Fourteen Years Ago . . .

 

Fourteen years ago, this date—May 8—was a Mother's Day. I remember it well, for the day's designation didn't set well with me. My own mother had died a few years before that point, due to lingering injuries sustained in a car wreck occurring on her way to her favorite hiking spot.

While my mother was no longer with us, her legacy remained—the many family stories she had passed down in a long chain of succession to me from her relatives who had received them from ancestors before that. Those were the types of stories which would cause children's eyes to light up around campfires late at night. I still remembered them from my childhood, and I wanted a way to preserve them.

More than just the stories, though, I also wanted to seek out the missing parts of some of the other family stories—the ones where my questions didn't seem to get answered. I had questions from those childhood years, but now as an adult—and one who had learned effective search strategies, thanks to genealogy training—I was confident I could find those answers.

Over the years, thankfully, the tools available to seek out those family mysteries have made the search easier and easier. I've pushed far beyond the stories I remembered from my childhood. Now, much of what I write is an effort of breaking into new territory, exploring possibilities, testing hypotheses. But most importantly, making sure to keep writing it all down. Someone else might want to follow this trail.

Tomorrow is another day to get back to the task at hand, exploring the possible relatives of my mother-in-law's second great-grandmother, Lidia Miller. For today's break from the chase, I wanted to reminisce about that day fourteen years ago, when A Family Tapestry was "born."

The Right Tools Can Make the Difference

 

Now that I've got my search direction set—hoping to find anything significant about Jonathan Miller of Perry County, Ohio—I'm off to (hopefully) make some discoveries. Since I recently accepted an offer to try one month of Ancestry.com's ProTools for free, I realized this was a great opportunity to use the beta version of their network-building option to explore how the various Miller families in the county might be related. In other words, I'm building another F.A.N. Club, this month for Lidia Miller's possible relatives.

The right tools can make the difference when puzzling over such a brick wall ancestor. We've certainly been the beneficiaries of multiple advances that have streamlined family history research over the years; this network-building option is just another benefit among several tools included in Ancestry's ProTools. I'm hoping it will help me work my way through this Miller puzzle.

First step was to set up the network, which I labeled Miller Family in Perry County, Ohio. (I know, highly original.) I put Lidia Miller front and center as the key network member, then added in her neighbor, Jonathan Miller.

As soon as I entered this non-relative into my new network, Ancestry noted, "this person will be visible as an unattached person in your tree." Basically, what Ancestry has done with this networking process is set up floating branches within the already-existing family tree. If I gather enough documentation to convince myself that the two Miller neighbors are actually relatives, all I need to do is re-attach Jonathan to my tree according to his correct relationship.

With that automatic set-up, I was free to attach documents to Jonathan with abandon. Right away, I added Jonathan's entry in the 1830 census, then the 1840 census, as I had already found those. By then, Ancestry's hints program kicked in and pointed me to a very likely marriage record from April 15, 1824,  identifying Jonathan's bride as Catherine Dupler. 

Moving to the 1850 census, I added in Catherine's identity in the network, then entered names and approximate birth years for each of the children in the Miller household. Likewise for the 1860 census, providing details on the youngest children in the family.

Another hint for Jonathan's headstone photo at Find A Grave provided a record of his date of birth and death. Equipped with that 1868 year of death, I switched gears from building this floating branch on my family tree to searching for a copy of Jonathan Miller's will.

This will, as it turns out, may lead us to some useful information—not, as I had hoped, based on the family members named as legatees, but thanks to a specific provision Jonathan had made concerning his property. We'll need to take some time to look at that property record in greater detail, in hopes that it will lead us to further discoveries.

Seeking Millers in Ohio

 

The quest I'm on right now may seem a hopeless plight: finding the family of Lidia Miller, my mother-in-law's second great-grandmother. It doesn't help that Miller has always been one of the three most common surnames in Ohio—not to mention, in much of the rest of the country. But when a Miller shows up in one's family tree, unattached to any relatives at all, what else is there to do?

Having discovered that the entry for Lidia's husband, William Gordon, in the 1840 census happened to be on the same page as someone named "Johnathan" Miller in Perry County's Reading Township, I figured that was as good a starting point as any to find her family. Taking a look at what was on that 1840 census for this other Miller, it seemed he could possibly be an older brother to Lidia. In his thirties while she was likely in her early twenties, that was far more likely than a father-daughter scenario—though the age ranges given for early census records provided plenty of wiggle room for such estimates.

This neighbor, Johnathan Miller, was head of a growing household which included one boy under five, three more under ten, as well as another daughter of the same age, plus two more under fourteen years of age.

