I’m In!

Signing up for online services is not my forte. Late at night is not my best time. I don’t know why I would have thought a combination of the two would make a winner. It’s best I aborted my mission late the other night in favor of a more sane time and approach.

The task I had in mind was obtaining a copy of the supplemental volume to Mercer Tilson’s 1911 publication, The Tilson Genealogy. Since I had so easily obtained a copy of the public domain title through Internet Archive, I had hoped the same could be attempted for its more recently issued supplement.

Let’s just say the interface for obtaining more recent books on loan online is not quite as user friendly as it could be. Something was lacking in the translation, and I found myself wandering around in cyber circles on the Internet Archive site. Same for the Open Library site. When stuff like that happens, it’s time to push away from the computer table and call it a night.

Back, fresh and rested, I saw considerable improvement in that online site yesterday. It’s amazing how that happens.

With a fresh attempt, I was able to sign up for an online account and check out the book yesterday, for which I was thankful. I was hoping this book would contain the explanations to some of the confusing discrepancies I had found in the 1911 genealogy.

Opening the supplement, Tilson-Tillson Descendants, I took some time getting oriented to the layout of the volume. The first thing that caught my eye was the preface, explaining how the supplement came to be. Published by Gateway Press of Baltimore in 1978, the book was actually the creation of “The Tilson Book Committee.” These five Tilson/Tillson descendants—Kenneth Keator Clark, William Tillson, Mary Davis Kidd, Maude Dudley Snyder, and historian Marjorie Tillson Cross—completed their task in July, 1978, at Tillson, New York.

It was that very place—Tillson, New York—that inspired the whole process, according to the preface to the supplement. Tillson, a hamlet in the Hudson Valley county of Ulster, must have been founded by a namesake from this same family line—although I couldn’t find out who that might have been from a cursory shuffle through online resources.

At any rate, owing to a letter sent from Texas—by a Tilson descendant, no doubt—to the postmaster at Tillson, New York, asking about the “Tillson” family, first one, then several other descendants joined together to explore what could be done about adding a supplement to the original Tilson genealogy. By 1974, a Tillson reunion garnered forty participants.

By 1975, enough descendants were on board with the project to raise funds to reprint the original Mercer Tilson volume. In addition, a committee formed to gather information on “as many descendants as could be found of Edmond Tilson” of Plymouth, Massachusetts records dating from 1638. The result of that work was the supplement I have just accessed.

The supplement was organized into four sections, each focusing on descendants of a separate branch of the fifth generation descendants from Edmond Tilson. The first section was my focus: that of William Tilson and his wife, Mary Ransom.

I was ready to turn pages! But I soon realized the unfortunate impact of the statement from the preface, “We regret omissions, but records were not made available.” Though the committee mentioned their hope that the data gathering process would be ongoing and sufficient to permit issuance of additional supplements, perhaps the absence of any further editions might have been owing to the lack of people’s understanding that they were even part of this colonial family. I’m sure my grandfather’s family had no idea of such a heritage. I’m sure if my grandmother had known, she would have made sure our family would have become part of the entries, just as she had done for corrections of the Broyles family genealogy.

In the end, while the supplement has provided me with fourteen hundred additional names of Tilson descendants—I am, after all, seeking news such as this to round out my database for DNA test results—it didn’t solve the tiny mysteries that had kept me running in research circles over the past few days. I still don’t have documentation—or even secondary reports—of just who Janet Tilson actually married. And I still don’t have any explanation for what became of her supposed son, Sampson Cole, or his unnamed twin sisters.

Maybe, at some point, I will find the answers to these puzzles. For now, seeing they are collateral lines that I was using to flush out details that were lacking on my direct line, I guess I’ll head back to the main trail from this rabbit trail and let this mini-adventure suffice me for the moment. I need to get back to my main goal of gleaning names of all descendants of my own direct line, to be applied to my DNA test pursuits. I still have genetic “matches” to match up with a paper trail.

Above: "The Country Wedding," painting by John Lewis Krimmel, before 1820; courtesy Wikipedia; in the public domain.

