Shedding Some Light on Light Townsend

 

If the orphaned daughters of my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend Charles ended up leaving their home in Florida to live in South Carolina with someone named Light Townsend as Aunt Fannie's story claimed, it would seem reasonable to discover exactly who such a person was. Orphaned or not, those two girls must have had some family members left with a vested interest in their wellbeing. Even if not, there should be some legal record of who would assume responsibility for the ongoing care of those minors.

The name Light is not one often seen—certainly not now, and in my experience, not a given name I've seen from previous centuries. The rarity of a name can sometimes become a blessing to the stumped researcher, and it was not hard to find information on someone named Light Townsend in Marlboro County, South Carolina, who died there in 1870.

That Light Townsend may well have been the one from the 1850 census, still in Marlboro County, who had in his household a possible wife, four children, and an eighty year old woman named Keziah who likely was his mother. Though the family composition changed slightly by the time of the 1860 census—gone were the eighty year old mother and the possible wife, though a nine year old boy named John R. Townsend was added—judging from the value of Light Townsend's property, he had likely been in that county for quite some time. Unfortunately, his passing precluded his appearance in the subsequent census.

Assuming that was the only Townsend man by the name of Light would be a mistake, however. If we looked in the northern Florida region where Delaney Townsend went to marry Andrew Charles in 1841, we would eventually discover there were at least two other men there who bore the same name, Light Townsend. One was a son of a suspected brother of Delaney, Benjamin, who died intestate; we can see his son Light listed in the 1860 census as one of two ten year old twins in Benjamin's household. 

Another Townsend man living in northern Florida—David R. Townsend, whose name appeared as probate judge in the administration of Benjamin Townsend's estate—also happened to have a son named Light, listed in his household in the 1860 census, along with a possible daughter named Kiziah, a name strikingly similar to that of the eighty year old woman living in the South Carolina Townsend household. 

If the story we learned yesterday from Aunt Fannie was true, census records would not provide us with any evidence confirming the presence of Delaney's two orphaned daughters in the household of the South Carolina man named Light Townsend. There might, however, be records of proceedings naming a guardian of the orphans. That would be a next step for researching this family story from Aunt Fannie, except for one other detail: I've found those possible orphan girls listed in someone else's household. 

According to Aunt Fannie

 

Somehow, genealogical verification beginning with the words, "according to Aunt Fannie," just doesn't have the academic ring of a traditional footnote. The truth of the matter, though, is that the Townsend lineage of my third great-grandmother may well be resting on the testimony of a woman named Fannie McClellan Rowell.

I was surprised to see, right there in the midst of a 1948 DAR application, attribution for some facts on the Townsend family credited to a letter written by Fannie Rowell. Yes, the Townsend family Bible was also mentioned in that application, but a DAR file like that is usually chock full of references to vital records, census records, and other governmental documents. Letters from Aunt Fannie? Well, that's different.

I've written about Aunt Fannie before, as early as 2015, when I was trying to piece together her own relationship to my maternal grandmother's McClellan family. She had always been referred to—at least in my family—as Fannie Rowell, not McClellan, and I naturally needed to chart the genealogical connection.

Since then, I've had to refer back to Aunt Fannie's stories in 2019, and again in 2021, while researching the connection between that same McClellan family and the published stories told by a man named King Stockton, who grew up in the McClellan household as the son of an enslaved woman.

Here she was again, this Aunt Fannie, mentioned in an application for membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution. While Aunt Fannie may have been old—she was not my aunt, nor my mother's aunt, but my grandmother's aunt—she certainly wasn't old enough to be providing testimony of such family matters as if she had personally witnessed them in her own lifetime. She did, however, provide details about her mother who, in turn, was Delaney Townsend Charles' daughter Emma.

Thanks to details in a letter from Aunt Fannie, cited in that DAR application, the applicant explained that, after the widowed Delaney's death, her orphaned daughters were taken to live for a while in South Carolina by a man named Light Townsend. The applicant also explained that Aunt Fannie, the granddaughter of Delaney Townsend Charles, had sent letters with names and dates of family members to John R. Townsend, grandson of Light Townsend, and thus that information had been preserved by the Townsend branch of that family.

Preserved, that is, as long as it was correctly noted, correctly transcribed, and adequately protected from the ravages of time. Where those original letters are now, I can't say, but at least some semblance of those reports has been preserved through that 1948 DAR application.

In the meantime, the question becomes: who was Light Townsend of South Carolina? Why was he so concerned about the orphaned children of Delaney Townsend Charles in Florida? If he did, indeed, travel to Florida to bring those daughters back to live with him in South Carolina, I'd like to find any records to indicate such an arrangement. But first, let's take the time to examine just who Light Townsend actually was.

Time to Cut to the Chase

 

Sometimes, research plans don't work as hoped. In attempting to uncover documentation to confirm the identity of my third great-grandmother's parents, I had hoped to discover the relationship of other Townsends in the territorial Florida county where Delaney Townsend went to marry Andrew Charles in 1841. If luck was on my side and Benjamin Townsend or Allen Townsend did turn out to be Delaney's brothers, then (I reasoned) I would be one step closer to identifying the parents of any of the three of them.

That plan hasn't been working out too well for me. I did find a will for Allen Townsend, but it mentioned absolutely nothing about relatives other than his own children. With Benjamin, as we saw last Friday, I was even less fortunate, for the man died intestate—even some of his children listed in his household for the 1870 census only a couple years before his death weren't mentioned in the distribution of his estate, let alone Benjamin's siblings.

While it occurred to me that the probate judge mentioned so many times in the administration of Benjamin's estate—David Townsend—might be another sibling who moved to town from their native South Carolina, I am concerned that examining his own final documents would be an exercise that reveals little (though I am willing to try that next step). However, when the search trail grows cold and researchers find themselves meandering in circles, it's time to reach out in multiple directions. And I did—and received some helpful information.

