Baby of the Family

 

Researching a sixth great-grandmother is apparently easier than I had thought. At least I can say that about my mother-in-law's sixth great-grandmother, Elizabeth Plummer Ijams. Despite appearing in documents drawn up by a liberal hand at spelling—not to mention letter formation itself—Elizabeth has been far easier to find in colonial Maryland than I had expected, something more than I can say for our ancestors in Europe from even the more recent 1800s.

The latest attempt at pursuing Elizabeth's trail has been looking for her father's will. Thomas Plummer, the man identified in the Harry Wright Newman book, Anne Arundel Gentry, was easily found in the court records for that county, a copy of which will has thankfully been digitized at FamilySearch.org. In that 1694 record, we learn that Elizabeth was the baby of the Plummer family, the last of four daughters named in their father's will.

In the stylized handwriting of the court's clerk, Thomas' surname was rendered as "Ploumer" in the July 12, 1694 will. In that document, Thomas specified his "only son Thomas," who received his hundred acre plantation known as "the Seamas Delight" in Calvert County.

But for the stylized handwriting, I'd now know the married names of Elizabeth's older sisters. "Margrett" was by then wife of someone named Hugh, but whether that surname was "Proily" or "Doily" or another variation, I can only guess. This will take additional research to confirm.

Following the eldest daughter was a far easier couple to decipher: second daughter Mary had married William Jackson. Easier to read, but likely much harder to locate with such a common name.

Third daughter Susana had me stumped at first, with husband Francis' surname rendered as something vaguely similar to "Swarson." Thankfully, that name was repeated more clearly in an additional item towards the end of the will as Swanson.

And then there was the baby of the family. Elizabeth, apparently not yet married, had been granted eight hundred pounds of tobacco, in addition to 164 acres of land in Anne Arundel County in a parcel known as Bridge Hill.

The names of these estates become a helpful clue as we wind our way through the generations, tracing each of the next owners of the property through time, until the parcel is sold out of the family entirely. Sometimes, in piecing together mystery genealogies, all we have to go by can sometimes be those whimsical names given to a piece of land.

Disappearance of the Children

 

At first glance, comparing the wills of William Ijams and his wife Elizabeth gives us two different lists of heirs. Not that the names of their children do not match between the two documents, but that the heirs listed in the later will comprise a much smaller list of family members. Why the disappearance of all those Ijams children?

When William Ijams drew up his last testament in 1734, his was a large family. William named five sons and four daughters when he filed that will in Anne Arundel County, Maryland: John, Plummer, William, Richard, Thomas, Ann, Elizabeth, Mary, and Charity.

Granted, William included so many contingencies in his will that it left me wondering whether he knew some of his sons might not outlive him—or at least not produce heirs of their own to whom they could pass their inheritance, should tragedy strike son as well as father. So when I saw the reduced list of heirs named in his wife Elizabeth's own will in 1762, I assumed that was indeed the case: tragedy surely had struck the extended Ijams family.

Not necessarily so, I'm realizing now as I rethink this list from Elizabeth's own will.

Filed in the same colonial Maryland county, Anne Arundel, Elizabeth's 1762 will mentioned only three sons: John, "Plumer," and Thomas. Of the four daughters only one was named—thankfully with her married named, Ann Williams. An additional name, Ruth Ijams, was noted to be Elizabeth's daughter-in-law, but the will did not identify which son had married Ruth, though I presume it would have been one of the three sons mentioned in Elizabeth's will.

Yet a stipulation added at the end of the document mentioned, "if any one of the rest of my children," seeming to indicate that there were indeed other surviving children. For those others, Elizabeth seemed to indicate that she felt, according to her husband's will, that those other children were not entitled to anything else.

Nor are we, the silent witnesses two centuries later, entitled to know their names, unfortunately. The rest of them may have all survived—or at least some of those descendants. But which daughters married, if any, and what their married names might have been, Elizabeth's will won't be informing us. Nor will that document explain what became of William or Richard Ijams, the two sons left out of their mother's listing.

There likely were other ways to trace those descendants, should any Ijams descendants wish to do so. Other than our curiosity regarding Elizabeth's will, I likely won't do so, either. My interest would solely be in pursuing Elizabeth's son John, who would be in my mother-in-law's direct line.