Tracking Down Tilsons

It’s fairly apparent, just from the little bit I’ve seen while working on my Tilson line, that there are details needing a little adjustment in The Tilson Genealogy. Written by Mercer V. Tilson in 1911, the book covers a phenomenal amount of data in cataloguing the descendants of the immigrant, Edmond Tilson, who settled in Plymouth Colony back in the 1600s. But face it: one author cannot get it all right.

While puzzling over the fuzzy details under the entry for Janet Tilson, daughter of William Tilson and his wife, Mary Ransom, I ran into my first indication that her name might actually have been Jennet—or Jenny for short—in an abstract of marriage records in Saint Clair, Washington County, in Virginia. I also found myself struggling with Mercer Tilson’s details about her husband’s name being Joseph Cole, and her son’s name Sampson. I was unable to confirm this through documentation available online. True, while not everything has been digitized for online accessibility, there were some online reports asserting that a Joseph Cole claimed a woman by a different name as his wife. And a Sampson Cole was showing as having parents by different names, as well.

While those may have been instances of mistaken identity, they still made me realize this was an area that needed some attention. I want to pursue these details further.

Since Janet Tilson Cole was likely named after her paternal grandmother, it was encouraging to unearth records that indicated that the senior Janet’s name was actually rendered as Jennet, as well. While not source documents themselves, a database posted on Ancestry from the Family History Library labeled Massachusetts Marriages, 1633-1850 indicated a “Jennet Murdoch” married Stephen Tilson on 17 April, 1740. Also, volume two of Mayflower Births and Deaths had a listing for “Jennet” Murdock, daughter of John Murdock and Ruth Bartlett, who was born 10 December, 1711. Notice both records—well, at least as transcribed—showed the spelling as Jennet.

While I realize spelling was a flexible skill subject to artistic interpretation in previous centuries, computer searches are comparatively rigid in today’s world. While some search engines of a genealogical kind have been sensitized to spelling variations, some have not. Hence, the need to consider searching by the keyword spelled “Jennet” as well as the customary Janet I’ve been seeking.

As I turned back to all my usual resources to try that alternate spelling in my searches, I ran across an entry at Ancestry.com that reminded me of two keys. One was that there is another resource I’ve yet to consult. Two was a reminder to read other researchers’ comments. I found both those hints in the comments for one entry, not for Jennet but for her brother Lemuel.

I’ll get to that other resource in a moment. First, let’s explore the comment at Ancestry.com that reminded me that genealogical research can sometimes benefit from a crowdsourcing approach. As it turns out, that mysterious “Saint Clair’s Bottom” where the Tilson family settled in Virginia may have started out with a similar name: Sinclair’s Bottom. According to one Ancestry subscriber,

Saint Clair…has evolved over the years but originated as Sinclair’s Bottom, named for Charles Sinclair, who was the first settler in that area… Dr. Thomas Walker found Sinclair in that area in 1750 during his expedition of “The West.”

Of course, that comment came with absolutely no documentation, but I see it as a trailblazer’s gift, bidding me to follow the path and check it out for myself. If nothing else, someone with knowledge of local history of the area should be able to point me in the right direction. It’s just a matter of contacting the right resources and asking questions. At least the comment provides a lead. Now I can view that as a hypothesis to be tested and either confirmed or negated—rather than a blank slate to be researched in what could end up being a thousand different possible directions.

The other hint I gleaned from this foray into other Ancestry members’ comments? A reminder that there is yet another resource to check for this Tilson genealogy. Apparently, two follow up volumes were drawn up to correct apparent errors in Mercer Tilson’s original publication, according to FamilySearch—though I can find reference to only one of the supplements on WorldCat.

Apparently, according to both Internet Archive and Open Library, the ebook version may be borrowed—which I’ll do, if I can ever figure out how to make the thing work for me. These, however, are not considerations which lend themselves well to late night comprehension, so will be added to my genealogical to-do list for the near—and less stress-induced—future.

At that time, you can be sure I’ll be zeroing in, right on these troublesome Tilson descendants whose records seem to contradict published assertions laid down, back in 1911. While ever thankful for the trail blazed by researcher Mercer Tilson, I’m also grateful for the access we have now to so many digitized documents online. It is likely in the confluence of all these resources that we will arrive at the blended truth of the matter.