With that, it's time to cut to the chase. I had mentioned earlier this month that there are some books written about this tentative Townsend family line from South Carolina. One of those books, now out of print, is accessible through a website online, as well as digitized on the FamilySearch website. I noticed that the first website, hosted by Joe Burval, the book's author, had been updated as recently as last October. Since it included an email address, I reached out to the author to see whether he had any additional documentation besides what he had included in his book.

Joe Burval graciously responded to my inquiry, though the news was disappointing: he has not been able to locate a will for Delaney Townsend's supposed father, John Townsend of Marlboro County, South Carolina. With that lack of evidence, we are left to assemble supporting details in a sound proof argument, if such can be found. Mr. Burval recommended I review his book to see how he approached this problem—not from the generation beginning with John Townsend, Delaney's supposed father, but from two generations preceding that—using multiple records to piece together a cogent explanation of the line of descent.

In a second email, the author added information more pertinent to my own research question. Apparently, as I had seen from other sources, there was an application for membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution which contained references to certain privately held records which had been the basis for that Townsend descendant's DAR application and successful bid for membership. Indeed, looking at the NSDAR website, it is easy to see that John Townsend of South Carolina is entered as a Patriot—and easy to find the application in question with the references I needed. Anyone could easily apply to receive a copy of that application, should they need to reference it in their own membership or supplemental application.

What was contained in that DAR application was a "certified" report of entries viewed in the Townsend family Bible, listing an incredible thirteen children of John Townsend and Kesiah Hayes. At the time of this 1948 DAR application, that Townsend family Bible was owned by a Dr. P. Kinney of Bennettsville, South Carolina. And yes, my Delaney Townsend, wife of Andrew Charles, was among those listed.

Granted, I'd feel a lot better about this being the only documentation that can be found to connect Delaney to her parents if I could see it myself with my own two eyes. Who knows where that family Bible is today? But I also am incredulous that there wasn't any further paper trail mentioning any connection between those Townsend settlers in Florida and their elders back home in Marlboro County, South Carolina.

With that in mind, you know I will keep searching. There are a few mentions about family connections in that DAR application that I'd like to follow up on, and there are some stories which will need to be verified—one of which goes back to my own family's Aunt Fannie, the celebrated teller of our family's stories. Perhaps tomorrow would be a good time to review her version of the story about what became of Delaney's children after their mother's death. 

Whatever Became of Charles?

 

When it comes to delving into the dark corners of family history, some questions may never get answered. As I wander through the history of Lafayette County, Florida—home of my third great-grandmother's possible brother Benjamin Townsend—I realize there were some details gleaned from the administration of his estate following his 1872 death that still are begging for answers. The first of those questions is, whatever became of Charles Townsend?

As we saw yesterday, there was an enigmatic notation that Benjamin Townsend's son Charles had died, and that Charles' unnamed son was to share in the distribution of Benjamin's estate. I had to go back and look at the details about this son Charles.

Charles had appeared in his father's household for three enumerations before Benjamin's 1872 death. In the 1850 census, he showed up as a three year old. For the 1860 census, Charles was noted to be twelve years of age, an aberration possibly due to the differing month when each census was drawn up. I was thankful that Charles, by then twenty two years of age, was still in his parents' home for the 1870 census, but that was the last I could find of him.

After that last appearance, there was no sign of Charles. I checked in Lafayette County records for any sign of his death, or at least a token mention of a marriage, since he was survived by a young child by 1875. Nothing—at least so far, in either Lafayette County or surrounding counties.

Of course, "nothing" as a search result only means to keep on looking. And I will. If a child survived him during that time period, for any distribution of funds there surely would be an appointment of a guardian, if nothing else.

The mention of another Townsend as distribution of funds for Benjamin's estate drew to a close points me in another direction—and yet, that additional Townsend name added to the mix may provide some answers. The money to provide supplies for Benjamin's unnamed grandson, child of his deceased son Charles, was paid to someone named James Townsend.

Looking at those same census records for Benjamin's household while he was still living revealed that he also had a son named James. Possibly Benjamin's oldest son, born shortly after his marriage to Jane Suggs in 1841, James might have been the most logical choice as guardian for the child—despite no sign yet of such a court document having been drawn up. Perhaps pursuing James' story may reveal more about what became of Charles—and his unnamed son.

Piecing Together the Estate

 

When an ancestor dies intestate, the only option for those of us seeking to research his family line is to follow the details as his estate is liquidated. Granted, hundred year old inventories of belongings can make for boring reading, but if we learn to read between the lines, we can sometimes infer points about who is related to the deceased, based on their interest in what becomes of his estate.

In the case of Benjamin Townsend—whom I'm following because I suspect he was a brother of my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend Charles—I already had an idea of the names of his immediate family members from the 1870 census. That document had revealed the likelihood that Benjamin's wife Jane, whom he had married in 1841, had long since died, since the wife named in 1870 was Martha, apparent mother of the two youngest children in the census: three year old David and baby George.

As of that 1870 census, likely children from the previous marriage (or possibly more than one) included sons Charles, Benjamin, Patrick, Light, and Joseph, as well as daughter Jane. Yet, by 1872, when William Sears was appointed as administrator of Benjamin's estate and drew up the inventory of the Townsend holdings, the paltry amount remaining was itemized and proceeds distributed to the then-remaining children.

That process was completed three years after Benjamin's passing. Named in that second step (in order listed in the probate records) were his children Benjamin, Light, Jane, and Joseph, as well as minor child David. 

At this point, a confusing entry mentions minor "Charles Townsend, child." That line was followed by writing which was subsequently crossed out. The document continues with an explanation that someone named James Townsend was paid out of the proceeds of the estate "for the child of Charles Townsend, deceased, to buy cloes [sic] for the little minor which were its share of its father's state."

