Progress on the Carter Count

 

In this month's attempt to build out the Carter branch of my family tree, it turns out that the last two weeks brought as much progress as anticipated. That's to be expected for the descendants of a man who lived in the 1700s. After all, my fifth great-grandfather had several children by at least two wives, if not three—many of whom lived to adulthood and raised families of their own. Let's see how the count went for this two week period.

When I began, I had 40,824 in my family tree on the fourth of January. I had just come off a holiday season where I was vainly trying to trace my father's Polish ancestors, and I was not making anywhere near the level of progress that I had hoped. Then, I switched focus with a new year and new research goal.

Two weeks later, I'm closing my biweekly count with 41,037 researched individuals in my tree. That shows an increase of 213 names, almost all from January's research project for my Twelve Most Wanted: John Carter of Spotsylvania County, Virginia.

Though I don't usually report it on this blog, I also track my increase in DNA matches. For this past two weeks, the increase in DNA cousins definitely was showing the first results of winter holiday sales: at least at Ancestry DNA, I had eight additional matches who are fourth cousins or closer, bringing my total of those "close" matches to 2,710. Usually, my "close" match count edges up by one or two per biweekly report.

Granted, not all—maybe not any—are DNA connections to the Carter line. Still, I'm looking forward to exploring those in my matches who do connect to that Carter line.

Since my focus this month is on my mother's ancestors, there was no activity logged on my in-laws' tree, which remains at 41,737 individuals. I'll return to researching that side of the family when we shift to my mother-in-law's roots next April.

This coming week, I'll be back to building out the lines of John Carter's children, particularly his daughters. The goal is to continue outlining the matrilineal descent for the children of his wives, based on available court records and other documents.