From Jan to Johan to John: Let's Assume

 

Earlier this month, I had taken a peek at my only DNA match sharing the ancestral surname Olejniczak from the brother of my second great-grandmother Franziska Olejniczak. This cousin match, although distant at an estimated third cousin once removed, claimed as his direct ancestor someone named John Olejniczak. That John, born in 1869, had supposedly emigrated from Poland and ended up in the United States in the unlikely location of Harrison County, Ohio.

When he first showed up in American records, he had reported his name as Johan. Indeed, the three eldest of his children actually were born in Germany, according to the 1920 census, so perhaps he had come to this country by way of Germany, even if he had been born in Poland, where friends and neighbors would have been more likely to have called him Jan.

Of course, on my end, I am thinking about the son of Franziska's brother Bartholomaeus, whom he named Jan—or, as the Latin version of church baptismal records would put it, Joannes Olejniczak.

The difficulty in trying, from my end of the research puzzle in late 1800s Poland, to document my way forward in time from that baptismal record is far greater than retracing this DNA match's steps from his own parents back to his connection with his Olejniczak roots. Though his public tree posted online is supported with few records, let's assume that while this may seem like a doubtful jaunt down a rabbit trail, it may become a worthwhile chase, and begin the hunt.

It takes several steps to follow the documents to see that the name our immigrant of interest used at the point of his death in 1963—John Olenzak—still represented the man who for his naturalization records had reported his name as Johan Olejniczak. Yet the final reporting of his date of birth—June 8, 1869—lines up perfectly with our Joannes Olejniczak's baptismal record. And while a Belmont, Ohio, transcription of Johan's citizenship records indicated his place of birth in Poland was called Michałowo—a place which in today's maps looks to be on the other side of the country, certainly too far away for his family to get to Żerków for his baptism two days after birth—a quick consulting of the map at Meyer's Gazetteer shows us a likely village within walking distance of the church parish. And eases my mind that we are talking about the right person and the right place.

Next step: to build a tentative tree to test the connection between the Olejniczak lines.

Image above: Inset from map of Żerków showing Michałowo toward the top left side; image courtesy Meyers Gazetteer entry for Żerków (click tab labeled "map" on website for full image).

Who Got All the Family Stuff?

 

I keep holding on to the notion that, though we can't shove our way past the ancestral "brick wall" of our past, surely some distant cousin in the family became the keeper of the family "stuff," as Denise Levenick calls it. And in that "stuff," hopefully, is some indication where those distant relatives once called home.

For my father-in-law's second great-grandfather James Kelly, those roots are buried somewhere in Ireland, but where is still undisclosed. Though it appears the family was mostly intact after their arrival in Indiana—James had died in 1853, leaving his widow Mary to head up the household—from that list of his children, I can only find a few who had descendants of their own to pass along any family keepsakes.

James' two sons, Matthew and Thomas, though born in Ireland, may never have applied for naturalization—at least not after they arrived in Tippecanoe County, their adopted home. I can find no sign of Matthew on a current list of such applications, though there are two possible candidates for Thomas: one arriving from Ireland in 1846, and another from Great Britain in 1853. Yet, as for any descendants who might save such papers, Matthew had none, dying a bachelor in 1895. 

Thomas Kelly, on the other hand, though dying barely a month before his older brother Matthew, had several children. If the immigrating Kelly ancestors left any keepsakes to their sons, it would have been Thomas who would have been most likely to pass such treasures down to the next generation.

On the other hand, James and Mary Kelly had four daughters who traveled with them to America—and who could have been the recipients of any family mementos. Yet once again, the possible heirs would have been limited. Of those four daughters, two died young—Catharine, my father-in-law's great-grandmother, and her sister Bridget, wife of Michael Creahan.

That still leaves us with two possibilities, and yet, of those remaining two, Rose did not marry or have children of her own. Thankfully, Ann, the baby of the family, did. Whether Ann even had anything to pass down to her three sons, I do not know—but I do know that three of Ann's descendants chose to do DNA tests and are on my husband's match list. My next step will be to reach out and try to make contact with some of those distant Kelly matches on the slim chance that any of them will reply and share what they know about our mutual Kelly ancestors. 

To Trace the Family's Route

 

Where to find pre-1906 American naturalization records? I go online, naturally. In the case of the Blaising family's arrival some time between 1866 and 1868—the two dates reported by some of Theresa Blaising's brothers in census records—their records could have been filed anywhere, as there was no central federal office overseeing the process then. If the Blaising family had traveled directly to Allen County, Indiana, where we have already found them by 1870, their naturalization records could have been filed at the county courthouse there, or at any of five different possible court systems within the state's jurisdiction. If they stopped somewhere else on the way to their ultimate destination in New Haven, Indiana, the paperwork could have been begun at that other location.

In order to trace the family's route from France—my goal in finding naturalization records—I might first have to trace their route after arriving from France. With that uncertainty, rather than hunt through records at FamilySearch.org or any of the genealogical companies with such digitized records, I took my search straight to a search engine, seeking naturalization records at the state level. I entered Indiana as my first choice, held my breath, and pressed enter.

Fortunately, a promising entry popped up at the top of the list at Google. It was a page from the Indiana GenWeb site for Allen County, which provided links for accessing the very items I was seeking. Taking my cue from that information, I followed the link to the Allen County Genealogical Society website, where an alphabetized index of naturalization records from the Indiana Archives and Records Administration provided clickable sub-headings. I clicked on "Bl" for Blaising, and presto, I was there, scrolling past eight entries for "Black" to reach the next surname, Blaising.

There, the record provided the person's name, age at time of filing, and the date of the document. A fourth column was labeled, "link."

I wasted no time getting to that next step.

On that new page, actually hosted on the Indiana Archives site, once again I was asked to enter the immigrant's first name and last name. There were also fields to fill in for keyword and organization name, which I left blank. I discovered that it was best to not enter the requested field for "search by county," as when I did enter Allen County, I'd get zero results, but if left blank, the person I was seeking would be served up, no questions asked.

