The joys and perils of the written words in history

Several times lately I've come upon someone who wrote about my ancestors, but they made mistakes.  I know that because of data on cemetery markers combined with family Bibles and census records.  So my great grandmother Cyntha Cannon Rogers, wife of Micajah Clack Rogers, is listed in someone's book as being Micajah's mother instead of his wife. And that is copied by other descendants, making it so confusing.

I know I've copied mis-information before. It's somewhat irritating, and I feel guilty that I passed on lies.

I was looking at the very confusing ancestors on my mother's side, the Williams family members, who of course named their sons after uncles and grandfathers, and my branch moved from Kentucky to Missouri, and then some moved on to Texas, where eventually my mother was born, and then myself.

One of my ggg grandfathers fought in the War of 1812, named Richard Frederick Williams.  So someone recording what they thought was accurate, wrote of him as if he was named Frederick.  He had a son of that name. But the story in that book mistakenly gives his son's wife the name of the son's mother, (Nancy Hansford.) Then this author goes on to name the children of Frederick and whoever his wife might really be. At this point I don't know when Frederick the son married or died, so he's sitting on my tree unmarried without information about him. Sorry about that.

The title of this misleading record is A History of the Pioneer families of Missouri: With numerous sketches ... by William Smith Bryan. p. 298. On Google books. free as an e-book, published originally in 1876 (and the author admits he took 2 years to write it.)

If it's true, I've sure got some strange things happening on my tree. For one thing, Frederick Williams, son of Richard was born in 1816. And all those children listed below as his were actually his siblings (the way my tree describes them at least!) He could not very well have married (his mother) Nancy Hansford, who was born in 1896.

"WILLIAMS, Frederick, son of Richard Williams, of Pulaski co., Ky., married NANCY HANFORD, and settled in Montgomery co., Mo., in 1832. Their children were Liberty, Margaret, Mary, William, Harriet, Martha, Ross A., John, Euphema, and Clara A. Margaret married JAMES GRAY. Mary married JOHN CRUTCHER. Harriet married STEPHEN MANNING. Martha married SYLVESTER MILLSAP. Ross A. married CHRISTOPHER MILLSAP. Euphema married JOHN CRUTCHER, JR."

However, many a smart genealogist takes everything as "possible" fact that is written in history books.  Finding source records is all important.

And if the record had had a bit of punctuation changed, so that it said he was "son of Richard of Pulaski KY, and Nancy Hanford, who settled in Montgomery Co Mo." and then the children were the parents', not Frederick's.  Oh well.

I appreciate the way this information is worded...

Richard and Nancy and their six children arrived in 
Montgomery County, Missouri, in 1832, based on 
land records and birthplace of children listed in 
censuses. The 1840 Montgomery County census 
lists a Richard Williams, believed to be our 
Richard, with four males and eight females, 
living in Prairie township. Coming from Kentucky 
at the age of forty, he may have brought slaves, 
although I have not found that in a census. This 
area’s land was not conducive to large tobacco 
farms needing slave labor, but on the same 
census were Crutcher families-- Samuel, 
Samuel Jr, and John Crutcher, each with slaves. 
They all married into the Williams family. 
[See in the graphics section an interesting story 
on the Laughing Man, whose mother was a 
daughter of Richard and Nancy Williams. The 
story points out the tensions of their world, 
and the power of laughter]. +++

I'm still looking for the story of the Laughing Man. There are anecdotal stories in this ebook, which has a mere 538 pages. None of the stories I scanned were titled The Laughing Man.  So I'll keep looking. I'm up to page 38 so far. (There's no table of contents, of course.)

And as for the ancestry of the Richard F. Williams family, his own parents are listed as Frederick Andrew Williams (1764-1831) and Casandra Elizabeth "Casiah" Tate Williams (1765-1851). Unfortunately, as I looked closer I found these South Carolina Williams moved to Tennessee, and never to Kentucky at all. The can't be our Richard F.'s parents, as I mentioned yesterday.