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Tips to Identify Women in Historical Records

Legacy Tree Genealogists’ Jessica Howe specializes in finding unknown ancestors. In this article, we discover some tips for identifying women in historical records by learning how cultural differences worldwide affect names and naming practices.

Women around the worldSuppose you have searched for female relatives in online databases. In that case, there is a good chance you’ve come across an alternate spelling of their name or found that they went by a completely different name throughout different records. Here are a few tips to identify your female ancestor in documents:

Consider Your Ancestor May Have Used a Nickname

It is not uncommon to find records for women who were listed as Betsy (Margaret), Sally (Sarah), Polly (Mary), or Tilly (Matilda), later finding out their given name was completely different due to nicknames for the period.  

Take Accents into Consideration

Geographic accents play a significant role in recalling relatives’ names and places and often influence how documents are recorded in your hometown. For example, a woman known by her grandchildren as ‘Granny Idermay’ was named Ida May. The Southern accent her family had added the -er to Ida’s first name and combined her first and middle names, so her children and grandchildren eventually assumed her name was ‘Idermay’ instead of Ida May.  

Phonetic Spelling Was Common

Documents with phonetic spellings were something commonly seen leading up to the mid-20th century. Most generations had no extensive formal education (rural schools on average only had 5-6 months a year due to crop harvests), and many children were considered graduated if they had an eighth-grade education. The lack of educational opportunities, especially in rural areas, led to countless misspellings due to the pronunciation of names.  

Religious Customs

Ashkenazi Jews often maintained separate legal and religious identities. You will often see females listed with their religious names in earlier records and then adopt the American equivalent later. German ancestors may have used a German name daily, but their legal and religious name may have been a Latin equivalent. German girls were baptized with the first name of Maria, Anna, or Anna Maria, and the second name (known as Rufname) was used in official records. By the 19th century, many Germans had three names (the religious first name and then two middle names), and they could have used all three names throughout their lives. If they migrated to the U.S., they could have shortened their given names over time. Jewish families will also give a child a relative’s Hebrew name to honor their deceased loved one who also had that name but use a given name that is entirely different.

In Japan, Buddhists often obtain a kaimyō for a deceased relative from a Buddhist priest in exchange for a donation to the temple. After that, the relative is posthumously referred to by that name as a show of respect.

Naming Patterns Can Be Helpful – Sometimes

Scottish and Irish families often had naming patterns for their children in the 18th and 19th centuries. The first-born daughter was named after the child’s mother’s mother, the second-born daughter after the child’s father’s mother, the third-born daughter after the child’s mother, and so on. If a child died in infancy, it was acceptable to name the next child with that same first name so that you may find two Margaret’s in the same family, and it could be a clue that the first infant had died.

The More You Know

Throughout the world, local customs and practices greatly influence the naming of children. A researcher’s job is to understand how these cultural differences influence the names found in vital records and other resources. It is equally important to stay abreast of new laws that affect how names are passed to future generations. For example, traditional Latin American last names consist of the father’s last name, followed by the mother’s last name. However, in recent years, many Latin American countries such as Argentina passed laws that contradict traditional Spanish naming practices that favor patrilineal surnames.

If you have hit a brick wall in your research due to your inability to identify an ancestor, the reason could be an incorrect spelling of or an error in recording an ancestor’s name. Our genealogists are knowledgeable and experienced in dealing with this situation. Contact us for a free estimate on professional research.

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Secrets of Murder: Uncovering a Family History Mystery

People often ask professional genealogists why they chose genealogy as a profession. What was the catalyst that started their journey into family history? Mine was simple: my grandparents grew up during the Great Depression in rural Alabama, and they chose not to relive those experiences and never passed on their family history to their children or grandchildren. 

I had been interested in my family history from a young age, but efforts to glean any information about my grandmother Marie’s family was akin to an act of Congress. I would ask her about her family, but all efforts to sweet talk her, beg her, or otherwise barter information about her family went unanswered. That woman was stubborn as the day is long (I see some of her stubbornness in my own children today). I gave up and began researching on my own after school and on the weekend. 

Grandma Marie, age 14

A Surprising Revelation…

As she got older, Marie developed Alzheimer’s disease and her mental filter slowly started to wane. She wasn’t as guarded as she used to be, and she would occasionally provide quips of information about her father or mother, but nothing extraordinary and definitely nothing that painted them in a bad light.  

One day, out of the blue at the dinner table, she casually explained to my father and me that she had a brother who was murdered while gambling with some other men in a nearby town. I will never forget the look on my father’s face as we simultaneously dropped our forks and looked at each other in astonishment. We knew all her brothers—I had photos of all of them standing next to her at her father’s grave, and none of them had been murdered. My father discounted this information as part of her illness; her mind must have been playing tricks on her. But something in me said, “There’s more to this story than meets the eye.” The following weekend I went online and started to search for this elusive brother. 

Unraveling the Family History Mystery

I knew that my great-grandparents had married sometime around 1922 because my grandmother was their first child. I also knew that my great-grandfather had been married once before and he and his first wife had six children. When I found the family in the 1930 U.S. census, I was able to account for all my great-aunt and uncles… all of them except one—ten-year-old Ethel Johnson. 