At that point, if more than one person had filed with that same name, all possible entries would be shown, requiring me to make a selection. This might be helpful for reviewing all possibilities to avoid the risk of following the wrong name twin. In the case of one of the Blaising brothers, John, I ran into that case, though our John did include his middle initial.

Clicking on the name selected then produced a drop-down window with a transcription of the basic information. While I was happy to have found that with relatively little effort, I was disappointed that there wasn't further information. Besides the immigrant's name, age, and county of filing, the record gleaned the date of arrival and document date. In addition, the synopsis listed the country of origin: France.

Of course, I wanted more. Perhaps because of that disappointment, I felt placated to see under that perfunctory listing, a blue link with those welcome words, "More detail."

I clicked.

The result yielded a full page listing of that immigrant's record. In the case of the Blaising brothers, I was able to learn that each of them left from the port at Le Havre in northern France, and sailed to New York City. My next step, then, will be to search for passenger records there, though one interesting discovery was that some of the brothers reported different dates of arrival, suggesting the possibility of serial immigration.

In finding these excerpts from the naturalization records, the good news was that the full page entry included the URL to link with that immigrant's actual document, housed at FamilySearch.org. The bad news was that the accuracy of those links left something to be desired. Not to worry, a little hunt and peck effort quickly located each Blaising brother's own filed record among the Allen County naturalization documents. At least the link brought me to the correct record set.

While I was ecstatic to have so quickly found these particular naturalization records, only four of the brothers were identified in the process: John B. Blaising, who vouched for his sister Theresa's marriage to John Kelly Stevens; oldest brother Henry; and then the two brothers immediately older than Theresa, Louis and August. A fifth Blaising man, also named John, appeared in records, making me wonder whether, with a double given name beginning with "Jean" he might actually have been known in later life only as, say, Phillip or Lawrence. However, at this point, I'm presuming Phillip might have filed after moving to Ohio, and likewise Lawrence at his new home in Albany, New York. That will be a puzzle for another day.

With this information, I'll draw up a chart for easy reference, including each brother's stated date of arrival in New York. Whether that helps guide me to any of those passenger records, I can't say. Whether, upon finding them, they include any mention of the place in France each brother once called home is yet to be determined. But it's worth the look.

 

Recapping Reports

 

To zero in on arrival dates for the immigrant Blaising family—all the brothers and the mother of my father-in-law's step-grandmother Theresa Blaising Stevens—I went back to the reports contained in the U.S. Census records. There, line items in the 1900 census, as well as the 1910 and 1920 enumerations, revealed at least what was reported by each resident in the United States.

Reports, of course, can be misleading. First, we need to rely on the enumerator hearing answers correctly, then writing them legibly enough for us to read. We also must hope that the enumerator gleaned his or her information from the source, not the neighbor down the street who was filling in while the hoped-for interviewees were away on an extended trip. Above all, we need to hope that the individuals themselves remembered and reported the correct answer. Otherwise, we are depending on answers as true which might be otherwise.

With those constraints in mind, here is what I discovered in all three enumerations, for Theresa's mother (before her 1907 death), her siblings, and her own report. 

According to Mary, the widowed mother, in the 1900 census she—or someone in her stead—claimed that she had arrived in the United States in 1868. This, of course, is not what was claimed in her obituary only a few years afterwards, but we will see how that report played out among her children's own census entries. Since she died in 1907, she was not found in any subsequent enumerations.

Henry, apparently the oldest son, also reported a 1868 arrival in the 1900 census, and noted that he was naturalized. However, ten years later, the 1910 census saw him change that immigration date to the 1866 date maintained by the family in his mother's obituary back in 1907. Once again, he claimed that he had been naturalized. Hoping to drill down to more detail in the 1920 census, I was disappointed to see some scribbled entries, overwritten by a clear "unknown" for both the date of arrival and the date of naturalization. Thus, Henry's entry doesn't provide us much help.

Next son Lawrence, who moved from Indiana to Albany, New York, appeared in the 1900 census with no arrival date and no information on naturalization status. By 1910, though, he reported arrival in 1866, and that he had been naturalized. Unfortunately, he died in 1918, so there was no way to follow him further in census records.

For next son Phillip, we run into conflicting data, which I suspect was partially owing to his own reports. Phillip, it appears, was married once in Allen County, Indiana, where his family had settled, but divorced and moved to Ohio, where he subsequently married and raised a second family. However, in later census reports, his age given and statement that he was married only once would have made me doubt I had found the right person, except that his residence in Ohio was reported in his mother's obituary. Nevertheless, in 1910, he reported arriving in the U.S. in 1876, and in the 1920 census, he claimed arrival in 1870 and naturalization in 1880, despite also stating that he was born in 1869 (while the 1870 census showed his age then as eight).

Son Louis was another Blaising child whom I couldn't find in the 1900 census. However, in 1910, he claimed arrival in 1866, though no word about whether he had been naturalized. In the 1920 census, he again mentioned arrival in 1866, and naturalization in 1876. Considering that the 1870 census had shown him to have been born about 1861, I tend to doubt that date of naturalization.

Son August was found in all three census reports, though in the 1900 census, all immigration information was left entirely blank. In the 1910 census, he referred to that same arrival date as many of his brothers: 1866. He also reported having been naturalized. But in the 1920 census, he switched the arrival date to 1868, and claimed naturalization in 1886.

Theresa herself included some variations from those dates given by her brothers, but that could possibly be due to reports actually being provided to the enumerator by her husband. In the 1900 census, she gave her arrival date as 1867, though in the 1910 census, she revised that date to 1866; there was no report of naturalization, but depending on the timeline of naturalization requirements for women, her marriage to an American citizen may have obviated such a need. Yet in the 1920 census, while keeping the 1866 arrival date, there was an entry on naturalization given as 1876 which was overwritten, making it unclear.

With the exception of the one brother, Phillip, dates given for arrival vacillated from 1866 to 1868. We can see from the siblings' mother's original entry that perhaps everyone followed suit—or perhaps by the time of Mary's death, the family gathered together to rebuild the family history in agreement. Variance in naturalization dates would be due to each person's own date for going through the legal process. Some may have started as soon as possible; others might have waited to begin the multi-year process.