More to my point would be to push back yet another generation to see where Elizabeth might have been mentioned in the documents drawn up by her own parents.

Evolution of a Letter

 

To find mention of a woman in colonial America, the most likely place to look might be in her husband's records. Thus, in my search for Elizabeth Plummer, wife of William Ijams, it would be reasonable to look for mention of her name in his will. Since William died in 1734 in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, it would seem a reasonable step to look there for his will.

There is only one problem with that assumption: the evolution of the letter "J." If you thought it would be a simple matter to look for a surname like Ijams, think again. That letter "J" can play tricks on the unsuspecting researcher. I've struggled with that very topic, every time I return to this Ijams research.

Take, for instance, my post written three years ago on the history of the letter "J." I assure you: the struggle is real.

I didn't, however, anticipate the one variation which took me by surprise this month when seeking a will for Elizabeth's husband William Ijams. I hardly expected to see the will indexed under the name "Jiams," but that is exactly how it was handled.

Let's take a look at the situation. In a document signed on June 28, 1734, Elizabeth's husband set out to put his house in order. He made provisions for his wife Elizabeth from his personal estate, and bequeathed property to his sons William, John, and Plummer. In addition, he named sons Richard and Thomas, as well as daughters Elizabeth, Mary, Charity, and Ann.

The only problem? His name was indexed as "Jiams."

Looking more closely, I checked for every time the document used what to me—and apparently to others, as well—looked like the letter "J." Perhaps it is no surprise, seeing this excerpt of the will, to realize that it began with the statement, "Jn the name of God Amen J William Jiams of Ann Arundell County in the Province of Maryland...."

No, those Js are not typos. Every handwritten letter appearing to be the letter "J" actually made more sense as an "I." Thus, the man writing that document in such a stylized hand was referring to someone named William Iiams, most likely husband of the Elizabeth I'm researching. 

The next task, I discovered, was to actually find Elizabeth setting her hand to a last will and testament of her own. We'll need to fast forward, tomorrow, to 1762 to compare the children's listings from the two documents.

To Begin at the End

 

You know the genealogy drill: begin at the end and work your way backwards in time, from death to birth. It was in such a search for indications of the last days of Elizabeth Plummer Ijams that I started by looking for a will.

Actually, to be more precise, knowing that Elizabeth, my mother-in-law's sixth great-grandmother, had died in 1762, I was fairly certain that I wouldn't find such a document. After all, most women of that time period didn't have property to dispose of, legally. I was sure the only mention I'd find of Elizabeth would be in her husband's will.

There was, however, a mention of such a document for her in a note affixed to a Find A Grave entry for Elizabeth. The note referred to a publication, the Maryland Calendar of Wills, of which there were several volumes, some available online at FamilySearch. Not finding the volume noted in the Find a Grave entry—volume twelve—I gave up and went looking elsewhere.

After trying some other resources—a register of Maryland wills at FamilySearch and a note at the Maryland Genealogical Society regarding their indexing project—I gave up Googling and went back to Ancestry.com to see what I could find. 

Surprise, there it was: the 1762 will drawn up by Elizabeth, widow of William Ijams, providing her last instructions to her children about her property in Anne Arundel County in colonial Maryland. Such a contrast it was to see the listing of her surviving children, so many years after her husband had drawn up his own will in 1734.

Reading between the lines on those two documents may help us piece together what became of Elizabeth's family in the interim, part of the task we'll need to undertake as we explore the life and times of this distant ancestor in my mother-in-law's roots. But first, we'll take some time to orient ourselves to the general history of the region that Elizabeth once called home.

Vanishing Into the Gap

 

As exciting as it was yesterday to find mention of the paternal grandfather of my brick wall third great grandfather Thomas Firth Rainey, it barely took one more day for me to realize that finding anything more on this Rainey family may take far longer than just another evening's research. Wills may be the go-to resource for discovering more about our distant ancestors from the 1700s, but it takes a couple more generations before widespread documentation can carry us through the ages. What's happened with that Rainey family line—poof! In just a moment—is that it has vanished into the document gap between the earliest years of our nation and the 1850 census.

