Following the Trail One Step Further

 

Since we've found resources on the Ambrose family from the then-newly-formed Frederick County, Maryland, would it be possible to trace that family back yet another generation?

Since Frederick County was formed in 1748 and my mother-in-law's third great-grandfather Mathias Ambrose apparently received land there from his father in 1759, surely that family would be mentioned in some history books about the earliest years of the county.

That, at least, was my thinking—not to mention, cause for my excitement when I discovered that one such book, History of Frederick County, Maryland, with the promising subtitle beginning, "from the earliest settlements," was available and searchable online at FamilySearch.org. 

And yet, no Ambrose. Not, at least, from the search function set to use on the volumes accessible at FamilySearch.org. But you know I can't give up on this quite yet.

Checking back to the Ambrose family history website, I could see the information gathered there: that the senior Mathias, for whom our Mathias was named, was born in Germany early in 1696, and that he emigrated from his homeland in 1732. While he landed in Philadelphia, his naturalization record was drawn up eleven years later and one state removed from the colony of his arrival, in Maryland.

The senior Mathias Ambrose was married more than once. Mathias' second wedding apparently occurred within a year after his arrival in Philadelphia, and that, too, occurred in Maryland, not Pennsylvania.

It was his second wife, Maria Catherine Spohn, who became mother of the junior Mathias and his three brothers and younger sister Maria Barbara.

With the notes provided in the Ambrose family history website, I intend to retrace that research journey and replicate the documentation used to verify those dates. This trailblazing information points me in the right direction to find not only my Mathias Ambrose's parents, but his paternal grandfather, as well. 

Better than that, this online resource has also pointed out an error in the claimed pedigree of this Ambrose family—a point I'd like to review when we return to the Ambrose family topic next week.