At any rate, those dates will form a "ballpark" range for the next steps in the process. While I will want to seek out naturalization records for each of the Blaising brothers to glean details to guide me to their home town in Europe, I will need to also find passenger records or some sign of how they arrived in the New World. For that, we'll need to revisit our work from earlier this week just one more time.  

Time for Comparisons

 

Now that I've got a copy of the actual First Declaration for Hugh Stevens, it's time to compare his answers to those of earlier arrival John Stevens. Since Irish immigrant John Stevens was my husband's second great-grandfather, I had made sure to get a copy of his record when we visited his newfound American home in Lafayette, Indiana, years ago. Now I'm wondering whether comparing the two Stevens men's answers will reveal anything.

Since I've written about John Stevens before, I simply turned back to that blog post to revisit the wording on John Stevens' First Declaration. For John, let's put the data in a simple outline:

• The document was dated August 4, 1851.
• He gave his age as twenty seven.
• He sailed from Liverpool in 1850.
• He arrived in New Orleans during December of 1850

From that information, we can extrapolate that John Stevens was born about 1824.

What about Hugh? Here's what the recently-received document revealed about that second Stevens immigrant to Tippecanoe County, Indiana:

• The document was dated October 10, 1854.
• He gave his age as thirty three.
• He sailed from Liverpool in 1852.
• He arrived in "Orleans" during December of 1852.

From that information about Hugh Stevens, we can assume he was born about 1821.

From birth dates that close together, one could presume that Hugh Stevens and John Stevens were brothers. After all, they both were born in County Mayo, Ireland, and both immigrated to the same rather small city in Indiana. What are the chances? But we need to be aware that they could just as easily be first cousins. Or more distant relatives. Or not related at all.

With this small set of data, there isn't much we can say at all—but we can consider it an indication of a F.A.N. Club at the very least. The similarity of travel routes, down to the same month of arrival, is a tempting indicator. That they both chose a city of barely over six thousand people to settle in can seem a compelling detail. That they both chose a destination other than the main immigration ports on the east coast—far easier for travel—is also a tempting confirmation.

Now that we have the actual dates for Hugh Stevens' arrival in New Orleans, we can take a second look at passenger records to see whether any "H. Stevens" passengers did show up in Louisiana in December of 1852. Better yet, let's take another look at a wide set of records to see whether there is any sign of a Stevens family containing both given names.

First, the Transcription

 

Years ago, I had discovered the Tippecanoe County Historical Association included a genealogical records section called the Alameda McCollough Research Library. You can be sure that every time my travels called for me to drive from Chicago through Indiana, I found a way to make a stop at that repository. Since I have no travel plans slated for that direction any time in the foreseeable future, I was ecstatic when I discovered, earlier this month, that they now can provide researchers with near-instantaneous gratification—so I ordered a copy of the First Declaration for my possible Stevens relative, Hugh.

Now that I've gotten the digitized document in hand—so to speak—let's take a look at the transcription. That, after all, will be my first step before determining what else we can discover about this Irish immigrant. Here is what the form stated.

To the Judge of the Tippecanoe Circuit court, in the State of Indiana:

Hugh Stevens, Being an Alien, and a free white person, makes the following report of himself; upon his solemn oath declares that he is aged 33 years; that he was born in the County of Mayo in Ireland, that he emigrated from Liverpool in the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty two; that he arrived in the United States at the City of Orleans in the State of Louisiana in the month of December eighteen hundred and fifty two; that he owe allegiance to Victoria, Queen of Great Britain + Ireland and that it is bona fide his intention to become a citizen of the United States of America, and to renounce forever allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state or sovereignty whatever; and particularly to Victoria, Queen as aforesaid, of whom he is subject.

The document was completed on the tenth day of October in 1854. Hugh Stevens signed on that day with a rather weak cross, noted as "his mark."

And from then on, he simply disappeared—but we know that that can't be the rest of the story. Though the document only gives us a few clues, let's see whether they can give us any guidance.

Thinking Creatively While Waiting

 

There is nothing that frustrates me more than having to wait. In this week's case, I'm waiting to learn just how to proceed with ordering a second copy of the First Declaration signed by Hugh Stevens, some time after his arrival in Lafayette, Indiana, in the early 1850s. Yes, yes, I know: if I had gotten the record copied and carefully preserved the first time, I wouldn't have to wait a second time. Such is the story, sometimes, of genealogical guinea pigs like me—always a test case, and sometimes a messy one.

While waiting, I thought I'd try to be productive by considering how else I could solve my research problem. You see, I'm stuck with my husband's second great-grandfather, supposed Irish immigrant John Stevens, whose own First Declaration tells me he emigrated from County Mayo in Ireland, via the port of New Orleans, up the Mississippi and its tributaries to arrive in Lafayette sometime before the close of 1850. The problem is: I have no idea who his parents might have been, back in Ireland.

Come to find out there was a second Stevens man—you guessed it, Hugh Stevens—who took the same route at about the same time, only a year or two later, and I'm wondering whether John and Hugh were related. Perhaps brothers? This could lead to an end run around this Stevens brick wall, I am thinking.

While I am waiting for Hugh Stevens' own naturalization record, I'm wracking my brain for ways to find any sign of Hugh in other records. Up to this point, I've had no luck. I checked for city directories online at Ancestry, but discovered there are pitifully few records of any kind specific to Tippecanoe County, location of the city of Lafayette. Besides, the dates are long after Hugh's arrival, with the collection beginning in 1885.

Looking at quick sketches of local history, though, I find an encouraging sign: Wikipedia's entry for Lafayette indicates that "in its earliest days" the place was considered a "shipping center" on the Wabash River—a detail which has long since changed, due to soil erosion impacting the river's navigability that far north in its course. At one point, the nearby Wabash and Erie Canal work undoubtedly was a draw for immigrant labor, particularly the Irish, who also flocked to other such projects—but this, too, would be before the time of Hugh's arrival.