So far this month, we've discovered that Thomas Firth Rainey, my third great-grandfather, was son of Isham Rainey. Isham, in turn, was son of William Rainey of Brunswick County, Virginia. Finding William Rainey's 1812 will yesterday opened up new research possibilities for me by revealing the names of Isham's siblings: Mary, Martha, Elizabeth, William, Jesse, Herbert, and Zebulon.

Now that I've found those names, you know I've begun the search for those collateral lines of descent. After all, I have potential DNA cousins to place in the right family group. But do you think I've found any actual documentation for these siblings? Sadly, no—with the exception of some marriage records from the 1790s. Other than that, it seems like the entire family, other than Isham, has disappeared.

The problem that has presented itself at this point in the research is two-fold. On the one hand, there are researchers out there who have been puzzling over this family for decades. They have not been shy about sharing their speculations. And others have been more than willing to help themselves to those theories by pasting them into their public family trees, despite lack of documentation.

On the other hand, there is that gap I mentioned. Unless I can find where the (possibly) wandering Rainey descendants moved, I can't with certainty say I've found a will for any of the brothers. If any of those siblings died before the advent of the 1850 census with its listing of every resident in a household, I'll have no way to know that those are the right descendants for my Rainey line. It's that gap between the early 1800s and the 1850 census which has suddenly brought me to a standstill.

There is, however, one encouraging sign. In William Rainey's 1812 will, he mentioned several grandchildren, providing us a token sign that there were indeed marriages and families continuing the Rainey legacy. But other than one specific grandson, there is no mention of names for any of the others among his grandchildren. 

One, however, is better than none, so it will be worth our while to learn a bit about Benjamin L. Rainey to see if information gleaned there can lead us to any others in the extended Rainey family.   

Back to the Beginning

 

Sometimes, genealogy research seems to gain lightning speed, even after having been stymied for months, even years. That's what happened this month, with the discovery not only of Thomas Firth Rainey's parents, but then the revelation of his maternal grandparents and their children. Then, progress can just as quickly turn in the other direction, and that is where I'm stuck right now, unable to push back through that maternal Firth generation any farther.

Since I'm stuck on that detour to what was once the research path of least resistance, it may be a good time to turn back to the beginning of this month's research goal. After all, the goal for my Twelve Most Wanted for March was to find the parents of my third great-grandfather Thomas Firth Rainey. What about pushing further back on his paternal side?

We've already discovered that Thomas' father gifted us with an unusual given name, Isham. Also knowing that the Rainey and Firth families originated in Brunswick County, Virginia, I decided to see whether Isham himself might have been mentioned in the will of any other Raineys in Brunswick County.

Once again, FamilySearch.org's Full Text Search came to the rescue. There in Brunswick County, the will book contained a document signed by one William Rainey on September 30, 1812. In his testament, which was presented in court on April 24, 1815, William Rainey named his wife Mary, along with his daughter, also named Mary; another daughter, Martha; a married daughter, Elizabeth Edmunds; his sons William, Jesse, Herbert, Zebulon, and, of course, Isham. In addition, the will acknowledged several grandchildren.

If we've gone back to the point at which we started this month, we now have plenty to work with in also pushing Thomas Firth Rainey's paternal line back two more generations. Not bad for one month's exploration.

Bypassing "Go"

 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Taking a Closer Look

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

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

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

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

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

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

The Snider Will

 

Sometimes, just looking at the details of an ancestor's will can help connect the dots between the current generation of the decedent's offspring and relatives belonging to earlier generations. It is not so much a case of looking at the names of those who will inherit parts of their father's estate, but a matter of examining the connection with witnesses—and sometimes executors—named on the document.

In Nicholas Snider's case, he drew up his will in Perry County, Ohio, and signed it on April 17, 1854. Best I can tell, he died just shy of one year later. His will was presented in court on April 27, 1855. In the brief document, his son Conrad was named first, being the son with whom Nicholas had been living at the time of his death—or at least at the most recent census. Also mentioned in the will were Nicholas' unmarried daughter Catherine as well as his married daughter "Mary" (baptized Maria Augusta), along with several sons.