Above: "View on the Wissahickon," by James Peale circa 1830; courtesy Wikipedia; in the public domain.

S’More Saturday Stats

The last week having felt like a time of trudging along in circles reminded me that statistics is my friend, and I need to do a little bit of statistical celebration again. So let’s take a tally of where we’ve been in the last two weeks and see if we can find any numbers to cheer us me up.

Last time I talked about numbers and research progress was exactly two weeks ago. In the meantime, I have indeed been busy, adding names to my database at Ancestry.com. When I started paying attention to progress, in this one particular family tree I’ve been focusing on, I had just under fourteen hundred individuals in my files. The next time I looked—nine days later—I had increased the count by over five hundred people. Now, two weeks later, the count has gone up to twenty four hundred people—one thousand more than when I started counting.

This included both direct line ancestors and their collateral lines, mainly because my goal in this is to make connections with all the DNA matches I’ve been garnering over at Family Tree DNA. I’m finding that the genetic genealogy side of the equation is insisting I’m related to way more people than I can locate on my family tree.

The numbers are rising on that count, as well. I am now up to 786 matches, with the most recent match having been added to my account just the other day, March 12. That’s up from 767 just two weeks ago, and 750 when I first started keeping track, nine days before that.

For the most part, those matches are in the frustrating ranges of “Fifth Cousin to Remote Cousin.” Many more people the “Third Cousin to Fifth Cousin” range, as well. So you see the need to be knowledgeable about all my fourth great grandparents and all the genealogical roads that lead to them. That means knowing what happened to all those siblings and their descendants, as well. Gotta have some way to make those connections!

I had neglected my routine of trying to contact two or three matches by email every day, so in the last two weeks, I tried to work that into my plan. Mostly, my emails went something like this: “Hi, I’m Jacqi, and you and I are matches at the v to w range at FTDNA. Let’s compare notes on our family trees; here’s the link to mine.”

Though I’ve had some encouraging responses in the past, these latest attempts have been rather disappointing.

One man put it bluntly: “Don’t see anything.” End of story.

Another match turned out to be a man whose relative talked him into testing—a relative who then didn’t seem too keen on pursuing the match any further.

One interesting connection was to a man for whom the match seemed to fall on his paternal side—a side he knew absolutely nothing about, because he knows nothing about his own father.  Almost as handicapped as an adoptee, his enthusiasm to discover anything more was hampered by his total lack of a paper trail.

A last contact—a woman managing the account for two relatives who tested and matched me—felt certain she could pinpoint our mutual match to a specific surname in her tree, a surname I can’t find anywhere in my tree.

And so it went, these past two weeks. I feel very much as if my task right now is to lay down the infrastructure of my future genetic genealogical endeavors. Having a family tree with both depth and breadth seems paramount. My genes may match someone else’s, but my paper trail is not yet sufficient to unlock the door to a documented connection.

Realistically, if you want to hit pay dirt with this DNA testing thing, you have to settle it in your own mind that you will be the one doing all the contacting. I’ve had virtually no matches initiate contact with me—a sobering realization, considering all the money people sink into such an effort as this.

Most of the connections I’ve made lately seem somewhat disappointing.

Every now and then, though, a rewarding discovery comes at the conclusion of communication with one of these distant cousins. That has shown me the power of this technology to indicate connections with distant ancestors via a process of what has been called triangulation. That has been what has encouraged me to pursue the Rainey line further in the case of my second great grandmother, orphaned before her marriage and brief years of motherhood. It may also help prove that some entries in tried-and-true published genealogies of a century ago included mistaken reports which pointed to the wrong individuals in my own lineage.

All these people, for the record, match on my mother’s side of my family. All those Taliaferros and Davises and related lines I’ve been laboring over belong to my maternal line. These are also the ones who lead me back to Patriot ancestors and eligibility in lineage societies like Daughters of the American Revolution and, yes, now even The Mayflower Society.

Having gone over some of these hundred year old genealogy books with a magnifying glass has helped me uncover discrepancies, warts and all. The tedium will be worth it, if I can set the record straight. After all, I can’t be the only one consulting these publications. There may be literally thousands of people alive now who can claim those Mayflower passengers as ancestors. While it may disappoint some, it will certainly be helpful to others to discover the correct line of descent for those legendary people from our nation’s history.