This, of course, brings up several questions. First, what happened to Benjamin's son Charles? When did he die? Who was his wife and mother of this child? But most of all, who was James Townsend, and why was he paid the money for Charles' orphaned child?

While questions such as these pull us farther and farther away from my stated research goal for this month—to find documentation of the parents of my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend—searching for these subsequent answers may eventually lead us to a collateral line whose documentation may provide the linch pin linking all these Florida Townsends together, and point us back to their true South Carolina origin.  

In Hot Pursuit of DNA Cousins

 

It's fascinating how quickly a family tree can blossom out into a bushy creation, once we add genetic genealogy to our family history toolkit. While some people may be the ones with a tip-of-the-tongue answer to the question, "How far back have you gone," my goal in building that family tree is quite different. 

It's been years now since I first added DNA testing to my genealogical research tools—since 2014—but I still can't help but wonder, "Who are all these people?" There are thousands of matches for my tree and for the trees of extended family members I have also tested. My only solution since the shock of receiving that huge number of initial results was to grow my tree out, not up. That meant extending each branch of the tree by adding collateral lines, then tracing each generation of their descendants.

Now that I'm working on my brick wall third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend, I'm not only tearing my hair out over the lack of records connecting her to parents or even siblings, I'm using DNA to do something about this research roadblock. First, I added Delaney's assumed parents to my tree—flagging them with all the bells, whistles, and warning signs possible—then added the supposed children to the line. And then, I cut the whole bunch off from my tree, forming a Townsend "floating branch" on my tree.

Now, floating in the outer space of my family tree, each of Delaney's supposed brothers have their own line of descent added in, bit by bit, guided by the 125 DNA matches currently attributed to John Townsend of South Carolina, Delaney's alleged father. As I find possible brothers for Delaney from this list—especially the ones living in the same county in Florida as she did following her 1841 marriage in Madison County there—I pull together documentation to trace their lines forward in time.

This, of course, is the likely explanation for how I managed to add 346 more names to my tree in the last two weeks. Yes, it's been a busy time adding possible nieces and nephews for Delaney. Tracing each of their descendants has so far grown that tree to 39,480 people—and there's more "bushiness" to come.

As I keep up this pace, the count has increased in the past two weeks by a few additional matches credited to the ThruLines readout for this Townsend line—no surprise, since I now have 2,615 DNA matches at Ancestry.com, and more at the other major testing companies, too.

It will take quite a bit of time for me to confirm with documentation the DNA connection between these Townsend descendants and myself. After all, we're talking about 125 matches flagged as Townsend connections. But if the paperwork looks good for a majority of them, that may give me something positive to consider about the true identity of Delaney's missing parents.

We All Need a Charlie in Our Corner

 

During this month, while I've been pursuing the challenge of identifying my Townsend fourth great-grandparents, a steady stream of emails has been going back and forth between me and a fellow genea-blogger. Charlie Purvis of Carolina Family Roots has been sending me links of material he's found—on my Townsend ancestors. And I'm sending back links of what I've found, based on what he discovered. It's been an ongoing dialog as I work my way towards a well-substantiated answer to my question, "Who were the parents of Delaney Townsend Charles?"

We all need a Charlie in our corner when we are struggling with research problems. Even though technology has streamlined family history research to an incredibly amazing degree—with more developments and resources to come—our own two eyes cannot be everywhere, all at once. With the billions upon billions of digitized document pages coming online (or still behind paywalls in private collections), we can hone our skills and specialize in one area. But we can't know it all.

That's where crowdsourcing the answers comes in. And I am hoping that we'll see a swing back towards cooperative group effort in finding the specific resources each one of us needs. 

When the online genealogy giants came into being and we all swooned to think how much of our sleuthing could be done at home—pajamas, bunny slippers and cup of hot chocolate in hand—the unintentional corollary was a move away from group effort toward individual pursuit. We could find almost anything (perhaps with the right subscription) at any time of day or night. Who needed help?!

At first, we saw vestiges of the old genealogical queries—think Everton's Genealogical Helper on steroids—translated into digital form on sites like Genealogy.com or RootsWeb. Those, however, eventually atrophied from (presumable) lack of use, or due to prohibitive operating costs for what had been envisioned as a nonprofit volunteer effort. We lost our way to talk with each other about the families we were seeking.

I've been lately encouraged, in our local genealogical society efforts, by the response to the invitation to just come together to "talk genealogy." No agenda, no special speaker—just talk about where our research has taken us lately, and where we are stuck. An easy time to share notes, great resources, unexpected discoveries, that is something we do now, once a month. Special Interest Groups are like that, too: a way for smaller groups to exchange information on a specific research focus.

Connecting one on one, though, has super-charged the effort. Of course, it helps to write a blog, where others can put their surnames in a search engine and discover a link to just the blog post they need. Blogger Patrick Jones of Frequent Traveler Ancestry and I connected on our mutual Carter roots, initiating a volley of emails between us, full of useful resources, when I was researching the puzzles in that line.

Blogging is not the only way to connect with other researchers, thankfully—though posting a comment on a key blog entry you've found can help, even if you don't write your own blog. There are other ways to connect with fellow researchers and become the kind of research partner who supercharges progress for others. This month, our local genealogical society will be featuring a speaker on using family history groups on Facebook and other social media to connect with those distant cousins we all wish we could find. I love this speaker's subtitle: "Even if you hate Facebook." Yes, I'm in that camp, too—but I've encountered some wonderful people (and unbelievable results) by venturing into that social media corner.

Back during those early years of online genealogy—I'm talking 1990s here, when they only had wood-burning computers—I met a wonderful researcher who shared roots with my mother-in-law's Gordon line. She was a semi-retired professor of history at a key university, and liked to use her summer breaks for road trips to research those Gordon roots. We struck up an online conversation that lasted for years, until debilitating health got the best of her and eventually claimed her life. 