Looking at the names listed in the will for Nicholas' sons, I can find Jacob, the eldest, then Joseph (being Aloysius Joseph, as the first son by that name was said to have died at sea), and Lewis. Simon was named as executor, but there were no bequests made in the document for him. There was no mention of either Peter or Andrew, Nicholas Snider's two remaining sons, though Peter was certainly alive at the time, being mentioned as a son of Nicholas in a 1902 book, A Biographical Record of Fairfield and Perry Counties, Ohio.

It was the others named in the will that had me wondering, though. In drawing up a will, it was not uncommon to see a close family member of the father's generation called upon to ensure that the provision of the will be attended to faithfully. Sometimes, such a person might be the widow's brother, for instance, but in other cases, a trusted business partner might be called upon.

In the case of Nicholas Snider, he chose one of his sons to serve as executor. For the witnesses to his will, he asked two men to sign: John Lidey and David Church. Both of those names stump me. I am fairly certain neither of them were connected to Nicholas' wife's family—and at any rate, she had already died, so there was no need to protect her interests in her widowhood. 

The question still comes up in my mind, though: when Nicholas moved his family from Pennsylvania—even by way of Maryland—was there no one from among his own family to make the long trip to Ohio with him? I'm still looking for familiar surnames, but records on this end of his life are too far removed from the time period when any other family members might still be alive. Perhaps returning to those earliest census records might help spot possible connections in either 1810 back in Adams County, Pennsylvania, or 1820 after the family removed to Perry County, Ohio.

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. 

Ancestor #3: If There's a Will

 

Genealogy lecturers who delight in crafting the clever presentation title might have found it irresistible to repurpose that old saying, "Where there's a will, there's a way," but I find it far more useful to grab the retake that FamilySearch launched this past year: their Full Text Search capability. With a few well-chosen search terms, including the name of a brick wall ancestor, this tool—if any can do it at all—can spot the name of a brick-wall ancestor among the legatees in the will of an as yet unknown parent.

At least, that's what I'm hoping as I pursue the third of my Twelve Most Wanted for 2025. 

That third research goal involves the early life of my second great-grandfather William Alexander Boothe. Supposedly born in 1812 in a now-nonexistent Virginia county—Nansemond—this ancestor married, had two sons, then lost his wife. According to family stories, he also lost his property and headed to Tennessee with those two motherless sons in tow. From that point, he married my second great-grandmother Rachel Teresa Riley—another relative whose name is in dispute—and fathered eleven more children, including my direct line Martha Cassandra Boothe.

William Alexander Boothe's existence is clearly documented from the point of his arrival in Tennessee, but finding him in those earlier records in Virginia has been a quest which eludes me. Granted, it's been a while since I wrestled with that research question—William Alexander Boothe was my first choice for Twelve Most Wanted in the year I started this project, January of 2020—but I really haven't made much headway.

It's time for me to find the rest of the story about Will's parents and potential siblings. After all, I have twenty six DNA matches to my test results at Ancestry, according to their ThruLines tool. If I push back another generation to the ThruLines suggested parents, I pick up an additional five possible DNA cousins. Granted, those are modest numbers—not like what I stand to gain by solving the research question for yesterday's selected ancestor—but its the thrill of the chase which keeps me and some of my DNA cousins on William Boothe's trail. With the latest tools added to the research arsenal, March may well be my month to find that answer. 

When It's Not There

 

When we find a specific detail about an ancestor's life, of course we first want to locate a document to verify the assertion. Last week, I encountered information through Harry Wright Newman's book, Anne Arundel Gentry, which indicated that a deed verifying the relationship of Elizabeth Plummer not only to her father Thomas, but also to her husband William Iiams had been destroyed by a courthouse fire. Not to worry, though—at least, according to the Newman book—for many of the records destroyed in the 1704 fire were re-recorded when residents voluntarily brought in their own copies to again be noted in the court documents.

But when I headed to the FamilySearch Labs' Full Text search to locate such a record, I wasn't able to find anything quite like the quoted document from the Newman book. This means finding alternate ways to locate the alleged document, if possible. If it is not available through FamilySearch, then another possibility could be the Maryland Archives. Besides that, someone posted a copy of a will pertinent to Elizabeth's own family on Ancestry. As the Newman book mentioned Elizabeth Plummer Iiams' death as occurring in 1762, that became my next goal to locate. Again, no results for my search.