Above: "One Shoe Off," 1807 painting by New England itinerant deaf painter, John Brewster, Jr.; courtesy Wikipedia; in the public domain.

After-Thoughts About Name-Afters

Families may have intended to name children after relatives from the preceding generation as a gesture of honor—but for those of us following after them, it makes the research trail more difficult.

I’m still mired in the research mess of several people named Joseph Cole, coupled with several named Sampson Cole, who don’t seem to be related to the people indicated in published genealogies. Try as I might to find a connecting relative whose identity in the mix can affirm for me that I have the right individual, the more I look, the more lost I get.

It occurred to me last night that perhaps looking to Janet Tilson Cole, rather than her husband or son, I could find some helpful information. After all, think about it: the reason William Tilson’s youngest daughter received the name Janet was likely owing to a namesake, herself.

William Tilson, born in 1741, was the soldier whose service during the French and Indian War had garnered him a piece of land in the outback of the colony of Virginia. Moving to Saint Clair—a settlement in what was then Washington County—he and his wife, Mary Ransom of Plympton, Massachusetts, had raised seven children. Janet, born in 1776, was the youngest of those seven.

Janet Tilson was the one who later married a man by the name of Joseph Cole—the very one whose identity I’ve been trying to ascertain through documentation. And yet, I can’t seem to find any record of her name—nor any Joseph Cole whose records link him to a wife by that name.

Let’s think about this Janet Tilson for a moment. Janet, herself, was named after someone: her father William’s mother, Janet Murdock Tilson. The older Janet is one for whom I’ve seen some records giving the spelling as Jennet. Could the same hold true for the younger Janet? And could it be possible, in that time frame, that some might have shortened that given name of Jennet to Jennie?

It just so happens that, though I’ve tried and failed at locating any marriage record for Joseph Cole and Janet Tilson, I did happen upon a report of a marriage record for a Joseph Cole and Jennie Tilson. It wasn’t, however, an original document that provided the information, but an index: Washington County Marriage Register, 1782-1820, originally published as Volume 34 of Beverley Fleet’s Virginia Colonial Abstracts.

Digitized and available on Ancestry.com (with my apologies to those non-subscribers who cannot follow the the above hyperlinked referrals), the abstract indicates the marriage of one Joseph Cole to a Jenny Tilson on December 27, 1799. If we can buy the plausibility of a Jennie coming from Jennet, a.k.a. Janet, then this will be a keeper.

It is interesting to note, as well, that the very line preceding Joseph’s happened to be for the marriage, exactly one year earlier—or could that have been a typo?—for a Hugh Cole. Hugh happens to be a name that I’ve seen appearing with mentions of Joseph Cole; perhaps they were brothers. Whoever they were, both Hugh and Joseph had the same officiant for their respective weddings. This may not seem like much, but it does give me hope that in the other places where I’ve seen Hugh’s name mentioned, the Joseph that follows suit is for the same man as the one who married our Janet.

Though those named-after relatives in this family have, so far, seemed to lead me astray, I keep hoping that, if I follow the trail of yet another clue-laden possibility, it will lead me to convincing evidence that I have the right people. Let’s hope Hugh yields us that clue.

Above: "Reader With Magnifying Glass," 1895 oil on canvas by Lesser Ury; courtesy Wikipedia; in the public domain.

Perhaps…

When faced with multiple ancestors sporting the same given name, it’s sometimes challenging to determine which one is which. Perhaps the best defense is to identify each identically-named ancestor in more than one way. Just as a hand slips easily into a well-fit glove, determining multiple qualifiers for each individual helps finger the right one.

That, at least, seemed like a sound idea when I thought to apply it to my William Tilson family in Washington County, Virginia. After having followed his sons to—and this detail does not help the differentiation effort—Washington County, Tennessee, William had returned to his old farm in Virginia, where his daughter Janet now lived with her husband, Joseph Cole.

Sounds easy, right? I have two additional identifying relationships to connect with this William to assure I have the right people.