Thankfully, I am now seeing signs on the horizon that we are beginning to emerge from our genea-caves to connect with other researchers and share resources as a sort of ongoing conversation. Whether we are doing so in person or via online connections, the important part is: work together on the research problems that have us stuck. Find someone who is languishing on the same family line and offer help, either as a "Giving Back" approach in thanks for all that others did to help us when we got started, or a "paying it forward" gesture, knowing well that we'll hit more rough patches in our future research. Teamwork can supercharge our progress.   

No Will — But Still a Way

 

Just when I was hoping to close in on a will for Benjamin Townsend, possible brother of my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend Charles, I pull up a record which promptly dashes my hopes. From the court records of Lafayette County, Florida, where Benjamin's family returned to live after leaving Alachua County, I find this entry from June of 1872:

Whereas Benjamin Townsend as is alleged died Intestant having whilst liv[ing] and at the time of his death goods Chattels rights and credits within the said County to the end therefore that the said goods Chattels rights and credits of the said deceased may be well and faithfully administered....

With that explanation, the probate judge for Lafayette County appointed William D. Sears as administrator of the estate of Benjamin Townsend. Thus began my search for records of the proceedings of that business.

Frustratingly—and, I might add, something to have quickly taken as an omen of what was yet to come—the very page upon which that appointment was noted was interrupted by a torn section of the record. Looking further for any mention of what became of Benjamin Townsend's property—not to mention, his family—I discovered one page in the Lafayette County records which included what looked like Civil War era cross-writing, making the deciphering process all the more difficult. 

That page included a record of the names of some of the children of the deceased Benjamin Townsend. What is interesting is that the name of the presiding judge in this case also happened to be Townsend—David R. Townsend. Another brother? I'll add him to my growing list of Townsends who moved from South Carolina to this northern region of Florida, after continuing my process of muddling through the probate file for Benjamin Townsend, late of Lafayette County.

Tracing a Presumed Brother

 

Sometimes, we end up chasing records regarding people whom we can only presume are our ancestral kin. In the case of my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend, that is exactly my lot for this month.

Despite finding a will for Allen Townsend in the records of the same county where we found Delaney—Madison County, Florida—the details of that last testament revealed no clues about Allen's siblings or parents. Nothing concerning the witnesses even helped. Nor have I yet been able to find an obituary for his 1880 passing. However, at least the naming of his several children—including married names for his daughters—helped me sketch out the lines of descent which proved helpful in finding connections with several of my DNA matches.

Moving on to the other Townsend men who arrived in northern Florida about the same time as Delaney did, my next goal is to look up the will for Benjamin Townsend.

While Allen Townsend was born in 1801, Benjamin proved to be a bit younger. While we've already seen that he married in Madison County, the same place—and in the same year—where Delaney married in 1841, he apparently chose not to remain there for long. While Benjamin and his bride, the former Jane Suggs, were apparently there in Madison County for the 1850 census, along with their four children and a twenty three year old young man named Noah Suggs from Georgia—same birthplace as Jane—by 1860, the family had moved to Alachua County. Again, in 1870, the family had moved—this time, to Lafayette County, possibly following Jane's death.

Looking quickly for General Land Office records through the Bureau of Land Management, Benjamin's name turns up in both Madison County and Lafayette County, although not in Alachua County. After the 1870 census, though, the trail goes cold on records for Benjamin Townsend—including any sign of a will. There were, however, other documents to consider in trying to piece together the story of these Townsends in Florida and their possible sibling relationships. It's just that the path forward becomes a bit more messy—and a lot harder to read. 

Doing the D N A Route

 

If there is no way to find a connection to an ancestor through the usual paper trail, we are now fortunate that we can take a different route: using DNA tests. Apparently, there are a lot of my Townsend cousins opting to take that same alternate route. Right now, there are one hundred twenty one of them just waiting for me to check our connection.

Fortunately for me, some of those Townsend cousins descend from supposed brothers of my third great-grandmother Delaney who, even more fortunately, managed to have their name recorded in records of the early 1800s in either South Carolina or Florida.

While I haven't—so far—unearthed any records about Allen Townsend that indicated any connection with Delaney or her immediate family, there are twelve DNA matches, according to the ThruLines tool at Ancestry.com, who descend from Allen and show a genetic connection to me.

So far, I've traced the paper trail to verify each match's link to Allen Townsend (and not, coincidentally, to any other of my family lines). Everything appears to be verifiable for those descendants of Allen. And somehow—albeit very minutely—we share segments of DNA. Enough, that is, to satisfy genetic genealogists that there is a connection.

I'll keep checking out the other DNA matches with that ancestral link to Allen Townsend—well, at least all but the ones who only included an enigmatic moniker—adding them to that floating branch in my family tree as I go. From that point, I'll move on to another of the Townsend men who also moved from Marlboro County, South Carolina, to Madison County, Florida.

Next on my list will be Benjamin Townsend, with nine of whose descendants I share DNA. But first, let's take a look at what might have been mentioned in Benjamin's will.

Considering the Uncertainty of This Frail and Transitory Life

 

As had so many of our ancestors before him, on May 26, 1877, Allen Townsend sat down to consider the uncertainty of his "frail and transitory" life—at least the part that still lay before him. He was not alone as he considered that future devoid of his presence, for the document he drew up contained the signatures of those several acquaintances whom he had called upon to witness his written wishes.

Allen Townsend's life trajectory—at that point, at least—was not as uncertain as it might have seemed. Within three years, that document would be called upon to put his affairs in order for one final time.

What I was hoping, in finding the Townsend will, was to capture any indication of how Allen was related to any of the other Townsends living in Madison County, Florida. All those among the elder Townsends in Madison County had, in one census record or another, reported that they were natives of South Carolina, not Florida. I wanted to find some sign of their connection.