Using other researchers' writings as a guide to locate documents can work to our benefit, and there are other resources out there for locating these collateral lines connected to our William Ijams (or Iiams) family. Even the extensive notes attached to the Find A Grave memorial for Thomas Plummer, Elizabeth's father, provide a guide of the book and page numbers for records of interest, which may be findable through the Maryland Archives.

I'll be gathering more of these hints to compose a to-do list for my document hunt. Somewhere, those records should be findable. It's just a matter of determining which repository has the actual document. Hopefully, somewhere, the records I need will be findable online. After all, it's a long way to Maryland—unless I can do my research "travel" virtually.

May: a Month of Mishaps

 

Times like this compound challenges faced by those of us bloggers who have committed to posting on a daily basis. If you thought today—after missing my chance yesterday—would be the big reveal for the details on the will of the founding Ijams ancestor in my mother-in-law's line, think again. Yesterday? My mind was too befuddled to think clearly enough to read anything, let alone handwritten documents drawn up in 1703.

But that was yesterday's excuse. Today? Well, if I'm lucky, I'll escape from the Denver airport before midnight, if our connecting flight arrives to whisk us away to Kansas City. This time, thankfully, the event is a joyful one: the wedding of a Stevens cousin's granddaughter, a time for family from across the country to gather together for a family reunion of sorts. 

If we get there, that is. While our consolation prize is that we finally get a much-delayed plane to fly in, the drawback is that we still aren't sure the craft is mechanical-issue free. What a dilemma.

So, about that will: the last testament of the founding immigrant William Ijams—or Eyams, as Harry Wright Newman painted him—was supposedly presented in court in 1703. You know my first stop was to check for a copy through the FamilySearch Labs' Full Text search. Unfortunately, despite searching for all the spelling variations I've already encountered—Ijams, Iiams, Jiams, and even Eyams, and even just looking for a William with wife named Elizabeth—there was no sign of any such document. While my mother-in-law's seventh great-grandfather may well have died when Mr. Newman reported it in his book, it looks like I'll have to come up with some other creative search ideas if I am to find the actual will.

Meanwhile, we've bypassed the other side of two Ijams generations, the wives of the elder and the younger William Ijams. Since I've spotted information on their two families during my explorations, we may as well round out the month by noting something about the two Elizabeths who married those Williams: Elizabeth Plummer, wife of the younger William Ijams, and Elizabeth Cheyney, wife of the founding immigrant ancestor.

Back to the Books

 

While source documents are vitally important as we push our way back in time to more distant ancestors, I keep comparing notes with those trailblazing genealogy books. Since we discussed my mother-in-law's sixth great-grandfather William Ijams yesterday, I thought I'd hop over to the pages of Harry Wright Newman's 1933 book, Anne Arundel Gentry to see what else could be found in addition to the 1734 will of William Ijams we already reviewed.

Sure enough, the names we saw included in William's will lined up exactly with those mentioned by author Harry Wright Newman. The book included a few more details about William Iiams' children, which will also need to be verified. No descendants were missing, though, to my relief.

Noted also were the names of this William's parents: William and Elizabeth Cheyney Iiams—or Eyams, as Newman put the spelling in his introductory comments to that section of the family's chapter. Newman portrayed this earliest William as "the Pioneer," though he also mentioned that any arrival record for the founding settler William had not yet been found.

Newman's best guess is that William Eyams—or Iiams, or Ijams—arrived in colonial Maryland by 1665, not long before his marriage to Elizabeth Cheyney before 1670. The author also noted that this earliest William drew up his will in 1698, but that it wasn't probated until November 10, 1703, in court in Anne Arundel County.

Having that date handy now, let's pop back to the digitized court records for that time period to double check which names William mentioned before his passing in July of 1703. 

Finding Yet Another Generation

 

No matter how much family history research I've done, it always seems incredible to me to realize I'm looking at a document drawn up by an ancestor who lived in the early 1700s. In today's case, that ancestor was named William Ijams, the sixth great-grandfather of my mother-in-law. Said to have been born in colonial Maryland about 1670, William drew up his will in "Ann Arundell" County (as the clerk put it) in 1734.