All would have gone swimmingly, if only there were but one Joseph Cole. Apparently, there wasn’t.

Now the task begins to find multiple identifiers to finger the right Joseph Cole. I turned back to the Mercer Tilson genealogy book to pick up some clues. According to The Tilson Genealogy, Janet Tilson—likely born in 1776—had married Joseph Cole and continued to live in the area on what was noted to be “the original William Tilson farm.”

According to that genealogy, the couple had three children. In addition to unnamed twin daughters, for whom no date of birth was supplied, the couple had a son, whom they named Sampson.

An additional note by the author stated his date of birth was “perhaps 1810.”

When trying to gather multiple identifiers for an individual, “perhaps” doesn’t cut it.

“Oh,” you say, “Sampson isn’t that common a given name; this will be sufficient.”

Ya think?

Let’s check Find A Grave to see what trouble is headed our way. Fortunately, the Mercer Tilson narrative includes a separate entry for the son of Joseph and Janet, indicating that Sampson died “about” 1894, and that he was buried in Lutheran Church Cemetery in Saint Clair, Virginia. The book also mentions that he was married to Eliza Cole, and includes the names of several children, so we should have several means of identifying the right man.

Right away, we find an entry for a Sampson Cole who was born “perhaps” in 1810 and died “about” 1894—actually, 1811 and 1893. I’d call that close.

While he might have been listed as having a wife named Eliza Cole (check) and several children, some of whose names from the Tilson genealogy matched the Find A Grave listing (check), unfortunately, the helpful Find A Grave volunteer who created Sampson Cole’s memorial noted that Sampson was son of David Mason Cole and Remember Woolsey.

Wrong.

So much for finding the qualifier to help us identify the right Joseph Cole who married William Tilson’s daughter, Janet. The more we struggle with these details, the tighter the snare seems to shut.

Perhaps there was a different Sampson Cole who was son of Joseph and Janet. After all, not being sure whether the “Lutheran Church Cemetery” in the old village designation, “Saint Clair,” would be the same as the Saint James Lutheran Church Cemetery where this Sampson Cole was buried, perhaps I should be looking for a different Sampson.

Using the search engine at Find A Grave, I entered my parameters for any Sampson Cole who died before 1899—just to give a little leeway—and was buried in Virginia. The results handed me a list of four gentlemen by that same name, none of whom had dates of birth or death remotely close to my possibilities—other than the Sampson we’d already located, of course.

Though I had been hoping that a Sampson, married to an Eliza, who was son of Joseph, who was husband of Janet, might provide enough variables to point me in the right direction, that is not how this search is turning out. Apparently—and yes, even with a name like Sampson—it takes more details than these to ascertain that we are talking about the right individual.

To Greasy Cove and Back Again

It seems a popular pastime, among family members, to name subsequent generations of new arrivals after members of the previous generation. Once again, I find myself attempting to disentangle my forebears from multiple generations of namesake ancestors. Perhaps, there is an as-yet-unpublished missing link to tie together the William Tilson and Joseph Cole I am seeking.

My original plan was to retrace the migratory steps of my fifth great grandfather, William Tilson, born in Plympton, Massachusetts, in 1741 to parents Stephen and Janet Murdock Tilson. Note with what particular care I identify that William Tilson. There is a reason for this: he is not the only William Tilson to occupy this Tilson genealogy. I’ve got to insure I’m discussing the right William.

According to various narratives, this particular William, though only thirteen years of age at the start of the French and Indian War, had served in that particular conflict. (Just for the record, apparently his service did not occur until closer to 1759, when he would have turned eighteen.) For his efforts, he was awarded—at least, according to one resource—a land grant in Washington County in the Commonwealth of Virginia, in 1763.

That explains the family’s move from Massachusetts to Virginia.

The land William received was located near a river called—depending on which narrative you glean this information from—the Holstien, Holstein, or Holston River. One book explained that the land was on the South Fork of the river. Another book insists it was on the middle fork. At any rate, it was called the Holston River, and the property was situated near what is now known as Chilhowie, Virginia.

The particular settlement was known as Saint Clair’s Bottom—although even with this designation, there have been variations in that reported name.

