dad, as well.

In that file, his origin was said to be in North Carolina. But none of this Pitt County stuff that had waylaid me for so long in my search for Job Tyson last week. This time, the North Carolina location was said to be Duplin County, instead.

Armed with this information, I headed to FamilySearch.org and their Full Text Search option to look for a Sheffield will that mentioned Job Tyson's father-in-law, West Sheffield. And just as the D.A.R. entry for John Sheffield had implied, there was a will in Duplin County for him, dated the same day, November 22, 1790, as the D.A.R. entry had noted. Added bonus: the will contained mention of a son named West Sheffield.

If West Sheffield's daughter Sidnah was said to have been born in North Carolina, could that specific location have also been in Duplin County? What about her marriage record? And if her future husband found his bride in North Carolina, does that mean I can find Job Tyson in Duplin County, as well? If nothing else, this discovery points me in another direction than those failed attempts at finding him in Pitt County. Maybe I can get out of Geneapoly jail, after all.

Looking Every Which Way

 

It's official: I'm stuck—at least on my goal to find the parents and origin of my fourth great-grandfather Job Tyson. I'm beginning to wonder whether he used an alias. Or spontaneously appeared out of thin air. Or contrived a way to make all his tell-tale documents self-combust. He simply isn't there to find.

Not being able to look backwards in time on this brick wall ancestor, I've turned to looking every which way. If I can't find him in his earlier years in life, perhaps looking at his children's history—and then expanding to collateral lines—might reveal some secrets.

With that in mind, I turned back to my DNA matches. At Ancestry.com, at least, I've got thirty eight DNA cousins who connect with me through that Tyson line. I figured this weekend might be a good time to catch up on that task.

As it turns out, I haven't yet made any revolutionary discoveries, but I did notice one detail: at least for the Tyson descendants in my match list, it seemed they followed the same path from Georgia to northern Florida. In fact, as I looked at the documents for these grandchildren and beyond, I spotted some of the same towns mentioned in my McClellan family history. This extended family did seem to stick together. Signs of F.A.N. Club cohesion seem to be everywhere, at least in some Tyson lines. 

Perhaps this is a good sign. It is a reminder, at least as I seek Job Tyson's roots, that perhaps he did travel to Georgia in the company of others. His descendants certainly stuck to that rule of thumb as they moved onward from Georgia.

It will be quite some time before I finish documenting each of those DNA cousins' lines of descent. Hopefully, as I move through the list, there will be other encouraging signs. A big plus would be connecting with a DNA cousin who inherited the family Bible, or family letters, or any other personal guidance pointing back to Job's origin before his arrival in Glynn County, Georgia.

At least, one can hope.

How Much We've Changed

 

This weekend, I'm putting the final touches on a four-session genealogy course I'm teaching for a local continuing education program. This class will truly be an experiment. Opting to ditch the online scene, I've asked to return to the local community college campus which traditionally has hosted this program for decades. I want to work with people in person.

While online connections may be convenient—hey, the genealogy-in-bunny-slippers crowd would agree—there is something missing from that type of learning environment. I miss the synergy of face to face interaction. Something evolves from a multi-person conversation that doesn't translate well to cyberspace.

As I prepared for the first session of this learning experiment, the resources I explored made me realize just how much we've changed over the years, especially for genealogy societies and those who gather together to work on their family history. I miss the collaboration, when people shared which surnames they were working on, or told everyone about a new resource found—and yes, some of those resources or channels for sharing were even online. But the person-to-person element was still there.

I've met some of the most fascinating, warm and sharing, talented and knowledgeable people through my genealogy research. But it came not from simply copying trees from a company's website. This came from reaching out and connecting with other researchers. 

Collaboration and cooperation, sharing what we've got—and what we're missing: I know it's still out there, but often hidden from view. I want others to see the importance of that person-to-person connection now, ironically in this age of interconnectivity when so many seem disconnected. Hopefully, this genealogy course will model that. The energy that expands when people find others seeking the same answers is so invigorating.