Jumping ten years ahead from that 1840 census, we get a bit more detail on Jonathan Miller's growing family in 1850. This time, we find names for those children: Michael, Barbara, Andy, John, Jonathan, Dianah, and Isabel. And we now know at least his wife's given name: Catherine. Again, we can track the family's changing dynamics with the 1860 census, where not only the younger children remain, but a couple named Samuel and Elizabeth "Burkly" are included in the household.

What was interesting was when I reversed directions and looked for signs of Jonathan Miller in earlier records. In tax records for his home in Perry County's Reading Township in 1838—the same year in which Lidia Miller married William Gordon—Jonathan was listed as owning forty four acres. Looking for earlier records, an 1829 entry showed him owning one horse and two cattle. An added bonus: several other Millers' names appeared on the same page in that earlier record, hinting at more possible relatives.

If I could find Jonathan Miller in tax records for 1829, what about the 1830 census? Sure enough, he was listed right there in Reading Township, with a much younger family including his wife and two daughters under the age of five.

That question led to another question: what about William Gordon, the man whose wife had started this exploration in the first place? Had he arrived from Pennsylvania by that point? It's doubtful. Although there were two heads of households named William listed in the 1830 census, the surname was entered as William "Jourdan." While our William would have been seventeen at the time, and thus still living in the home of his father (also named William), both households entered in the 1830 census seemed to represent younger families. William and Lidia's story would not have blossomed until after that point.

All this exploration has done for us, however, is demonstrate that someone named Jonathan Miller lived in Reading Township, Perry County, since at least 1829. That still doesn't tell us who else might have been related to the man, and certainly doesn't provide any clues about a connection with Lidia. We'll still need to dig further to learn more about Jonathan.

Friends, Neighbors — or Family?

 

As we search for the identity of another brick wall ancestor in my mother-in-law's line, it's time to rely once again on that helpful concept of the F.A.N. Club: the friends, associates, and neighbors of that mystery relative. In this case, I'm wondering whether a neighbor of William Gordon and his wife, the former Lidia Miller, might also have been a family member. 

Looking at the far end of the same page in the 1840 census where William Gordon's name had been entered, I spotted someone by the name of Johnathan Miller. Granted, with a surname as common as Miller—one of three of the most common surnames in the entire state of Ohio—musing about relationships between neighbors named Miller may turn out to be a fool's errand. After all, searching for all Millers listed in Perry County for the 1840 census results in nearly forty hits—and that's just the names of heads of households. Even narrowing the parameters to those Millers living in William Gordon's neighborhood of Reading Township puts us chasing eleven heads of household.

Granted, we have to start somewhere. Since Johnathan Miller was the name listed on the same page as William Gordon's entry, I'll assume that is a good sign. We'll spend some time this week exploring what can be found on this other Miller family, in hopes of finding some documentation which leads us to family connections for our Lidia.

The Usual D N A Rant

 

When the results of my first DNA test arrived, I wasn't looking to see whether I could exchange lederhosen for a kilt. Actually, I was floored by all the results. "Who are all these people," I wondered about my initial test at Family Tree DNA. My results came back with well over one thousand DNA matches—and most all of them were barely as close as a fourth cousin. I had a lot of work to do.

Just in case a different company's DNA test was where all my close cousins had flocked, I eventually tested at Ancestry.com, 23andMe, and MyHeritage. I didn't want to miss any clues that could help bust through my brick wall research roadblocks. Despite that overzealous approach, over the years, I've found the tools at Ancestry DNA to be the most helpful to me—despite their unyielding resolve to withhold any form of chromosome browser—and have to remind myself to go back and check my investments in the other companies.

This weekend was one of those times to revisit the DNA results at the other companies. I started with 23andMe—just in case they wouldn't be there the next time I got around to checking. Since I've been working this month on my mother-in-law's tree, I focused on the results for her line, finding one recent DNA match who seemed to be a fairly close relative. 

Could I discover the connection? I'm glad that Relatives in Common has been added back in as a feature at 23andMe after the credential stuffing incident, but between navigating that tool and the steps to add a match to the family tree there, I was worn out in no time. Granted, I did find one match to enter in the tree, but the process reminded me of what a ghost town my family community has become at that company after their woes of the past two years.

In contrast, jumping back to Ancestry DNA—especially now that I'm testing the Pro Tools option on my account there—seemed like a breeze. I've already gotten a tree built there for my mother-in-law's line, and sorting through DNA matches linked to her surnames seemed like a breeze. This was my first weekend to specifically examine the Pro Tools' shared matches option, and it's helping me gather those loose matches whose close relatives I've already linked to my tree.

Perhaps it's a form of guilt by association, but the Pro Tools provided the boost I needed to incrementally harvest matches from the list of unknowns and migrate them over to their rightful place in the family tree. Granted, that boost won't answer every relationship question, but I also remember that for every DNA match I can add to my tree, it paves the way for me to attach others who were once unknown. Our family trees are so inter-related—especially for my mother-in-law's Perry County, Ohio, roots—that the more we add by way of collateral lines, the more information we can find to eventually attach those mystery matches to their rightful place in the family line.