One final thought is to revisit the passenger records for ships arriving in New Orleans. I've checked those records in the past with little success, both for the Stevens men, and for John's Kelly in-laws. It seems our ancestors always arrived in the very gaps currently existing in the preserved records, an unfortunate scenario for researchers like me. But perhaps things have changed, or more records have been discovered. It is, while I'm still waiting, a reminder to go take a second look. Maybe this time....

Naturalization: First, the First Papers

 

In searching for more information on our immigrant Stevens ancestor in Lafayette, Indiana, let's start with the first step: the Declaration of Intention, or what is often called "first papers."

The idea of the Declaration was to formally have the immigrant state his or her intention to renounce any allegiance to the country of origin, and instead transfer that affiliation to the United States government. In order to assure that transference of allegiance, signing that Declaration became the doorway through which the immigrant stepped into a waiting room of sorts: the waiting period required before proceeding to the next step in the naturalization process.

In the case of Hugh Stevens, the possible brother of my husband's second great-grandfather John Stevens, his arrival in Indiana by 1852 meant a waiting period of two years.

What I've already observed by looking at various Declarations over the years for ancestors in various states is that the format used for that document was not a standard layout. Different time periods and different jurisdictions required different sets of information. In the case of Hugh Stevens' arrival just after John Stevens own immigration (and long before major changes to the process in 1906) tells me that, since they both filed in the same court, Hugh's record will likely contain much the same categories of information.

That an immigrant could file a Declaration of Intention in one court, then proceed to file the Petition for Naturalization in a different court—or never file one at all—is highly likely, compounding the problems with researching such material. In this case, I've already noted that Hugh filed his first papers at the Tippecanoe County courthouse, but I already know I have no guarantee of finding the rest of the paperwork at the same location.

I've already taken the first step to obtain a copy of Hugh Stevens' Declaration of Intention. While we're waiting to examine the details, we'll first explore what is now available online for Tippecanoe County. Next week, we'll revisit two websites which have provided ongoing assistance to me in my pursuit of Stevens family history.

Where to Look When You Don't Know Where to Look

 

I'll admit it: when stuck with this brick wall ancestor John Stevens and his (likely) brother Hugh Stevens, I haven't the faintest idea how to proceed towards solid answers. Thankfully, I have learned that there are ways to move forward in such a stalemate. There are ways to look for answers, even when you don't really know where to look.

Before I talk about that though, truth be told, I have a second problem with the family history project I chose to work on this month. While I remember seeing Hugh Stevens' Declaration of Intention, which was originally filed at Lafayette, Indiana, if I actually purchased a copy, I have no idea where to find it. So many years ago, when I did make paper copies of records, some ended up damaged over time, and discarded. While I have since digitized John Stevens' Declaration, I have no idea where that same document was for Hugh. I'm working from memory at this point.

That clear memory, though, stayed with me: that Hugh followed the same basic route outlined by his likely relative John, from County Mayo in Ireland, to the British port of Liverpool, then to New Orleans and up north on the waterways leading from the Mississippi to Indiana. My question now is whether I can read between the lines on those two Declarations—Hugh's and John's—and find any further information on either Stevens men. But where to look next? That is where I'm stuck.

When it comes to family history questions in general, I know Cyndi's List can provide links to explore all sorts of research topics and techniques. For even more broad-based answers, I've developed the knack of putting search engines through their paces. I've also learned that it is possible to do genealogy by Wikipedia, not only for background information but also for specifics—sometimes even down to specific ancestors. And there are other, more specialized wikis which hone in on precise topics, such as the ISOGG wiki for genetic genealogy information.

But in a case such as this month's puzzle, my go-to resource is the FamilySearch wiki, and that is mostly where we'll turn for a quick refresher course to get grounded in the details of documenting immigration and naturalization on behalf of this puzzle surrounding Hugh Stevens.

If I had to rely on what is usually shared on subscription genealogy sites—those many documents which, while appreciated, are sometimes limited in scope—I would only have been in luck, had I searched for immigrants passing through, say, New York City. But filing a First Declaration in Lafayette, Indiana? Such a discovery would either have become lost in the shuffle, or not been included in the featured online collection at all. In fact, the only way I first found those two records for Hugh and John was by traveling to Lafayette and looking them up myself.

Thankfully, things have changed quite a bit since I made that trip over ten years ago. It is now possible to order a copy directly, online, for a modest fee, and I will be doing that to access a record of Hugh's arrival. But in the meantime, let's spend some time this week reviewing the history of the naturalization process as it changed over time in the United States. For that, we'll look at the articles available at the FamilySearch wiki, as well as at the source, the National Archives itself. The process of reviewing what we think we know can still be beneficial, especially when key details that we've inadvertently omitted or forgotten get brought to mind afresh. 

Ancestor #7: What Happened to Hugh?

 

Among the tools added in the past year at Ancestry.com, one I appreciated the most was their beta offering which included the option to view a family tree in "fan view." Just changing the way the pedigree chart looked helped me spot areas in my trees which needed more work. I took that viewing option one step further, and made a fan view version for each set of eight great-grandparents for my parents and my in-laws, and posted then on my desktop for instant reference (and hopefully, inspiration to get busy on needed research projects).

Some of the diagrams were indeed perfect for that inspiration, such as the diagram for Thomas Taliaferro Broyles, my mother's great-grandfather whose diagram I shared in a post when Ancestry unveiled that beta version back in September. You can easily spot those empty family branches screaming for attention. But today, as I shift focus on my Twelve Most Wanted for research projects in 2024 to those missing ancestors in my father-in-law's roots, the diagrams I spot for his family look more like what I call "egg-head" drawings than the half-eaten pie-shaped diagram for someone like ol' Tom. How do you plan a year's research strategy from hint-less diagrams like those Irish ancestors in my father-in-law's roots?

There was one exception, thankfully. I had entered an unnamed father for my husband's second great-grandfather, John Stevens. The reason for that unnamed entry was that I had found an immigration record for a man named Hugh Stevens—a man who had taken the exact same route from Ireland's County Mayo to Lafayette, Indiana, as John Stevens had done at almost precisely the same month in a previous year. While I had no idea of the relationship, the coincidence was almost begging me to assume they were brothers, and that was exactly where I placed him in my father-in-law's tree, after creating a place holder for the two brothers' father.