For our purposes almost three hundred years later, William Ijams' will serves to help us find the names populating another generation in the Ijams line. While we will look at the names of the siblings of John Ijams, William's son in my mother-in-law's direct line, first we need to recall the spelling challenges of researching such a surname as his. Ijams, as it turns out, was not always spelled in the same manner as we've found it in more recent documents. In the case of this particular will, the surname was actually written "Jiams," similar to how we found the name written for William's son John in his will nearly fifty years later.

So who was mentioned in this 1734 will? The first mention went to William's wife Elizabeth, who was to receive much of his personal estate—if she chose to remain unmarried after his passing. Then, in order of mention, William designated legacies for his son John, his son Plummer, and his daughter Ann. Later in William's will, he also mentioned another son, William, plus his sons Richard and Thomas. Included in the mention of names were three additional daughters, Elizabeth, Mary, and Charity—with that last daughter's name a guess on my part, due to the faded nature of the digitized record.

Equipped with that list of names of the children of William and Elizabeth, we can see how those same given names made a fair showing in the generations to follow. We can take our cue from that, now aware of how easily one William Ijams could be confused for a cousin. The same will likely be true for the names Plummer, Elizabeth, and Ann. As we dig further into researching descendants of that extended Ijams family, we will likely find those names echoing through subsequent generations, as well.

As surprised as I was to discover the Ijams line remaining in colonial Maryland to such an early date, this William did not turn out to be the founding Ijams ancestor. That designation was apparently to go to William's father. And, seeing how the family had such a penchant for namesakes, you will find it unsurprising to learn that my mother-in-law's sixth great-grandfather was the son of yet another man by the name of William Ijams.

Fishing for Another Line

 

I'm still holding out hope that I'll discover a new branch of my mother-in-law's matriline which will lead me to the "ah hah!" moment when I realize just how this family tree stuff all connects. But after the failed attempt to find such a matriline descending down to present time, it looks like it's time to reel back in and start fresh by casting my line from a higher vantage point. Instead of looking at each descendant of Rosanna Jackson Mitchell, as we've been doing this past week, we'll need to move back a generation or two.

In the meantime, we'll return to Rosanna's maternal grandfather's line to move back another generation there. That grandfather was William Ijams, who had been born in colonial Maryland, yet with two of his younger brothers, along with his wife Elizabeth and several children of their own, had moved to what was then the frontier of Ohio. We had found mention of his name in his father John Ijams' 1783 will. Now, it's time to step back another generation to John Ijams' parents, also named William and Elizabeth Ijams.

While the challenges of finding a story line to bring these ancestors to life seem insurmountable, we'll give it our best shot, examining the local history of Anne Arundel County during the colonial period of John Ijams and his parents in the coming week. Just knowing these ancestors are findable, despite their being my mother-in-law's sixth great-grandparents, is awesome in my book.The line just keeps going back, yet still remains in North America. Knowing that we are a nation of immigrants reinforces the assumption that  eventually, we must have come from somewhere else, but here we are, still looking at last wills and testaments which were drawn up in Maryland in 1734.

According to the Book

 

Discovering a book dedicated to the recounting of one's own family line can be a mixed bag. On the one hand, we need to proceed cautiously, if we do consider the book's contents at all, just in case the published researcher has committed the same errors so many of us unpublished researchers are prone to making. On the other hand, since some of those family history volumes have the added advantage of being written by researchers one hundred—or more—years closer to the ancestors in question, they may contain personal knowledge of which those in our current century may not have been aware. My personal view is to find a reliable published researcher and use him or her as a trailblazer: someone who is pointing out the path back to more distant ancestry. For this, I adopt the motto: Trust, but Verify.

Now that we're tackling the ancestry of my mother-in-law's fourth great-grandfather, William Ijams of Maryland, for starters, I may as well proceed according to the book. "The book," in this case, would be Harry Wright Newman's Anne Arundel Gentry, a book published in 1933.

We've already seen from the Newman book that William was the eldest son of John Iiams and Rebecca Jones. The book provided the dates at which John Iiams' will was drawn up (October 9, 1782) and probated (April 21, 1783). Taking those dates to the FamilySearch Labs Full Text search engine, I was able to pull up the actual will and confirm what Harry Wright Newman had listed in his book.