An ancestor's last testament can sometimes provide us such a gift to guide us through an otherwise unexplained connection between family members. Sometimes, a wife's relative—often a brother—might be named as executor, for instance, to ensure that the widow received all that her husband had intended for her after his demise. The dying man, himself, might mention his own siblings among the details in his will. Even for those dying intestate, the monotonous reading through probate records might point out interested family members present to purchase treasured family relics from among the items in the liquidated estate.

While I had hoped for the same from Allen Townsend's will, his was not one looking backwards to those older than he was—nor even looking to any younger siblings. The closest I could come to family connections within the document was discovering that one of the witnesses had married a Townsend daughter—Josephene, who became wife of Benjamin Duval.

It was Allen Townsend's headstone in the family cemetery which so clearly indicated his origin in South Carolina. One step will be to examine what can be found concerning the Townsend family at the place of their stated origin, Marlboro County, South Carolina. Though Allen was somewhat older than the other two Townsends I have found in Madison County, Florida, perhaps he was not quite the oldest child of the parents I am seeking—if, indeed, he was brother of Delaney at all. Checking what records can be found on the Townsend family in Marlboro County, South Carolina, will be part of our tour of duty for this month's Twelve Most Wanted goal.

In addition, there are twelve DNA matches which connect descendants of Allen Townsend with my own DNA test, according to Ancestry.com's ThruLines tool. I am halfway through checking for documentation on those connections, and six matches provide a solid trail of records to connect those people back to Allen Townsend. Their connection to my test points in the direction of a relationship between my family line and theirs—but whether that is owing to Delaney's own relationship to Allen, or connection through another family line, is something I have yet to determine. 

All About Allen

 

When we are stuck on a "brick wall" ancestor, it's time to chip away at any bit of information we can find on the family, and that includes exploring collateral lines. While I don't yet know that the Townsend men who moved from South Carolina to settle in Madison County in territorial Florida were Delaney Townsend's brothers, I'm thinking my third great-grandmother Delaney—unmarried at the time of her arrival in Florida—could possibly have hitched a ride to the Florida panhandle with one of those Townsend men in town.

This week, we'll start off by focusing on everything we can find on the older of the two Townsend brothers in Madison County: Allen. Since Allen is easily found in the 1850 census, we can see he was born in South Carolina about 1801. Along with Sarah, his presumed wife and mother of his six named children, all but one family member were also born in South Carolina. After a daughter they named Florida—a telltale sign of their intentions—their youngest child, Josephine, was born in Florida in 1840, marking the approximate end of their journey southward.

Since many people of that time period moved for the purpose of seeking suitable land, I checked the General Land Office Records at the website for the Bureau of Land Management. Sure enough, there were entries for someone named Allen Townsend who had acquired several parcels of land in Madison County, Florida. Earliest of those entries was dated July 28 of 1838.

It was from Allen's death in Madison County that we gain our best clue about his origin. His 1880 headstone, placed in the Townsend Family Cemetery in Madison, Florida, informs us that he was born on November 21, 1801, in Marlboro County, South Carolina. While that headstone looks a bit too pristine to trust it to be contemporaneous with his passing, it is still worth our while to consider that information as at least a hint.

Now that we have a date of death for Allen Townsend, the next stop will be to search court records for a will and probate procedures, in the hopes that perhaps a witness to his will might be one of his own brothers—a handy clue for our purposes.

In the meantime, as I've done for so many others whose family connection still stirs lingering doubts, I'll make an entry in my family tree for Allen, but mark it with a big yellow triangular warning sign. In this case, being unsure of the connection, I'll also make Allen's entry in my tree the start of a "floating branch," cutting him off from any indication of relationship to Delaney until I've found documentation to assure me of the connection. The sooner we can find trustworthy records, though, we'll hopefully be able to reconnect Allen Townsend to the correct spot in the Townsend family tree. 

Chipping Off the Old Block

 

Despite lacking any actual documentation to tie my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend to her roots, there is another option we can try: explore her genetic record. While this pushes me to the outer edge of the realm of viable DNA matches, it is possible to find some connections. It's just that those links will be fairly weak, if present at all. Like chipping little shards off the old block of her parentage, the genetic material passed down through the generations—both in my line and that of Delaney Townsend's siblings—will still include a sliver of that inherited Townsend identity.

While I have yet to find a will for Delaney's supposed father in their home county of Marlboro in South Carolina, it was quite obvious that the then-remote place in territorial Florida where she traveled to marry Andrew Charles in 1841 also was home to two Townsend men and their families. Whether they were brothers of hers, I can't yet say. But for a place like Madison County, Florida—which at the time had a population under three thousand people—chances may have been better than average that Benjamin Townsend and Allen Townsend were Delaney's brothers.

This weekend, I decided to see what could be discovered about these possible DNA connections. For Benjamin Townsend's line, I currently have nine matches. For Allen Townsend, there are twelve. Sure, we all share a minor amount of genetic material—we are, after all, talking about relatives who share a set of fourth great-grandparents—but where there is at least some shared genetic material, even of that small amount, there is some sort of family connection.

In the background this month, I'll keep working my way through that set of DNA matches—besides the two Florida Townsend residents, there are one hundred additional Townsend DNA connections yet to review—but my next step is to get back to the paper chase. I'll look closely at the possible collateral lines of Allen and Benjamin Townsend to examine records associated with each of them. Especially in the case of wills or administration of estates, I'll watch for any clues of other Townsend family connections.

Lacking direct documentation, sometimes we can infer relationships based on the appearance of names in key documents: choices of witnesses to wills, or appointment of executors or guardians. This coming week, we'll explore what can be found through the records of these two of Delaney's possible brothers.

Bungling Birthdays

 

Who would forget their birthday? That's a question I find myself asking when I run into an ancestor reporting a roving date of birth.