The only problem was that almost immediately after Hugh arrived in Lafayette, he seemed to disappear. What happened to Hugh after that point?

Of course, it would be redundant to say he died; people traveling anywhere in the world in the 1850s would be dead by now. But how soon after his arrival would that have happened? Did he acquire a malady from his trans-Atlantic passage and collapse shortly after greeting his relative in a new world? Or could he have moved on, perhaps marrying and starting a family of his own before his demise?

I have ulterior reasons for wondering about these questions. Even though I attempted this same research poject two years ago, I still can't place the Stevens family's specific townland of origin in County Mayo, and hope to trace Hugh to discover more about John's roots. In addition, it would be doubly helpful to find any DNA matches from another branch of the Stevens line. Right now, there only are three matches from John's line but nobody else—not even guesses as to who might have been in the previous generation. Finding any sign of Hugh might be very helpful, indeed.

Research, Dennis the Menace Style

 

There is a fabled vignette in which Hank Ketcham's cartoon character, Dennis the Menace, asks his harried mom, "If I can't have a horse, can I have a cookie?"

I say "fabled" because I have no access to the actual cartoon strip itself, but I know the story has been shared by—even analyzed by—many others. While Dennis wryly reflects afterwards on an "invisible horse who's worth his weight in cookies," I'd like to borrow Dennis' original plea for an impossible desire of my own: not for a horse, but to somehow access the truth on John Stevens' origin in County Mayo, Ireland. Hopefully, after all is said and done, I'll end up with at least a cookie.

Is hoping for a research breakthrough on my husband's second great-grandfather as impossible as Dennis' wish for a horse? With what appears to be a dearth of actual records in support of John Stevens' existence back in County Mayo, perhaps that is the case. But there is one small observation to be made, perhaps along the lines of another apocryphal story about a child's Christmas gift of a pony which "must have gotten away": there must be a "pony in here" somewhere.

Take my one and only clue that John Stevens came from County Mayo: the statement he provided on his Declaration of Intent, years after his arrival in Lafayette, Indiana. How do I know that? I had to travel to Lafayette myself to look for—and thankfully retrieve a copy of—the document.

This was not a record I could obtain from any online source—at least, not at that time. Now, there are several online resources for retrieving copies of such documents. But that doesn't make the process easy—or foolproof. The "first papers" in this naturalization process could be filed at almost any time after the immigrant settled in the United States. And that's the problem for those of us chasing that document decades—or over a century—after the fact. An immigrant could have filed two years after arrival—or twenty. If he moved while in the process of establishing citizenship, his papers could have been filed in two different jurisdictions, perhaps located hundreds of miles apart.

Even if the location of the application was certain—in John's case, that would be Tippecanoe County, Indiana—knowing where the document is stored now could also be challenging. Depending on the time frame, the process could have been recorded at the Northern or Southern District of the U.S. District Court in the state of Indiana, but the actual naturalization proceedings could have been conducted at local or state courts, as well as the federal court system. And different courts handled the matter, depending on the year the request was processed: circuit court, probate court, court of common pleas, superior courts, or even the Indiana Supreme Court.

Fortunately—though I say this tongue in cheek—there is an online resource for retrieving such records from Indiana, in case you don't have the means to whisk yourself away just now. The virtual records are currently available online through FamilySearch.org, though I don't know whether that availability is merely an artifact of the pandemic lockdown. But don't be in too much of a hurry to locate your ancestor's naturalization records from this Indiana collection just yet; apparently the collection is only browsable—sorted by alphabet and date, but in no means organized alphabetically. Hence, hunt and peck. This process may take some time; it may be quicker to fly to Indiana.

That said, that little slip of paper—John Stevens' Declaration of Intention—was the only way I could learn of his Irish origin. And that is the problem I referred to at the beginning of this post. Consider this: if that bit of intel was only available in one hard-to-locate document, what else could be lurking out there in the ether, somewhere between here and County Mayo, Ireland?

Do I see anyone smirking yet? You know I'd be saying this: there must be a "pony" in there somewhere!

The "What If?" Strategy

 

In the process of searching for our specific ancestor, it is tempting, once finding a reasonable document, to assume that is the proof we are seeking. That's never a foolproof approach, though. There are several reasons why we seek more than one document to confirm the details of an ancestor's life story.

For one thing, we need to consider what I call "name twins." There is a strong possibility—especially given common names of folks living in population centers—that someone else could be given the same name as the ancestor we are researching. A wise alternative is to seek several documents along that person's life trajectory to confirm we are following the same person's history. 

Likewise, keeping track of not only the timeline but the locations where significant life events occurred is important for ensuring we are still researching the same person. Impossible feats of travel, given restrictions of the time period, would be a clue that we have jumped track from our ancestor to someone of the same name but different family.

In the case of my father-in-law's mystery great-grandfather, Stephen Malloy, we have a situation where the family received one report of his demise which might be quite believable—until we begin asking questions about the circumstances.

Questions, as it turns out, are a good device to employ in genealogical research. We always need to consider possible alternative explanations. And in Stephen Malloy's case, there are questions.

One question we had mentioned yesterday: the fact that Stephen's wife Anna chose to remain unmarried for the rest of her life, despite being free as a widow to remarry—indeed, in that day and age, especially with a child to support, that would have been the norm. Was there any doubt about that story that her husband had been killed in Boston?

Another question flows from the very details found in the passenger record of the ship upon which our Stephen was supposed to have been aboard. The age for that man was cited as twenty six, and yet his supposed bride would have been thirty seven that same year—hardly a believable age spread for a couple during that time period.

The least verifiable of my doubts comes from the overarching history of the region which Stephen Malloy left in 1849. Ireland had experienced some civil unrest, both politically and from a sectarian point of view, and Stephen's abrupt and seemingly mysterious defection plays with my own doubts in ways not likely to be substantiated without further evidence. I begin to wonder: why did Stephen Malloy leave home so abruptly? Could it be that he never made it on board the ship in Liverpool? If he were fleeing trouble back home, could he have assumed an alias?