That usual DNA rant that hits me periodically may just be a feature of a system lacking effective tools. Right now, as I migrate more toward those tools which facilitate finding answers, the less I find to complain about.  

Checking Out the Home Place

 

When facing a brick wall ancestor and finding no wiggle room from clues or other hopeful signs, my approach is to widen the spotlight when peering into the murky darkness. For Lidia Miller, my research project for this month, that is the only choice I have at this point. I've found very little on her, other than a marriage license bearing her name. I even lack an actual record of her death, although the implication of her orphaned son, living with his paternal grandmother in 1850, suggests that Lidia did not live long.

For this weekend, I thought I'd broaden that search by exploring the place that Lidia called home. Shortly after Lidia's marriage to William H. Gordon on April 24, 1838, William did appear in the 1840 census, calling Reading Township of Perry County, Ohio, his home. If that was so, let's check out the home place that—at least for a few years during her brief life—Lidia called her home.

Perry County, which was established in 1818 as a county in the relatively new state of Ohio, was where William's extended Gordon family had settled after leaving Pennsylvania. While I am not sure yet how Lidia and the Miller family came to call the place home, I do know that, at the time of that one census showing the couple's own family in 1840, they lived in a county with a population not yet reaching twenty thousand people.

Perry County contains fourteen townships, of which Reading was the one where William Gordon had settled. Reading Township surrounds the village of Somerset, which was established over a decade before the county itself was formed. The area also contains Saint Joseph's Church, home of the first Catholic parish in the state of Ohio, formed to minister to pioneer Catholics who had traveled along Zane's Trace to settle in the vicinity in the earliest days of Ohio statehood.

Whether Lidia Miller's parents were among those first settlers to the area, I can't yet say, though years later, her son Adam Gordon reported that his mother had been born in Ohio. I don't even know yet whether Lidia was herself Catholic, though a memorial erected after the death of her infant son can be seen at a Catholic cemetery in the area.

Reading through an old history of the township, I can spot a few mentions of early settlers claiming the surname Miller, but of course, no mention to clue me in to which of them might have had a daughter named Lidia. The sense of it, however, suggests that many of the settlers there may have had a German origin, having most recently migrated there from Pennsylvania.

Taking a look at who was in the area, I started first with the very page upon which Lidia's husband's name had been entered in the 1840 census. I didn't have far to look before I ran across the name of another man by that surname Miller. Reported to have been a man in his thirties, apparently with a wife, four sons and three daughters, if "Johnathan" Miller were related to Lidia, he could have been an older brother. Then again, he could have been a cousin—or no relation whatsoever. To find out, though, we'll have to poke around in the dark to find anything more on this mystery ancestor.

Indirect Indicators

 

In the case of a young bride dying so soon after the birth of her second child, not much can be found to record her life's story—not, at least, for those living in the early 1840s in Perry County, Ohio. To find anything more on Lidia Miller, wife of William Gordon, it may be necessary to rely on indirect indicators of her family and infer from those details what would likely be Lidia's life story.

Lidia Miller was my mother-in-law's second great-grandmother. One of the few actual signs of her existence is the faded record of her marriage to William Gordon on April 24, 1838, in Perry County. Though she did have two sons who survived her, not much can be found concerning those children's early years; I have yet to find baptismal records, for instance. The brief life of the second-born son, William, can be found in his 1841 memorial headstone where he was laid to rest at Holy Trinity Cemetery in Somerset. There, the faded engraving indicated the infant lived one month and died on February 25. Even the note etched on the stone, naming his parents, seems to blur out Lidia's name, though the child's father's name—also William—can clearly be seen.

From there, the details dim further. Firstborn son Adam spent his earliest years living with his widowed paternal grandmother—where he can clearly be seen listed in her household for the 1850 census. We need to fast-forward to the 1900 census to see where Adam stated that, while his dad was born in Pennsylvania, his mother was an Ohio native.

Adam can also be found in his by-then deceased paternal grandfather's 1849 will. This grandfather, also named William Gordon, had seen to it that provision be made not only for the many grown children from his two marriages, but specifically for his orphaned young grandson in the sixth item in his final testament, also naming Adam's father.

As for any other signs of Adam's mother, we need to jump to the seventy ninth year of his own life to see one last mention of Lidia's name. On Adam's March 5, 1918, death certificate, his son Simon reported that Adam's mother was named "Lida" Miller.

So Lidia was remembered, at least by family. But where else was she documented? And can we find anyone else from her own Miller family? That's the question I'll have to grapple with this month. I want to find something more than mere indirect indicators of her existence.