Sometimes it's just a matter of a misplaced year. I've seen young men in previous centuries, eager to march off to war, insisting that their year of birth was earlier than it really was. Likewise, I've seen some aging relatives who suddenly gained a year overnight, when eligibility for Social Security benefits became a question. But a wandering day of birth? That's what has me puzzled.

It just so happens that today—February 8—is a day when I remember my family always celebrated my father's birthday. Only it wasn't his birthday. We just never knew that.

Long after my father passed away, one day I was visiting my much older half-sister and comparing notes on our family history—especially that closely-held Polish heritage of my father's secretive parents. The conversation wandered onto birthdates of various relatives. My sister made a comment about February 10 being when she remembered celebrating Dad's birthday.

Wait a minute, I thought. Surely she was mistaken about that memory. But no, she was quite confident in her childhood recollection.

That's when I remembered a small detail a distant relative had discovered about our dad. He had been poking around his computer during those earlier days of online genealogy and had located Dad's birth record. While the year of his birth had surprised me—not to mention this being the first document bearing the true surname of his immigrant parents—the record revealed another detail: neither I nor my older sister were correct about the day he was born. It wasn't the eighth, nor the tenth. It was February 5.

There, in my own family history, was an example of that frustrating wandering date of birth. Thinking of that now, I guess I can cut those other ancestors some slack, as well, for their inability to cite the same number each time they were asked to report their date of birth.

If at First You Cannot Find, Search, Search Again

 

The farther back in time we go to trace our ancestors, the more likely it is that we'll encounter snags when the pen-and-ink handwriting of past centuries encounters the digitization process more agreeable to today's computers. I learned that this week while unraveling the family history trail of my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend and her husband Andrew Charles in 1850s Florida.

Turning to local newspapers can be a handy secondary resource when our ancestors fail to appear in the usual documents of the era. As I mentioned yesterday, I was elated to discover a brief insert in The Floridian and Journal pinpointing the date of Delaney's husband's 1850 death. I had searched for the family's names in the collection at GenealogyBank, and that one article had been my sole result.

I was grateful for what I could find there—if it weren't for that newspaper entry, I wouldn't have found anything—but I still wondered what had become of the rest of the extended Charles family in Madison County, Florida. I spent the evening pulling up links to legal documents regarding the administration of the various Charles estates.

Early this morning, in my ongoing email conversation with fellow genea-blogger Charles Purvis, I discovered a friend of his had passed along a news clip from GenealogyBank concerning another Charles obituary: for Andrew Charles' mother, Rebecca.

"That's funny," I thought. "Why didn't that show up in my search results?"

I went back to my GenealogyBank account, logged in, and tried my search for Rebecca Charles once again. Nothing. I returned to Charlie's email, took a look at the newspaper source and date—The Floridian and Journal for April 3 of 1852—and honed my search terms until there was no wiggle room left for the search engine. It had to find the article.

Perhaps there were grunts and groans out in the ether as the search engine complied with my query, but there it was, just as Charlie's friend had sent it.

Died at her residence at Charles' Ferry, Suwannee River, on the 25th January, Mrs. Rebecca Charles, in the 58th year of her age. The subject of this notice was raised in Buncombe County, N. C., and emigrated to Florida with her late husband before the change of Flags—having lived where she died upwards of thirty years, rendering efficient aid and comfort to many a weary traveller now living to testify to the hospitality of her house—Mrs. Charles connected herself with the Methodist Episcopal Church some years ago, and although she never made high pretensions to piety, her friends and relations have abundant reason to believe they mourn their loss not as those who mourn without hope.

Having found the insertion only after several tries, I wondered why the article hadn't shown up on my first search attempt. Looking at the faded newsprint, I figured it might have been possible that the optical character recognition could have run afoul of the faded letters in the name Rebecca. For that reason, I toyed with using different search terms to persuade the search process to come up with the desired result. The winning combination was to use only the surname, plus select the specific newspaper name—fortunately, there weren't too many options in that part of Florida in the early 1850s—and the specific year.

That experience, of course, prompted one of those "notes to self" moments. When using a search engine to find records in documents with variable imprints—either newsprint or faded handwriting—don't be discouraged when the search brings up zero results. Try, try again. Vary the search terms. Experiment with spelling variations. Check out whether "less is more" is the motto for that website's operation. Despite ink blots, faded print, torn pages, whatever you do, just keep searching. 

Image above: Clipping of "Obituary" for Rebecca Charles from page three of The Floridian and Journal, published April 3, 1852, in Tallahassee, Florida; courtesy of GenealogyBank.com

Found — While Looking for Something Else

 

Isn't it always the case that, after searching high and low—and unsuccessfully, I might add—for a specific document about an ancestor, the very record shows up while I'm looking for something else? Here I am this month, focused on finding the parents of Delaney Townsend, a quest which has languished in my to-do pile for years, and what should pop up but the missing record confirming another family history detail that's been nagging me for years.

Truth be told, I wasn't exactly on task when I stumbled upon that discovery. In fact, I had just been at a local genealogical society gathering when someone in the group pulled out his phone and reminded us to all check our FamilySearch family tree app for "Relatives Around Me." The minute I reached for my phone and pulled up the app, a window popped up announcing that "Relatives at RootsTech" was now available to access in preparation for this year's conference in March.

I am so susceptible to details rabbit trails. Sure enough, there was the familiar Relatives at RootsTech app, back again on my phone for another year. When I got back home, I had to pull it up on the much larger screen on my laptop and see what else I could find.

That's when I noticed the link to the article, "Meet the Sponsors of RootsTech 2025." I already can guess the major sponsors, but I was curious who might have been included in the "also ran" section, so I scrolled through to the bottom of the list. There, I found the Bronze Sponsors, including a company called  GenealogyBank. Although I have been a long-time subscriber to their services, their description in the RootsTech article caught my eye: "Ninety five percent of our huge newspaper collection is exclusive to our site. What we have you can't find anywhere else."