Perhaps my questions might never have found a satisfying answer—except that now, we have search capabilities unparalleled in previous generations. While I can take the tedious route of searching Boston newspapers for crime reports of the murder of one Stephen Malloy, I can also search for alternate explanations by other means as well.

One possible alternate explanation could be that Stephen did make it to Boston and decide to settle there, making a new life for himself. Searching online records did reveal one document which gave me pause to consider these alternate possibilities: a petition for citizenship filed by one Stephen Mulloy in the state of Massachusetts in 1855.

According to the document, this Stephen arrived in Boston on or about the first day of April in 1849, only a few days after the date given on the passenger list for the Anglo American. The document also provided his date of birth and current age: born December 24, 1827, he claimed to be twenty eight when he completed that 1855 document. Thus, he was nearly—but not quite the same—as the age of the Stephen Molloy on the passenger list.

Though the tantalizing detail of the record was that this man, too, was born in County Limerick—location of the home where our Stephen sent his letter to his wife in 1849—his age, being so much younger than his supposed wife Anna, gives me pause to wonder whether this traveler was the same man as our Stephen. Indeed, records of this man in the Massachusetts 1855 state census, where he was boarding with a Reardon family, could lead one to presume he was waiting for his wife's arrival from Ireland—but the subsequent state census in 1865 showed him a married man with two children. Hardly our Stephen Malloy. Or was he?

There are, of course, other possible explanations for our Stephen Malloy's disappearance. Coming here in 1849, of all times, he could possibly have caught gold fever and headed for California. He could, once in this country, have assumed an alias. Either of those scenarios could have reached a climax of finding him shot to death—but even with today's search tools, we might never find the full story.

With that, we have some other search options to explore before the month is out and we turn our attention to other research goals. At this point, the best way to determine next steps is to talk it all out. We'll grapple with the possibilities tomorrow.

Postscript on the Irish

 

Some research projects are hard to let go. Count my failed search for my father-in-law's Kelly ancestors in Indiana among them. Yet let me add just one more word before we move on to August's research challenge.

There was so much to glean from William Giffin's book, The Irish, that I couldn't say it all in one post. Nor does this one tidbit I found necessarily connect to the immigrant Kelly family upon their arrival in the vicinity of Lafayette, Indiana. It does, however, provide a glimpse of circumstances which might have influenced the choices made by their future in-law, John Stevens.

I already had learned about John, who eventually married Catherine Kelly, that he had filed his Declaration of Intention in Tippecanoe County, which document serendipitously gave me the exact details of his immigration route.

The Declaration provided his stated age—twenty seven at the time, though who knows whether that was framed in the Irish tendency to minimize such numbers during those vital working years. The record also told me that he was born in County Mayo, and that his route to America was through Liverpool in England, eventually arriving in the city of New Orleans in Louisiana.

What I failed to pay attention to—and had to go back and check today—was the date in which the Declaration was completed in Lafayette. Here's why.

William Giffin's book on the Irish in Indiana went into detail on several aspects of immigrant life during various time periods throughout the state's history. Noting the evolution of acceptance of Irish common laborers in the state, Giffin noted that the Irish were active in state politics long before 1860. Almost unanimously, Irish immigrants supported the Democrat Party, and for good reason: the party's line was sympathetic to the cause of immigrants. In fact, because of that Democrat control of the 1850 state constitutional convention, delegates voted to "ease voting requirements for immigrants."

Giffin noted that the catch was that "aliens could vote providing that they declared their intentions to become citizens and met a minimal residence requirement."

Apparently, there was a rush among those Irish immigrants to file their first papers of the naturalization process. Giffin cited a study of one Indiana city in which many such Irish declared their intentions in the week leading up to the general election itself.

That made me curious. As it turns out, I have a copy of John Stevens' Declaration of Intention, so I took a look to see. Sure enough, apparently as soon as he could, the Irish immigrant from County Mayo fulfilled the requirement on August 4, 1851. 

I don't have any way to know whether taking that act indicates anything on John Stevens' part, but I like to think he was certainly attuned to current events in his new hometown of Lafayette, Indiana, and possibly even keen on the twists and turns of local politics.

Above: Copy of the Declaration of Intention of John Stevens of County Mayo, having arrived in Tippecanoe County, Indiana, via New Orleans in December, 1850; copy on file in author's records.

Indulging in Daydreams

 

My mind can't help but wander, as I comb line by line through all these transcribed records of my Gramlewicz relatives of a prior century. Perhaps it's the tedious task which that mind wishes to escape, but as I review records and check them against what I already entered in my father's family tree, I think of what it must have been like to endure the events which now are reduced to mere lines on an aging page.

As I cross-check each detail, the research trail has me doubling back along lines which I've long since documented. Somehow, in reviewing these Gramlewicz relatives, an online resource led me once again to the digitized page listing my great-grandmother's trip across the Atlantic with her three children, all of whom were eight years of age or younger.

I had grappled with this passenger list quite a while ago, when I struggled with the naturalization record drawn up years later for John Laskowski, Marianna and Anton Laskowski's oldest son—having had a good laugh at the realization of what the ship's name actually was, as compared to what an eight year old boy might have remembered hearing. 

Looking at the document once again, I realized my paternal grandmother Sophie was listed in that passenger record as an infant—best I could tell from the angular German hand completing the required information. That's when my mind began to wander—to what it must have been like for my great-grandmother, leaving her hometown in Żerków to board a ship in Bremen, Germany, and then traveling across the Atlantic in February, on her way to meet her husband in a place as huge as New York City.

It wasn't exactly like I wondered who might be traveling with her to provide assistance on the journey, but somehow as I revisited the document once more, my eye caught the details on the lines above her family's entry. Someone else had reported their hometown as the same one Marianna Laskowska had. Who were these other people claiming that same small town as their home?

One of the names I didn't recognize. It hardly even looked like a Polish surname—Laryner, if I could read the handwriting correctly. But the line below that entry made me realize: hey! I know that guy!

Oh, that confounded handwriting! Could that name have been Miecyslaus? The last name, as poorly rendered, was surely Gramlewicz—or at least the typical misspelled version I have seen before, Gramlewitch. That was the same name Anton and Marianna had given their second-born son—a name he changed to Michael by the time he grew up and completed his own Declaration of Intention.