I had assumed Ethel was my grandmother’s half sister from her father’s first marriage, but she was born after my great-grandfather’s first wife had already died. When I searched for my great-grandparents’ marriage certificate, I found they had married about eight years after Ethel was born and my great-grandmother had a different surname than what we were always told. A couple more clicks of the mouse revealed the answer to this conundrum—my great-grandmother had also been married once before and that marriage produced two children: Razzie and Ethel. Razzie was born about 1917, and through a series of unknown events, he never lived with my great-grandparents. Ethel did live with them and adopted her stepfather’s surname, hence her enumeration in the census record. 

Discovering the Truth

Newspaper clippings revealed the story Grandma Marie had recounted that day at the dinner table was almost entirely accurate: Razzie was killed on New Year’s Day in 1937 after arguing with a man about whiskey. According to the newspaper articles, the man went to Razzie’s home, knocked on the door, and then shot him. He would later go on trial and be found guilty for Razzie’s murder. 

The Cullman Democrat, January 1937

When we questioned other family members about Razzie’s murder, no one knew anything about it. His death hadn’t been talked about for almost seventy years. His life had sadly been forgotten by those who knew him… forgotten by everyone but his little sister, Marie. 

Razzie was buried in a modest cemetery on the outskirts of town. The locals who maintain the cemetery chipped in many years ago and bought him a small tombstone. The groundskeepers never knew what brought Razzie there, but thanks to my grandmother’s slip of the tongue, he will never be forgotten again. 

Are you looking to tear down your genealogical brick wall? Have a family history mystery that needs solving? Legacy Tree Genealogists helps connect family trees from all around the world.  Contact us today for a free quote!

 1. “Razie Boston Shot By Huland Quick,” Cullman Democrat (Cullman, Alabama), 7 January 1937, p. 1, https://newspapers.com, subscription database, accessed June 2020; “Circuit Court Ends It’s September Session,” Cullman Democrat (Cullman, Alabama), 23 September 1937, p. 1, https://newspapers.com, subscription database, accessed June 2020.

 

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“Where Are My Ancestors From?” 5 Tips for Using Migration Patterns in Family History Research

If you’re having difficulty pinpointing your family’s origins, these tips are for you! We share how to use migration patterns to extend your family history.

You want to extend your family tree as far back as records will allow, but what do you do if you’re having a difficult time pinpointing your family’s origins? Migration patterns and genetic communities offered by DNA testing companies are two of the most overlooked pieces of research we have at our disposal. The following 5 tips will help you extend your family tree or break down genealogical brick walls:

  1. MyHeritage DNA’s PedigreeMap™ shows you where concentrations of your DNA matches ancestors may have originated from. For people who know very little about their family history, such as adoptees, the PedigreeMap™ can be an invaluable place to begin research. To take advantage of this feature, you can purchase a MyHeritage DNA test here.
migration patterns

MyHeritage DNA’s PedigreeMap™

2. The AncestryDNA® Communities feature offers genetic communities which can be extremely helpful if you’re searching for ancestors in a specific area. These genetic communities are based on clustered pools of historic DNA, and group other DNA matches who share ancestors with you under the same umbrella. If your DNA matches the reference population for a specific subcommunity, AncestryDNA will further narrow your genetic communities down to a particular area or migration (see below). If you have an abundance of unknown DNA matches in a certain community, that’s a good indication your ancestors may have lived there too.

AncestryDNA also offers a historical timeline for each of their genetic communities, which gives some context to what life might’ve been like in those areas throughout the centuries.

migration patterns

AncestryDNA® Communities Example

3. There’s more to your ancestors’ stories. Think of your family history as a giant pie (not a pie chart, that’s a post for another day!). Many of us think about our ancestors lives in a cut and dry format—they simply moved from location A to location B. But the truth is, their stories were much more complex than that and we often overlook the rest of pieces in between A and B. When our ancestors migrated to a new area, they often traveled in groups with their extended family, friends or neighbors. Sometimes they traveled hundreds of miles, over extended periods of time, and unlike the images of the Oregon Trail we were often taught in school with caravans of covered wagons and hundreds of families walking alongside their belongings, that wasn’t always the case. Frequently, families stayed in small groups and temporarily settled in a location that was on their travel route or near an acquaintance that lived in the area. In doing so, they left paper trails of their lives in the form of church minutes, court documents and even newspapers articles for that county or state. If you’re having trouble finding records about your specific ancestor, research the people in their communities that may have migrated with them. Genealogists often refer to this as “the FAN Club” (Friends­, Associates, Neighbors), and you can read more about using FAN Club research here. Your ancestor might have been a witness on a friend’s court document while they were passing through the area, or they may have visited a neighboring church for Sunday service. The people around them helped shape their community and their lives often intersected with one another.