Looking at family history means exploring local history, too. While I wandered through some century-old publications for our local area this past week, I recalled how production or sharing of many such resources once were the domain of local genealogical societies—from publishing their own books to preserving local records that would otherwise have been impossible for researchers out-of-town to access. Granted, now that I'm stuck puzzling over my fourth great-grandparents in my Tison line, FamilySearch's Full Text Search is finding many of those old publications for me—a quest that would otherwise have taken me ages to replicate—but this also reminds me of how producing material is no longer the focus of some of our local societies. Our focus has shifted.

Over these same years, our numbers have shifted, as well—downward. Where once, people saw genealogy not only as a fun way to learn their family's stories but a mission to share resources with those others who would appreciate them, we now have settled into a more comfortable, possibly shrinking, role.

Granted, generation by generation, people have changed. I appreciate what those who came before us have accomplished. I certainly appreciate what I can accomplish online now with the many tools and resources that were unimaginable in past decades. But there was something about that person-to-person connection of past generations that I think we're missing. I want to find a way to bring that back.  

There Just Might be a Reason

 

Sometimes, a family history research problem seems like it has gifted us a one-way ticket on a tight loop. Around and around we go, never seeming to find an answer—not even a hint to break us loose of this endless search. That's the way it's been this month, trying to discover any clues about Job Tyson's origins.

It dawned on me that there just might be a reason for this lack of information on my fourth great-grandfather—a reason which should have occurred to me earlier. What if Job emerged from what later became known as a burned county?

There are, of course, several counties across the United States which have been considered, at one time or another, to be burned counties. I took a look at brief notes at the FamilySearch Wiki for the two counties I found mentioned concerning Job Tyson's roots. Pitt County, the North Carolina jurisdiction mentioned in the genealogies I found regarding Job's daughter-in-law's Hardee line, happens to be one of those burned counties. So is Beaufort County of South Carolina, where I found an entry in the 1790 census for Job Tison near the household of someone named Aaron Tison. 

That, however, doesn't call this search a lost cause. There are other ways to piece together an ancestor's story. FamilySearch.org offers alternative strategies, not just in the many record sets which have been digitized in that online resource, but through a helpful guide concerning what can be done next.

Once again, this may point me back to that old genealogical research friend, the F.A.N. Club, in seeking any more clues about where Job Tyson originated. Perhaps my next step might be to wonder just who that Aaron Tison was who appeared alongside Job in the 1790 census. Traveling partner? Relative? Future Georgia resident? It might help to keep an eye on this associate. Who knows? He may also be family.

Taking a Closer Look

Taking a closer look at an ancestor's will from 1710 is a far cry from examining a typewritten testament from, say, the twentieth century. If we want to learn any more about Mathias Tison of Bath County, North Carolina, we'll have to buck up and read the handwriting, no matter how unusual it might seem.

Mathias Tison—or Tisson, as the 1710 document styled him—was the father of Susannah, the woman who eventually married John Hardee of Pitt County, North Carolina. John and Susannah, in turn, were progenitors of a friend of mine from our local genealogical society, who discovered our tentative Hardee-Tison connection through using FamilySearch.org's "Relatives Around Me" at a local society meeting.

The question I have now is how to follow the other lines descending from Matthias Tison, to see whether somewhere in the mix is my fourth great-grandfather, Job Tyson.

To launch us on that multi-generational journey, we first need to look at Matthias' own will. But how to read the difficult handwriting? Thankfully, I found a more recent abstract listing each of his descendants named in the will, obtained from a 1987 hardcover book compiled by genealogist Roger Kammerer and published by the Devisconti Scroll Trust. According to that volume, The Tyson and May Genealogy of Pitt County, Matthias' children included "Jhon," Edward, "Corneilyous," Edmond, Thomas, Susanna, "Jhonas," Samuell, and Mathyas. Also mentioned was a grandson, "Arone."

While looking at the Tyson genealogy revealed much of what we've already discovered about Susannah, who eventually married into the Hardee line, a quick glance through the pages concerning the earliest generations revealed only one mention of a descendant named Job—and that, without any further information. While admittedly, this is a volume representing one researcher's discoveries, that does not seem to be a promising sign. The author did note that, "with regret," tracing all known descendants of Mathias Tyson was not possible at that time.