But this other Miecyslaus: I had seen him before, in family records. This, at least according to the age as well as the town of origin, was most likely the same man who later, with his surviving family in tow, decided to leave New York City and return to his native Poland. This was the same Gramlewicz whose daughter Anna later decided, after moving back from New York to Poland, that she really wanted to call the city of her birth her home—the very one whom I later found living in Anton and Marianna's apartment in Brooklyn, listed as their niece. 

My research had found a way to come full circle: the daughter of Marianna's traveling companion in 1889 had come back home to New York to live with her in 1915. And I hadn't seen that clue, the first time around, because I didn't yet know to even look for it.

 

Above: Excerpt from passenger list of the S. S. Wieland, arriving in New York City from Hamburg, Germany, on 16 February 1889; image courtesy Ancestry.com.

A Missed Opportunity

 

If I had seen what I've just found of a past census record before participating in my own most recent census enumeration, I think I would have gotten down on my knees and thanked the enumerator for doing a conscientious, careful job of noting my entries. My descendants may be depending on it.

As it is, I did make progress, in the current research project, in finding out more about Charles Sullivan in Toledo. Not long before his wife's untimely death due to complications of childbirth, Charles had filed his Declaration of Intention to become a citizen of the United States. He filed the document in the Court of Common Pleas in Lucas County, Ohio, where he had settled with his wife and children in Toledo.

From that document, we learned a few details about Charles—although, unfortunately, nothing about his parents. Those few details were enough to confirm that we were, indeed, looking at a report about the right Charles Sullivan—an important detail, considering the prevalence of a name like his.

For one thing, he reported his birth as occurring on May 1, 1882, in Stratford, England. We learned that he stood five feet, seven inches tall, with blue eyes and dark brown hair—and even that he was "tattood" on his "left rist."

Charles traveled with his wife Alice—another gratefully-received hint that we are on the right track—and children aboard the RMS Adriatic, arriving in New York City about the tenth day of December, 1920. From there, he and his family traveled to Ohio to settle with Alice's siblings and Sullivan aunts at 324 Saint Mary's Street, the very house where Alice soon gave birth to a stillborn son before losing her own life.

But what about their story, back in Stratford? Wouldn't you like to know more? I sure would. Yet, even though I can find them in the 1911 census, the opportunity to discover one of the key points I was seeking was doomed to slip through my very fingers. Notice the category in the 1911 census for England and Wales with these specific instructions: "Birthplace of every person. (1) If born in the United Kingdom, write the name of the County, and Town or Parish."

 

Now, wouldn't you like to know that about your own British Isles ancestors? That was precisely what I was seeking, not only for Charles, but especially for his wife, Alice. But do you think the census enumerator was able to follow those straightforward instructions for Charles (line one), his wife Alice (next line) and their young son Charlie? The answer:

No. 

Now Indexing: Something Not in my Plans

Perhaps this stay-at-home order has inspired countless numbers of would-be indexers to find something productive to do. I'm not sure. All I know is that, now that I've finally gotten around to doing some indexing on FamilySearch.org for this month—face it, I only have one more day left to get it done—I can't find any projects in the queue to be indexed.

Well, there are a few. But not many. At least, not among the U.S. records. And I'm certainly not sure enough of myself to tackle records in foreign languages.

Usually, I zero in on records from areas where my ancestors once settled. I may be a volunteer indexer, but I'm not exactly an altruistic volunteer; I look for record sets which might eventually help my own research cause. Don't be surprised to see me indexing naturalization records for New York City area. Or marriage records in Cook County, Illinois. Maybe even something from the old South.

I seriously doubt any records from Wisconsin would advance my research cause—well, not unless I figure a way to link with my mystery DNA cousins there—but that is what I ended up indexing today. Specifically, I worked on naturalization records.

Granted, the news from FamilySearch.org is that, for the last full month of April, they added 57.2 million newly-indexed records to their collection. That must mean there were a lot of volunteers busy at work transforming those digitized records into searchable material. Perhaps we'll see a similar news report, once we close out the month of May.

That's always good news for any family history researcher—especially those with roots in countries named in the long list of records uploaded at April's end. But I can't recall ever signing on to my FamilySearch account and finding such a dearth of indexing opportunities in my home country as I did today. I'm sure our work is still far from done.

Now Indexing: More New York Naturalization Records

I'm back at digital volunteer work today. I'm still hoping that someday, I'll be sitting at my usual online indexing tasks and will finally get the chance to add a record of my own ancestor to the searchable collection at FamilySearch.org. After all, my more recent immigrant ancestors came to this country through the port of New York City—and they couldn't have taken all their secrets with them when they passed to their grave. I'm seeking the paper trail they left behind.

Thus, every two weeks, you'll find me at my computer, chipping away at the various naturalization record projects still needing indexing at FamilySearch.org. Indexing is an organized program to convert pictures of documents into computer-searchable files. That's what makes genealogical pursuit a breeze now, compared to the days before computers: go to a genealogy website, type in a name (and perhaps a bit more detail) and click a button to be served up a long list of every scanned record which could possibly contain information on your ancestor.

Compare that with the "good old days" when researchers sent their snail-mail-delivered written requests to targeted county clerks across the country—along with a check to pay for services—in hopes of locating the birth, marriage, or death certificate for that one missing ancestor's verification. Of course, back then, chances were strong that said clerk might respond—after months since dispatching that letter—with an answer that there was no record of any such person.

Now, satisfaction can be instantaneous—if, that is, such a record has been digitized and indexed so that the computer search can be completed. All to say, if no one has done the work of translating the picture of that document into text which a computer can recognize—a.k.a. "indexed"—that handy search function cannot be performed.

Thus, an army of volunteers from around the world is regularly going through the process of doing that translation service. Anyone who is willing to volunteer their time to do so, and willing to learn via a few project instructions, can serve as an indexer. The work is "batched" into small chunks of records which can be typed into a pre-set form in about ten minutes or less. Once you get the hang of doing one batch of records, you can either submit the batch and call it quits for the day, or opt to continue with another ten-minute batch. Or two. Or more.