I wasn't sure about the "anywhere else" claim, but since I couldn't find any death information for Delaney Townsend and her husband Andrew Charles, I decided to give GenealogyBank's claim a try. And voilà! While it didn't name any relatives or include much more in the way of details, I did find a newspaper insertion for Andrew Charles' death.

Died on the 11th inst., at his residence in Madison County, of inflammatory sore throat, after an illness of 2[4] hours, ANDREW J. CHARLES, aged 35 years.

At least that's a start. Found in The Floridian and Journal, published in Tallahassee on July 27, 1850, that tiny insertion on page three at least revealed that Andrew J. Charles died in the county of his residence, Madison County, and that he was thirty five years of age at the time of his death. Both those details agree with what I've already gleaned, and provide me with the missing date for Andrew's seeming disappearance after the 1850 census. Since at the time of the previous census in 1850, the entire county claimed only 5,490 residents, I feel fairly confident this could be our Andrew Charles.

Since my Twelve Most Wanted ancestor for this month is Andrew's wife Delaney, one would think that would be my focus. And it is—but I didn't expect to see any mention of a married woman in a newspaper in territorial Florida during that era, even a dead woman. (But I tried looking, anyhow.) There are, however, other ways to find an answer to the question of what became of Delaney after the death of her husband.

Above: Clipping of "Obituary" for Andrew J. Charles from page three of The Floridian and Journal, published July 27, 1850, in Tallahassee, Florida; courtesy of GenealogyBank.com. 

When They All Say it's So

 

What do you say when information on the brick wall ancestor you are researching shows up in several places—all without documentation? Those assertions may sound reasonable, even convincing, but without a paper trail to support such entries, in my mind they are still worth...nothing. Nothing better, that is, than a possible lead.

That's the situation I'm facing as I work on the second of my Twelve Most Wanted ancestors for this year. When I decided this was the month to work on my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend, I already knew there were others out there who had posted details about her supposed parents. And yet, no will can I find for her supposed father, and any hope of finding Delaney named in his household for any census enumeration is nil, considering she was already married to Andrew Charles in Madison County, Florida, by 1841, long before each name in a household was entered in the census record.

I've certainly been putting the FamilySearch Labs' Full Text search capability through its paces in looking for possible records that might divulge a connection between Delaney and her father, whoever he was. And in genealogy's true spirit of collaboration, I've been party to a spirited conversation with fellow blogger Charles Purvis of Carolina Family Roots, who has sent me several links worth consideration. I now have a stack of reading to catch up on, as well as new avenues of inquiry to explore.

In the process, I've already unearthed one tiny confirmation which led me to more clues on Delaney, herself, as well as her husband, Andrew Charles, which I'll share soon. But it is clear that, to piece together Delaney's story, we'll need to take a detour away from the usual paper trail towards some less-traveled research terrain.

From the flurry of details Charlie sent my way yesterday, I can see a bit of light shining on a possible way forward, which is encouraging. Perhaps, at the end, I'll discover that when "they" all say the story is just so for the Townsend family, that's truly the way it was—or, perhaps, the trail will lead me to details about a real answer. One I can verify through documentation, not hearsay.

Checking Who's in the Neighborhood

 

In the effort to piece together the story of Delaney Townsend, my third great-grandmother from South Carolina who spent her adult life in Florida, I couldn't help but notice a record just one page over from Madison County's authorization to solemnize Delaney's marriage to Andrew J. Charles. The next record, dated only two weeks after the March 8, 1841, record for the Townsend/Charles marriage, was for someone named Benjamin Townsend.

Checking the census for Madison County nine years afterwards, Benjamin Townsend and his wife Jane showed up with four children all under the age of ten. More to my point, though, was the entry for Benjamin's place of birth: South Carolina, same as my Delaney Townsend.

It was tempting to assume that Benjamin and Delaney might be brother and sister, but I restrained myself. After all, South Carolina was a state which, at the time, encompassed a population of over six hundred thousand people. There were plenty of chances for this to be a coincidence that the two families shared a surname.

However, I couldn't help myself: I ended up checking the Madison County results for that 1850 census, looking for any more Townsend entries. There were several Townsends who gave their place of birth as South Carolina. Besides Benjamin, there were Allen and Sarah Townsend, and Samuel and Edia Townsend. Siblings? Cousins? Kinfolk?

I poked around Madison County a bit more. Looking at Find A Grave, I checked burial records in Madison County for Townsends. While many of the entries were likely for children of the couples I just named, there was one memorial for Allen Townsend. That entry included a photograph of the memorial headstone, specifying exactly where in South Carolina to look: Marlboro County. Could that have been the case for the other Townsends in Madison County, Florida?

The F.A.N. Club theory has proven successful in tracing other brick wall ancestors, and is particularly calling my name right now to look for family, associates, or neighbors who might have made that same trip from Marlboro County, South Carolina, to Madison County, Florida. It may be time to see whether all these Townsends have relatives in common, whether siblings, cousins, or more distant connections.

The fact that they all originated in South Carolina but decided to show up in the same location in then-territorial Florida is calling me to look for further clues. After all, remember I'm on the hunt to find documentation of the connection to South Carolina for my third great-grandmother Delaney. Though others assert the connection, I have yet to find anyone who has provided the evidence for the relationships.

Revisiting Delaney

 

No sooner had I packed away the to-do list for my unfinished pursuit of January's featured ancestor from this year's Twelve Most Wanted than I confronted the need to pull out a past year's to-do list for February's research goal. This month, we'll be focusing on my third great-grandmother Delaney Townsend. The problem is: the last time I worked on her story, I closed out the month without the answer I was seeking.