With that, it's back once again to searching for any documentation which can lift us from Job Tyson's generation back at least one step toward the past.

North Carolina Nexus

 

Finding a possible nexus between the Tyson line and the Hardee line, especially leading back to Pitt County, North Carolina, may have been helpful, but the next step is to find actual documentation. For someone said to have been born in 1701—that would be Susannah Tyson, daughter of Mathias and Mary—that next step can cause trouble.

Why? It's fairly simple. Given not only the date over three hundred years ago—not to mention the change of government—the chances of the records we need to verify family connections being in decent condition are slim. Worse, those records might currently be non-existent, if we take into account courthouse fires, wars, and other catastrophes.

One encouraging note, however, was the possible discovery of a will which might have been penned by Susannah's father, Mathias Tyson—or Tisson, as the clerk fashioned that name back on April 5, 1710. I say "possible" because the page upon which the will was written was torn or bent just after the phrase, "last will and testament of." There is one word inserted, but hidden, before the next line continues with Mathias Tison's name.

Granted, at the end of the document, where Mathias Tison left his mark, the clerk inscribed the name as "Mthyas Tisson," which is, I guess, close enough for me.

The document stated that this Mathias was an inhabitant of "Baith County" in North Carolina. As it turns out, there was a county named Bath in North Carolina, but it is now called an extinct county. The county was in existence as part of the British Colony of what is now North Carolina, from the county's establishment in 1696 through 1739.

At that time, Bath County contained three precincts, one of which eventually became known as Beaufort Precinct. When Bath County was officially abolished, Beaufort Precinct became a county in its own right. And, as the years passed, Beaufort County itself eventually was carved out to form additional counties, one of which—as you might have suspected—became known as Pitt County.

Thus, at least for this Tison line which led, through Mathias' daughter Susannah, to her husband and eventually the Hardee family descendant who married Job Tyson's son William, we now have a connection back to Pitt County, North Carolina. But what about Job, himself?

If we can't draw our way up the family tree by virtue of Job's as-yet-unknown father, perhaps we can discover a way down from Mathias Tison back to Job's own generation. We'll take a closer look at Mathias Tison's will tomorrow.

How Twisted and Tedious the Trail

 

If we can't figure out a family line based on one side of a married couple, how about trying the other side? That seemed like a viable premise when I realized that my fourth great-grandfather, Job Tyson, eventually had a daughter-in-law whose roots reached back to another Tyson relationship. Added bonus: that relationship led to the location of the supposed roots of Job Tyson's family, too. Surely, I'd be led straight back to the answer in Pitt County, North Carolina, by following this other line.

That line belonged to the Hardee family of Pitt County—the very line conveniently said to belong to my newfound kazillionth cousin, according to "Relatives Around Me."

To use a trailblazer to outline a family's generations seems straightforward, at face value: find a published genealogy maintaining that connection—in my case, the Tyson and Hardee families of Pitt County—and then verify by finding documentation.

That was easily said. Not so easily done, at least in this case. So far, I've wandered through several manuscripts, thankfully posted either at FamilySearch or at Ancestry. While reading, I've outlined the names and dates of pertinent family members.

Next step: find the documents. That's the not-so-easily done part of the equation. So far, I have eighteen tabs open on my computer. My brain can't hold all that information in one night's setting. Though not quite to the stroke of midnight, I had to give up last night, even though it meant trying to remember everything once again in the morning.

It is likely time to pull out the old yellow warning sign to post on each name I've entered—tentatively—in my family tree. Having a place to diagram the relationships helps, but snaring any unsuspecting passer-by into thinking that posted entry was correct would be a disservice to fellow researchers. But sometimes, finding the facts can take time, yet remembering everything found without a work space can be a challenge.

So far, I've outlined the proposed generations of Job's daughter-in-law, William Tison's first wife Mary Ellis Hardee, back to her ancestor John Hardee, who married someone named Susannah Tyson. Next will be to find adequate documentation to verify the stories handed down through those typewritten genealogies of past generations of the Hardee and Tyson families. There are several resources yet to consult, leading down a twisted and tedious trail, indeed.