This William didn’t stay in Saint Clair’s Bottom long. Though all seven of his children listed in the 1911 Tilson genealogy were apparently born there, by the time the subsequent generation reached adulthood, they chose to continue the migratory pattern. Families of Washington County and Bristol, Virginia, 1776-1996, indicates that the three of William’s sons who moved on to Tennessee were Stephen, Peleg (my direct line), and William—hence, my need to keep my Williams straight.

In addition to the difficulties I face in keeping tabs on my William Tilsons, there is also another problem with most genealogical narratives of this family: the tendency to call the place where the family eventually settled, Unicoi County, Tennessee. While it is true that the Tilson sons moved to that area, during the time of their arrival—anywhere from 1799 to the first decade of the 1800s—there was no such designation. Unicoi County was not established until 1875.

Nor was the town known, at that point, as Erwin. That name wasn’t arrived at—even then, only by a mishap—until the 1879 designation as “Ervin” was mistakenly changed to Erwin and, eventually, made official with the town’s charter of incorporation in 1891.

William Tilson’s entry in Find A Grave has the details of his immigration closest to the correct designation when a volunteer there noted on the memorial:

[William] moved…to Saint Clair Virginia…then moved with some of his sons to Greasy Cove, Tennessee, about 1799. [He] moved back [approximately] 1825 to Saint Clair after [his] wife Mary died in Greasy Cove.

“Greasy Cove”—along with Unaka, Unika, and Longmire—had been an early designation of the town which eventually became Erwin, according to the town’s official website.

Finding William Tilson’s memorial at Find A Grave was helpful. Sure enough, he was buried in the same cemetery as his son in law, Joseph Cole, at the Saint Clair's Bottom Primitive Baptist Cemetery. The only disturbing thing about the entry was that the date of death did not match that given in the Mercer Tilson book. However, as the memorial notes, the markings on the headstone can no longer be read—even by someone as knowledgeable about the property as a historian who serves as a deacon of the church.

As for Joseph Cole—the one who married William’s youngest daughter, Janet—you can add him to those many generations who like to repeat the names of their ancestors. Though there are assertions that Joseph Cole not only married William Tilson’s daughter but that he also came into possession of William Tilson’s farm as well, I have yet to find the right Joseph Cole’s memorial at the same Saint Clair’s Bottom Primitive Baptist Cemetery where William was buried.

From Families of Washington County and Bristol Virginia:

Daughter Janet Tilson married Joseph Cole and lived near Love’s Mills five miles from William McKee’s property on the South Fork of the Holston River. This was the original William Tilson farm. They had twin daughters and a son named Sampson Cole…

William and Mary Tilson moved to [Tennessee] in their later years to be near their son[s]. Mary died during this period and is buried [there]. William then moved back to Washington County [Virginia], making his home with Janet and Joseph Cole on his original farm.

Try as I might, though, I could not match any available Find A Grave memorials for Joseph Cole with records I’ve gleaned from other resources. Perhaps it is because, out of over two hundred interments at that cemetery, only half have been photographed and entered on the website. I can find absolutely no entry for Joseph’s wife, William Tilson’s daughter, Janet. Nor can I locate a memorial that lines up with the details I have for their son, Sampson.

Perhaps, this is yet another matter of too many namesakes populating the generations. Clearly, I’ll need to set up a device to separate each of the Williams, Josephs, and even Sampsons from each other.

You know what that means. Time to get technical. This calls for some scorecards.

Above: Raftsmen Playing Cards, 1847 oil on canvas by George Caleb Bingham; courtesy Wikipedia; in the public domain.

Never Think the Trail Will Be Easy

Rabbit trails have their inherent pitfalls. We knew this when we accepted the assignment. It’s not easy, following those rabbit trails detours.

I’d like to label this post with a title such as, “Oh-Oh,” but realize I already have at least one other entry—if not two—sporting the same title. Just something to bear in mind.

So, I’m following the path of my Tilson ancestors from their home in Plymouth colony to their new digs in southwestern Virginia. I’m trying every buzzword I can scavenge from the narratives to help locate the Saint Clair community in which the Tilsons supposedly settled in Virginia.