It's time to move on to the next generations, so I'll test that process again for each new step. According to Newman's book, John Iiams was son of William Iiams and Elizabeth Plummer. Since the name Plummer seems to echo through subsequent generations of the Iiams and Ijams family, I'm keen to see what I can find on this maternal branch—but also mindful of my goal of following that Ijams line as far back as possible during this month.

Peeking ahead yet another generation, our William's grandfather William Iiams was in turn son of yet another Iiams by the name of William—you see now why that given name seems to have ricocheted throughout the generations of the Ijams family. This elder William—we're now talking about my mother-in-law's seventh great-grandfather—was married to another Elizabeth. (Not that we want to make this more complicated or anything....) 

The maiden name for this ancestral Elizabeth, wife of the elder William, has been alternately entered as "Cheyney" or "Cheney." She was apparently daughter of Richard Cheyney, born about 1652, according to Newman's calculations.

As for her husband William—listed as William Eyams—he was the founding immigrant ancestor of this line in my mother-in-law's ancestry. Though his name is not included in any records of arrivals to the colony of Maryland, we do have a date for his will, which was drawn up in 1698 and presented in court in Anne Arundel County—another document to verify through the FamilySearch Labs Full Text search.

Thus, the trailblazer—in this case, Harry Wright Newman—has laid out specific dates to guide us in confirming the Ijams family's story, once they arrived in the North American British colonies. Now, we'll begin tackling the search for documents and start reading between the lines to see what other information can be uncovered.

When the Family Stories Don't Add Up

 

There are times, when we work on our family's history, that we realize some things just don't add up. Here I am this month, working to push back the generations on my mother-in-law's Ijams line, when I find myself distracted by something that falls in that category: it just doesn't add up right.

Face it, my mother-in-law's fourth great-grandfather William Ijams, was a child of colonial Maryland. Born in 1748, William was oldest son of a couple living in Anne Arundel County, whose father was a member of the exclusive old South River Club. Looking closely at John Ijams' will, it is clear the man was also a slave-holding planter.

Though William was John Ijams' eldest son, he was not the one named to inherit the prized family property when his father passed away in 1783. That privilege went to the two youngest sons in the family, Thomas Plummer Ijams and Isaac Ijams. To William was granted just one bequest: two of his father's slaves—"and no more."

What was ironic about that abrupt documented dismissal was that William's two youngest brothers eventually sold their inherited residence in 1796—a property which had been held by family members for the prior five generations—and moved with William to the Northwest Territory.

Unless you are deeply involved with the politics which established that Northwest Territory, you may not be aware that two of the men who were instrumental in framing the Northwest Ordinance were both from Puritan-influenced New England, and insisted that the new territory be established as a free territory. In other words, no slavery allowed.

So, my question: what did William do with his sole inheritance, once he decided to move to the frontier which became Ohio? Furthermore, if he did come from a slave-holding heritage, why would he have chosen to remove himself from that position of privilege and move to the edge of civilization, especially with such a restriction?

There is another piece of the Ijams story which can be interwoven into the narrative at this point. While in the previous month, we were able to connect the surnames which married into the Ijams family, we can now see that that research effort will yield us some benefits.

Remember Walter Teal, William's son-in-law, husband of William's daughter Mary? His father, Edward Teal, was one of the first settlers in Fairfield County, Ohio, at about the time of the Ijams family's arrival there. Edward, as it turns out from old history books, was among those who established the first Methodist Church in what eventually became Fairfield County—as "class leader," as one 1901 history book recounted. Other members of that early congregation represented family names of William Ijams' future sons-in-law, demonstrating the close association of William and his family to that early "religious society."

The question at this point may be whether William Ijams came to the Northwest Territory, then converted, changing his entire outlook on slavery as well as other matters of life, or whether he already had bought into those principles before leaving Maryland. Going back to the passage on the first Methodist congregation in Fairfield County, Ohio, author C. M. L. Wiseman noted it was "composed of Methodists who had emigrated from near Baltimore, Maryland." If that early group included William Ijams' family, they likely were of that religious persuasion before deciding to move to Ohio.

While many people who migrated westward went for the promise of a better opportunity in that new home, William Ijams seemed to have chosen to leave his "better" opportunity behind when he made his decision to move. Whatever was involved in that decision, it called for a radical departure from life as he had experienced it through his family's heritage.