4. A great source for specific roads and migration routes for American research is William Dollarhide’s Map Guide to American Migration Routes, 1735–1815. The book provides a visual guide to show what roads or canals your family may have traveled when they migrated from one region to the next. For instance, families who migrated out of Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina after the War of 1812 used the Fall Line Road, which stretched from Maryland to Augusta, Georgia. They then took the Federal Road through southern Alabama and into Mississippi. Knowing this when I received my father’s Y-DNA results, I was able to piece together a trail of DNA matches who share my ancestor’s surname in areas surrounding the Federal Road in Georgia and southern Alabama. These matches helped me identify unknown family members and find documents for my ancestors in states no one knew they’d been in!

5. Use census records as a form of migration information for your ancestor’s origins. If your ancestor was born in New York, but his children were born in Pennsylvania, Indiana, and Missouri, that’s a great clue that you might find records for them in those states as well. Work your way back, starting in the most recent place they were enumerated and exhaust all the local records for that area before moving on to another state.

Exploring your ancestors’ migration patterns can add an additional piece to the puzzle in discovering the story of your genes. By utilizing the DNA tools available in combination with thorough records research, you can extend your family history as far as possible, as well as learn more about the lives of those ancestors that helped make you, you.

Legacy Tree Genealogists has been at the forefront of genetic genealogy research services for over a decade. Our team of experts have solved hundreds of DNA-related cases, and can help you solve your DNA puzzles! Contact us today for a free quote.

If you're having difficulty pinpointing your family's origins, these tips are for you! We share how to use migration patterns to extend your family history. #DNA #genealogy #familyhistory #genealogyresearch #ancestry #migration #heritage

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“Children of the Dust”: How Genetic Genealogy Helped an Amerasian Woman Locate Her G.I. Father

With client permission, we share one woman’s experience of growing up “Amerasian” and the important role genetic genealogy played in helping her locate her G.I. father.

Growing Up Amerasian

When Anni was little, she would often ask about her father, but her mother always gave her the same vague reply, “I met him Taichung, then I had you.” Anni was born in the 1960s – the daughter of a Taiwanese mother and an unknown U.S. serviceman fighting in Vietnam. Anni said she always felt different, realizing early on that she didn’t share the same facial features the other children in her village had, her skin was lighter, her face more “European” than the rest of her family. People in her village were quick to point those differences out as well, often taunting her into tears. Recounting as an adult, Anni said she could tell that her inquiries about her father were painful for her mother to discuss, and she would often shy away or blatantly refuse to talk about him.

Amerasian Amerasian

(top) Anni, around age 3; (bottom) Anni and Lucy

New Beginnings

When Anni was 11 years old, she and her mother immigrated to the United States. They both spoke very little English, but quickly became accustomed to American culture. Lucy eventually married but sadly died of cancer a few years after arriving. She never revealed who Anni’s father was and for the next 40 years, his identity would remain elusive.

The Waiting Game

Not one to ever give up, Anni took several DNA tests in hopes that she might have some close matches to her father’s side of the family – “it had been 50 years after all… someone must have taken a DNA test by then.” But like many other people, Anni only had distant matches, her closest match being a fourth cousin. She had no idea what that meant, or how to decipher how she was related to them, so she enlisted the help of a genetic genealogist.  After reviewing the DNA results, the researcher was able to determine several of the distant matches shared similar surnames in Scotland. In fact, all of Anni’s DNA matches were in Scotland or Ireland. None of them were in the United States! Her mother always said her father was an American soldier, so was she mistaken?

The Research Process

By building out the family trees of each of Anni’s distant DNA matches, our genealogist was able to cross-reference them and found that several people shared a set of ancestors from Glasgow, Scotland. The ancestral couple, John and Jane, had 9 children, but only one of the children emigrated to the United States. Our genealogist then built down the family tree for that line and concluded there were several potential candidates that fit the approximate age of someone who could have been Anni’s father.

Of the potential candidates that were no longer living, military service was examined for any suggestion that they had been stationed near Taiwan. For the remaining living biological father candidates, correspondence was sent inquiring about any military service in Taiwan. One man, John, confirmed that he had been stationed in Taiwan during the appropriate time, but he did not remember Anni’s mother, Lucy. John agreed to submit a DNA sample to confirm the researcher’s hypothesis and six weeks later, test results confirmed that John was indeed Anni’s father. Over the next few months, Anni and her father exchanged correspondence and family photos. She has an adopted brother and a half-sister. Most importantly, Anni finally saw her father’s face for the first time. She was later able to meet John and his wife and see dozens of family photos.

The Background

Amerasian researchAnni’s story is not unique. In 2009, Smithsonian Magazine published a story about children born to Vietnamese mothers and American servicemen. They dubbed them “children of the dust” – children that were orphaned or left behind once the dusts of war settled. During World War II and the Vietnam War, U.S. servicemen were encouraged to R&R [rest and recuperation] in Thailand, Vietnam, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, and Philippines. Local women often worked in bars, massage parlors, and nightclubs around the cities to support their families, often interacting with the men every day for weeks at a time. Sometimes this led to relationships, thus leading to an influx of illegitimate children during these periods of history. The term Amerasian was originally used to describe the children born to an Asian mother and American serviceman father. The total number of Amerasian children born remains unknown.

Legacy Tree has years of experience connecting families by identifying biological fathers and other family members. Although unknown parentage searches can be emotional journeys, they can also be incredibly fulfilling. Contact us today for a free estimate.