Easy, right? That's why so many people have volunteered to do indexing—thankfully. Indexers are people from all ages and all walks of life: private individuals, genealogical societies—even extended families, working together in a private group. But even with as many willing hands as have participated in the process over the years, there are far more records still being added to the collection than volunteers can keep up with, hence the need, always, for more volunteers. 

Now Indexing: Naturalization Records for New York

I'm back to my old haunts once again, indexing New York City naturalization records at FamilySearch.org. Although I've been most recently doing research on my Polish ancestors in scary foreign-language websites in a cloud far, far from home, I don't have the guts to try my hand at transcribing any of those documents for my monthly indexing project. I reverted to my old hang for one simple reason: no matter where they came from in Europe, most of my immigrant ancestors did come through the port at the Big Apple.

Not that this is an easy slog. I've done easier in my many forays into volunteer indexing. Though the forms are mostly typewritten—no struggles with ambiguous handwriting there—they are sometimes digitized in such a way as to cause frustration. Overlays on top of unrelated forms—which one to pay attention to?—or instructions which don't seem to fit the form I'm viewing, or attempts for a one-size-fits-all instruction sheet for multiple types of forms can sometimes add to a volunteer's frustration.

However—and that is a big forever, spoken with a deep sigh—it is this record set upon which so many researchers rely to trace their family lines back to the "old country." Many of these documents divulge the exact village where immigrants were born, or where they lived just prior to boarding their ship for passage to America. Though not all of the information given on the naturalization forms is transcribed via the indexing process—thus my perennial warning to look at the document, not just the cover information—there can be a wealth of resources naming each of the children in a family, their dates of birth, sometimes even the specific place where each of them was born.

Thus, the treasure trove which many researchers would love to stumble upon. Only, until those digitized documents are transcribed into a computer-searchable format, we'd still have to hand-crank through microfilmed versions of these records. The indexing process is what makes searching for ancestral records on a website like FamilySearch seem almost magical—or at least instantaneous. Although the hunt and peck and wait-for-snail-mail routine of the decades pre-Internet may have developed a researcher's virtue of patience, we can now simply speed ahead and conquer multiple generations in the time it once took to discover, to our dismay, that we just sent our stamped, self-addressed envelope and cashier's check away for documentation on the wrong Johann Schmidt.

Reinventing Yourself, Immigrant Style

I've heard it said that those stories about ancestors' names being "changed at Ellis Island" are, for the most part, incorrect. I'm willing to buy that assertion, but only if I can offer a substitution: that some immigrants did indeed change their name at some point after arriving on American shores. While some of those changes were done through legal channels—I've shared about discovering my godmother's name change following her move to New York—others were likely less formal. Like really less formal.

Of course, that doesn't preclude the possibility that an immigrant did go through proper channels and that I just couldn't find the record. My grandfather's situation may turn out to be exactly that type of example. For now, though, I'm left with three simple clues—not quite the stuff that sound proof arguments are made of. I found those three clues in a census record, a draft record, and a petition for citizenship.

Mind you, not all those documents were concerning the same name. That's the trouble: it's only my opinion that they represent the same person. But have patience. I can 'splain.

From the 1910 U.S. Census for Brooklyn, New York, we can find my supposed grandfather, in what I presume was his original name, Theodore J. Puhalski, living in the household of his wife's parents, Anton and Mary Laskowski. Along with the entry for his wife, Sophie, are conveniently placed the given names of my father and his sister.

The census does make mention of the year of Theodore Puhalski's arrival in this country: 1884. That—along with the fact of his occupation—is corroborated nicely with the same report in his naturalization records, signed by Theodore at the end of December, 1905.

Just as we find such crumbs of the minutiae of Theodore's life—tiny details which match between two entirely different records—we need to replicate that same process in bridging the record gap between Theodore J. Puhalski, husband of Sophie Laskowska, and John T. McCann, husband of Sophie Laskowska. For instance, despite his death certificate reporting that he was born in Brooklyn—not!—I have a record under the name Puhalski which states the man's date of birth was August 7, 1876, and a record also asserting that John T. McCann was born on August 7, 1876.

Interestingly enough, that World War I Draft Registration Card, completed on September 12, 1918, using the name John T. McCann, declared that he was a naturalized citizen, and an alien from Russian Poland. How many guys with a surname like that do you know of from Poland? And how coincidental that both men were machinists working for a printing company in Brooklyn. Maybe even the same company. Perhaps they knew each other...

Above: Heading of the naturalization record for Theodore J. Puhalski, dated December 29, 1905, from the Eastern District of New York; image courtesy Ancestry.com.

Now Indexing : Back to NYC Naturalization Records

It's so difficult being homeless. Our genealogical society may have big plans and hopes, but we are still strapped to a very small budget. Despite our sixty-plus years of existence, we still depend on the graces of others for those tangible items which help any office run smoothly. Come to think of it, we even depend on others to supply that "office" space for us to conduct our business.

All that to say, it's hard to plan for training sessions for our members when we don't even have a place to host them. I'm still waiting on the word about whether we can use a computer-friendly site to train our members on how to index records at FamilySearch. Our plans for a team-centric indexing challenge may have to wait until next year. Fortunately, that year is drawing ever closer.

In the meantime, I'm playing it solo in the indexing department. I returned to my usual haunts for this month's indexing installment. New York City is always good for more naturalization records. Besides, I keep hoping to uncover a few more relatives in the process.

While there are some digitized entries from this record set already searchable online, New York being New York, there are many more to be indexed. I can always be sure of going back to the FamilySearch indexing website and finding another set of New York City naturalization records to research.

This time, I indexed records concerning quite a few immigrants from Ireland—wondering, all the while, whether the ones who came from locales of my father-in-law's family might have known any of our relatives. The world becomes a much smaller place, once we have all these documents at our fingertips, rather than seeing the crowded blur of people rushing past our faces. Digitized records in searchable form not only make a genealogist's tasks more quickly executed; they also allow us to see more of the world's timeline in microcosm form.