Category Archives: Research Methods

Research via Wikimedia Commons

Collections, Research Methods, Technology, , , , ,

The database team here at NEHGS posts information on updates to our databases on our blog, dbnews.americanancestors.org. In each post, we try to give you a little information about the database, the new records, and provide some sort of visual.

So I’m always looking for images in the public domain that pertain to various towns and other locations around New England. For some of our ongoing projects like Historic Catholic Records Online or Early Vermont Settlers, it can become difficult to find a new image to illustrate each post, and I have to keep track of what I’ve already used! Continue reading Research via Wikimedia Commons →

Whistle in the wind

American History, Family Stories, Genealogical Writing, Research Methods, , , ,
Pennell manuscript boxes at the Maine Historical Society library.

Much to my chagrin, google Thomas Pennell + Pennellville and this excerpt of a Wikipedia article still comes up: “Pennellville was settled by Thomas Pennell II (1720–1770), who arrived in 1760 at the age of 40. His father, Thomas (1689–1723), had emigrated from Jersey (in the Channel Islands) around 1708. He originally settled in Gloucester, Massachusetts. He married Sarah Durrell, and sired two sons and two daughters.” Continue reading Whistle in the wind →

Irish origins

Family Stories, Research Methods, , ,

I recently attended my first concert ever, with my husband. Whenever I listen to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s music, it puts me into a holiday mood. During the concert, I learned that founder Paul O’Neill passed away two years ago. I was curious about his roots and wanted to see what I could find. I learned from his obituary that he had grandparents from Ireland. Through a variety of interviews published online, I was able to start tracing his tree. I first started looking into his maternal side.

Paul’s maternal grandparents were Andrew Joseph Moore and Julia P. Merryman. Both were born in Ireland. The couple married in South Dublin on 13 June 1924,[1] a few short years after the Irish War of Independence. Continue reading Irish origins →

Mysterious Menteiths

Family Stories, Research Methods, Royal Lines, , ,
Click on images to expand them.

As I work at reconstructing the environment in which the Livingstons of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries lived, I have been struck by the frequency with which I have encountered members of the Menteith family. (It is fair to say that there are a number of such families in this project, interrelated in various ways, but the Menteiths keep turning up!) To arrive at the early modern Livingston family, I have gone back on various lines (including the ancestry of Livingston spouses), so the resulting family trees cover individuals who were not named Livingston – or aware of these particular connections. Continue reading Mysterious Menteiths →

The Coffin cluster

American History, Genealogical Writing, Research Methods, ,

Three new sketches have been uploaded to the Early New England Families database for Tristram Coffin, his mother, and one of his sisters.

Tristram Coffin, age 32, and his wife Dionis (Stevens) Coffin, about the same age, brought their five children – ranging in age from 12 to 1 – from Brixton in Devon to New England by October 1642, when the death of the youngest child was recorded in Haverhill. They had four more children born in New England. Continue reading The Coffin cluster →

Marrying up

Genealogical Writing, Research Methods, Royal Lines, , , ,
The ruins of Cadzow Castle.

In reviewing some late fourteenth- and early fifteenth-century marriages in the Livingston family in Scotland, I was struck by a pair of alliances that must have been important to the Livingstons of that era. This review also underlined my impression that the records of that period – and the later accounts based on those records – can be a challenge, since all too often the compilers shrug and offer “(?) daughter of ______ Somebody of Somewhere” by way of identification. Continue reading Marrying up →

Top 10 published resources continued

American History, Genealogical Writing, Mayflower 2020, Research Methods, , , ,

In an earlier Vita Brevis post, I introduced a free webinar that I conducted in August on the Top 10 Published Resources for Early New England Research. The Vita Brevis post was the first in a series of upcoming posts that will break down the top 10 list into individual discussions. The first post addressed what makes a published resource a “top 10” and analyzed the first published resource on the list, the Genealogist’s Handbook for New England Research. Today I will continue the conversation and talk about the second and third, in the “no particular order” list, of top 10 resources: Mayflower Families through Five Generations and New England Marriages Prior to 1700.

Mayflower Families through Five Generations, also known as the “Silver Books,” is published by the General Society of Mayflower Descendants (GSMD). Continue reading Top 10 published resources continued →

Family left behind

Family Stories, Research Methods, , , ,
Thomas and Bernard Corcoran arrive in New York in 1920.

Tracing your immigrant ancestors across the ocean is a journey. You need to understand the ports they have left from as well as those to which they came. You also need to familiarize yourself with the different resources available to locate passenger lists – whether on FamilySearch, Ancestry, stevemorse.org, or even in overseas archives. When we find an ancestor’s passage to the United States, this journey doesn’t end when they step foot off the boat. Many of our ancestors travelled back overseas to visit family they left behind, bringing money that they made during their time here. Some even brought back additional family members after establishing their roots in a new land. Continue reading Family left behind →

Family lore

American History, Family Stories, Research Methods, , ,
The farm on New Canada Road.

I love to walk. Sweet fern and dry grasses scented the warm air during my late summer walks through the Blue Hills. As Marcel Proust describes in Remembrance of Things Past, scents evoke memories. In my case, the memories are of my grandmother and lazy summer days at New Canada Farm in Danbury, New Hampshire. It wasn’t until cleaning out my mother’s papers after her death that I learned that New Canada Farm was named for a nineteenth-century settlement of French Canadian farmers along the road. New Canada Road starts at Route 4 in Wilmot and hugs the contours of Ragged Mountain before passing into Danbury and turning towards Gulf Brook. Continue reading Family lore →

The potter’s field

American History, Research Methods, , , ,
THE NEW YORK HERALD, 29 July 1870

“We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.” – Isaiah 64: 8

Recently, I was researching a case for a client whose ancestors had roots in Sullivan County, New York during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Locating New York records from any period presents a near perpetual brick wall. I had few clues with which to assemble this report.

According to the New York Death Register of Manhattan, my subject, John Gray, died from delirium at a city hospital in 1829 at age 41. From evidence furnished to us by the client, he was married nine years prior, probably near Liberty, in Sullivan County. The death register noted that he is buried in “Potter’s Field.” Discovering the whereabouts of burial for my subject could help lead to more details about the family, especially if some are interred with him. Continue reading The potter’s field →