The Tilson Genealogy provides a few hints to lead me there, especially in the mention of William Tilson’s youngest daughter, Janet. She had married a man in that Virginia community by the name of Joseph Cole, staying behind to set up housekeeping there while her brothers—and later, her parents—continued onward to Tennessee.

You may remember I had mentioned yesterday that, after William’s wife had died in Tennessee, he returned to Virginia. Though William’s sons had stayed in Tennessee, apparently his daughter and son in law had never left the original Virginia settlement. According to The Tilson Genealogy,

[William] soon returned to his former home near Holstein Mills, Virginia, and died at his son-in-law’s, Joseph Cole’s, about 1825.

Though I was able to locate Saint Clair, thanks to Google Maps, I was having trouble finding any other entries fixing the town in Washington County, as the genealogy had listed it. The book’s narrative indicated that the town had later become part of Smyth County, but even so, I couldn’t find any other sources to corroborate that.

Heading to my favorite convenient utility for sorting out which town belongs in which county—a link I found years ago at the old Rootsweb website—I was informed that Saint Clair is actually considered to be part of Tazewell County.

That didn’t help much. Neither the Wikipedia entry for Tazewell nor that for Smyth indicated inclusion of a town bearing the name Saint Clair—though some of the other towns on the Google Map showed up in the listings for Tazewell. At least I was close.

Search difficulties like this remind me of my agonizing elementary school days—you know, those never-ending days of wearying exercises to look up words in the dictionary and dutifully inscribe them in some paper to be handed in before afternoon recess. Why, oh why, I ended up reading the entire dictionary page before actually writing down the assigned word and its definition, I never knew—but I think you can guess, now.

It will come as no surprise to you that I, back in the present and stumped with my inability to find anything online about this mysterious Saint Clair settlement, found anything and everything to catch my eye. Including this:

St. Clair’s Bottom Primitive Baptist Church.

Admit it: if you had found a search result like that, wouldn’t you click on it and go take a look?

So I read the fine print:

One of the few remaining pre-Revolutionary churches in Southwest Virginia, St. Clair’s Bottom Primitive Baptist Church was organized in 1775. The present building was erected in 1851 on the site of a log meeting house, which was deeded to the congregation by Colonel Joseph Cole. Colonel Cole is buried in the cemetery surrounding the church.

Wait! Joseph Cole? Wasn’t that the same name as that of my William’s son in law?

The scramble was on. I was now searching, not for William Tilson, but for Joseph Cole. Yet I couldn’t find anything for a Colonel Cole. If he was a colonel, within that time frame, when would he have served but in the Revolutionary War? I checked on the D.A.R. website, which obliged me all too well with several Joseph Coles—none of which bore the rank of colonel.

Since the narrative mentioned this Joseph Cole was buried in the church cemetery, I thought I’d wander over to see whether that cemetery was included in the many records on file at Find A Grave. Fortunately—or, perhaps, ominously—the results were more than obliging. I found not one entry for Joseph Cole, but two. In one, he was listed as having been born on May 22, 1750. In the other—which included a more detailed biography—his date of birth was claimed to be March 14, 1750. Both entries provided the same place of birth and death, as well as the same date of death. The entry with the later date of birth also called him Captain Joseph Cole.

This is all well and good. Quibbling about a date of birth that is off by eight days plus one or the other of two months whose names both begin with the letter “M” is trivial at this point—especially considering what else I found in these entries.

Despite having found someone by the right name (Joseph Cole), right location (Washington County A.K.A. Smyth County, Virginia) and right time frame (alive in 1825), this Joseph Cole had a wife by a different name than Janet Tilson. In fact, he had two wives: Remember Cole (yes, that was her maiden name) and Margaret Leeper.

Two chances to miss the right wife. How did that happen? Could this be a different Joseph Cole from that same tiny settlement?

I struggled with this observation, despite knowing both that published genealogies are no less immune to errors than any diligently-researched family tree posted online today, and that websites like Find A Grave often have volunteer-generated entries in error, as well.

And then I remembered one more clue from the Tilson book: if William Tilson had returned to the Coles in Virginia after the death of his wife, he would likely be buried in the same cemetery as his son in law.

Wouldn’t he?