It was almost four years ago when I tried to find documentation confirming Delaney's parents and origin. While I learned a lot about this ancestor during that month's search, I still hadn't achieved my goal.

Part of the reason Delaney has been so hard to track is owing to the timeframe of her life. Born about 1816, possibly in South Carolina, as a single woman, she was inexplicably standing before an officiant in the Territory of Florida by 1841, about to be married to a local resident by the name of Andrew Jackson Charles in Madison County. If she was from South Carolina, what was a single woman doing, traveling to the then-frontier regions of the country, so far from her parents' home? There is obviously something missing in this story.

That is not the only detail which is missing in Delaney's story. After making a cameo appearance nine year later in the 1850 census with her husband and their three children, the couple disappeared by the time of the next enumeration. Strangely, their minor children were left behind, living with a relative, suggesting something ominous for Delaney and Andrew Charles. Yet again, no record of what might have happened.

The positive note in all this is that, making Delaney one of my Twelve Most Wanted in 2021 resulted in nearly thirty blog posts with links to the documents I was able to find on the family. That gives me a jump start on the process for this month's effort, thankfully. I already have found some strong hints of the identity of her parents and some siblings, too. What I don't yet have is any record specifically indicating the relationship between Delaney and those presumed parents and siblings. I want to see the records.

As happens so many times when we are stuck on what we call our "brick wall" ancestors, I foresee some days this month taking us on a detour to examine the records about Delaney's supposed siblings, all in the hope of finding some mention of the connection between family members. It may turn out that we learn a lot about a family which doesn't, in the end, relate to our Delaney. That is the risk we take when we explore documents pertaining to possible family members. If nothing else, we gain the satisfaction of attaining negative evidence—or perhaps merely the nagging feeling that we still need to look further.  

The D N A Holiday Sales Bubble

 

Every winter, the holiday DNA sales result in a slight bubble of matches trailing through the months of January and February, due to the weeks-long processing time at the labs for new DNA tests. I always look for those results to arrive, since by the end of the year, the one or two—maybe five, if I'm lucky—matches that had dribbled in before that point for each of my biweekly counts seemed rather lackluster. January brings the first results of a fresh collection of family history experimenters eager to discover more about their roots through genetic genealogy.

For my biweekly count in the first half of January, I actually received thirteen new matches—a big jump in possibilities for me. The second half of the month brought another eleven. Even December's earliest holiday sales matches (perhaps a jump on the action with a Thanksgiving gift?) provided enough new material that when I checked on the results last night, I discovered I was farther behind than usual in doing my due diligence on that aspect of incoming data. It was high time to get to work.

First step was to filter my DNA matches by checking the box labeled "New." Then, I scrolled through the list, looking for two details: size of the shared genetic material, measured in centiMorgans, and whether there were any familiar surnames in the list.

Almost right away this time, I spotted a familiar surname, did a little research and plugged that new match into my extended tree. Mind you, this "bushy" family tree, full of descendants of collateral lines, was built exactly for this purpose, and it has been a project I've been working on since first DNA testing family members in 2013.

Every two weeks, I track my progress on building out the family trees used for this DNA purpose. For instance, in the past two weeks, I've added 173 documented individuals to my mother's line, bringing the total count on my tree to 39,134 relatives. While I haven't worked much on my in-laws' tree lately, I did add twenty eight names there in the past two weeks, thanks to work on DNA matches. That tree now has 37,367 people. So with those data sets, it becomes easier to spot the right place to plug in a new DNA match.

Along with that work, I try to make a connection with the DNA match personally, either by sending a message or, in cases of closer relationships, connecting in more personal ways. I've gained a few more friends on social media, a couple via direct email exchanges, and a few more by actually connecting in person.

It won't be long and the holiday sales bubble will shrink back down to the typical one to two DNA matches I receive every two weeks. A rate that glacial doesn't yield exciting surprises or incredible research breakthroughs, but even a little increase can add up.

Considering what I've been finding in the last month, though, I can't help but say that I can't wait until Christmas again to see what the next holiday sale might bring.

Someone Else's New Year

 

Last night, someone was pounding a drum in our neighborhood in celebration of the New Year. I can't exactly tell you which New Year is being celebrated right now, but it's someone else's celebration for a New Year from an entirely different calendar, the lunar calendar. While it could be the Chinese New Year, it could also be New Year for the Vietnamese, or the Koreans—or any of the other Asian roots claimed by my neighbors.

Living in a place which has been called one of the most ethnically diverse cities in the United States, it's not hard to gain an appreciation for the fact that different people celebrate differently, work differently, follow different customs and habits, even prefer different foods. But after we've lived here for a while, those differences seem to fade. First, perhaps, it's "fusion" cuisine which celebrates a blending of the old and the new, but eventually, we end up forgetting our roots. It's only been a few generations for me, but I couldn't tell you which holidays my paternal grandfather's Polish forebears celebrated, or even which foods they liked to eat on those festive occasions.

Perhaps that's what has brought about this call to re-discover our roots, to find out where we came from and what it was like to be not-American, to reach beyond hyphenated-American status to the rank of strangers from a strange land. For many people, the search doesn't involve more than a few generations.

For this coming month, though, my own search will diverge from that international research path to one which kept leading me back through local American documents. From generation to generation, sure the path skirted the borders and stepped just beyond civilization—but it did still tie my maternal line to American property. It's just when the paper trail grows dark, the going gets rougher. While I yearn to detect some signal of where this family originated, I keep missing the message.

February's goal for my Twelve Most Wanted will seek to find the roots for one of my third great-grandmothers, Delaney Rosella Townsend. When I last traced her back as far as I could in time, I found her in one of the least likely situations: young, single, and far from the supposed home of her parents. If it weren't for the one census record where I was able to find her, I wouldn't even have known where her parents supposedly lived. But this time is a new year, and a new opportunity to see that changed. This month is the time to trace that obscured route back home.