Or perhaps John Ijams knew that about his eldest son before he even drew up his will. 

Sorting Out the Family Names

 

When it comes to tracing the extended Ijams family, it's been a challenge to sort out all the family names. Some given names appeared to be favorites over the generations. My main interest has been William Ijams, my mother-in-law's fourth great-grandfather, but it didn't take long to discover that he wasn't the only William Ijams in his family's home back in colonial Maryland. In order to make sure I didn't accidentally slip across family lines and stumble into the wrong collateral line, I had to first diagram the relatives as I found them.

Thankfully, we've located William's father's will, which provides a basic road map to guide us through the lines of descent. Though that showed us William's brothers—which, according to the will of his father John, also included sons John, Isaac, and Thomas Plummer Ijams—the document also provided us advanced warning of name twins ahead. Witness to John Ijams' will, for instance, noted John Ijams "of Plummer"—presumably son of the Plummer Ijams who also served as witness. And in the codicil dated March 15, 1783, there was mention of a William Ijams "son of George."

Fortunately, the will provided some guideposts to help us roughly estimate age ranges. John Ijams had drawn up his will on October 9, 1782, then added that codicil on March 15, 1783. The document was presented in court in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, on April 21, 1783, so we have an estimate regarding John's date of death.

The document listed four married daughters: Elizabeth Lyons, Ann Stockett, Mary Ijams—likely deceased by that point, though her two children and inferred husband were mentioned—and, almost as an afterthought at the close of the document, Margaret Sunderland. 

As for the sons, John Ijams specifically noted that his eldest son was William. Also named were sons John, Isaac, and Thomas Plummer Ijams. It was to the final two sons that John bequeathed his property and—thankfully—made mention of stipulations, in case either, or perhaps both, died before they came to  "ye age of twenty one."

That was the only device left us to help determine dates of birth for any of John Ijams' children. Since John died in 1783 sometime between his last codicil dated March 15 and the presentation of his will in court on April 21, we now can say his youngest two sons had to have been born after at least mid-April of 1762. Further, since the will specified that youngest son Isaac would be permitted to "act for himself at ye age of sixteen," his birth was likely after April of 1767.

Those dates are only estimates, of course, but may become useful as we move forward in this exploration of William Ijams and his siblings, some of whom moved with him when he left Maryland for the wilds of territorial Ohio around the turn of the upcoming century. 

Using Trailblazers to Chase Down the Documents

 

When a genealogy book conveniently tells all about an ancestor's family, for some that might be the end of the story. For me, it's just the beginning. I need to chase down the documents to confirm the author of the book got those details right.

Fortunately, in the case of my mother-in-law's fourth great-grandfather William Ijams, I have one of those handy books: Harry Wright Newman's 1933 volume, Anne Arundel Gentry. Among the twenty two pioneer settlers of that colonial Maryland county mentioned in the book, William Ijams' founding immigrant ancestor claimed a spot. This month, I'll be using the Newman book as my trailblazer to check out what legal documents had to say on his assertions.

According to the Newman book, William Ijams—Newman has his surname spelled Iiams—was son of John and his wife Rebecca Jones. Conveniently, the book mentions John Iiams' date of death to have been in 1783. Armed with my new favorite genealogical search engine, the Full Text search now available from FamilySearch Labs, I located the 1782 will for John Iiams in the Anne Arundel County, Maryland, records, presented to the court there on April 21, 1783.

Unsurprisingly, John's will contained mention of a son named William. Well, let me amend that: if you can buy the idea that the will for "Jhon Jiams" was really the last testament of a man named John Ijams, we are in business. If so, our William had brothers named John, Isaac, and Thomas Plummer Iiams, as well as married sisters Elizabeth Lyons and Ann Stockett. In addition, he had a sister Mary who died before her father's death, who apparently had married a paternal cousin—likely the Thomas Iiams also mentioned—for her two children were named in the will with that same Iiams surname.

Having the family constellation outlined in that document helps as we move forward—or backward in time, as we soon will be doing. Collateral lines will come in handy as we move farther along in the extended family, for this was a family which believed in recycling favorite given names, as we will soon see. Our William was not the only one to have been given that name in his family line.