Counting noses and genders on old census records

Repost from When I Was 69 blog,  "Mysteries of genealogy." 9/6/2014

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 Ruth Woodward Swasey was born on this day in 1788 in the recently formed state of Massachusetts.

The next record that has been found shows she married at 18 to Alexander G. Swasey, a mariner, in Newport, Rhode Island, July 7, 1807.

At this point I don't know a thing about her parents.  Perhaps she wasn't actually born in Mass, but in RI?  No way to know...as I don't actually have a birth record.  I'm just passing along family tree information from Ancestry.  And the "source" is a Find A Grave entry, which has changed and now lists her birth as just 1789, without the month or day.  So I don't really know where her birth information came from.

Mysteries of genealogy.  This is one I don't particularly like...not having a source document.

Her wedding was given, as July 2, 1807 in Newport, RI, but has no source at all. (Note, I think it came from a book written in 1910, more later about that!)

She and her husband are listed as residents of Rhode Island on June 4, 1820.  I think this "Rhode Island, Vital Extracts, 1636-1899" is considered a census.

Ancestry says she gave birth to 12 children (2 of whom were in the same year). Another mystery, which means I when I look further into information about each child, I might find more about how these two were twins or maybe weren't.  But most of her children don't have actual birth days...so it is probably based on census records.

Census takers went about their business on different months of the year, thus many people would have already had their birthdays that year, and would report their ages as being a year older than those who had not yet had their birthdays.  So when the census reports then changed back that age to the birth year, often it is a year off from actual facts.  That's a fact!

I also could find out more about where she lived, by looking at each child.  Their birth place would necessarily include that the mother was there then!  Not that she definitely lived in that town or county, but the records were written about that child being born there.  However, most of her children's birth places aren't listed, and the one that is, I doubt was born where it says he was, because there's no connection to Newburyport, MA.  It matters to me, because this is the ancestor of mine that was Ruth's son, namely Alexander G. Swasey (Jr.)

I also have a fun document in which she and her husband are named as parents of two sons who married 2 daughters named Stearns, from Watertown, MA.  So when the History of Watertown MA spoke of the Stearns family, it included these Swasey brothers.

Genealogy of the Families and descendents of the early settlers of Watertown, Massachusetts

On lines 380 and 381, Georgiana and her sister Harriet Elizabeth Stearns, married respectively to William Pitt Swasey (a mariner) and Jerathmel Bowers Swasey, in 1843 and 44, sons of Alexander G. Swasey  and Ruth Woodward Swasey. These weddings both occurred after Ruth had died on March 4, 1842.

These were younger brothers of my ancestor, Alexander G. Swasey, Jr.  He was the second son born, but named after his father, which is interesting.  My father was the third son born and named after his father...many years later.

 In 1830 Census for Newport, RI, Alexander G. Swasey has this reported

Home in 1830 (City, County, State):	Newport, Newport, Rhode Island
Free White Persons - Males - Under 5:	1
Free White Persons - Males - 5 thru 9:	2
Free White Persons - Males - 10 thru 14:	2
Free White Persons - Males - 15 thru 19:	2
Free White Persons - Males - 40 thru 49:	1
Free White Persons - Females - Under 5:	2
Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29:	1
Free White Persons - Females - 40 thru 49:	1
Free White Persons - Females - 70 thru 79:	1
Free White Persons - Under 20:	9
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:	3
Total Free White Persons:	13
Total - All Persons (Free White, Slaves, Free Colored):	13

Ruth would have been 42 at this census, and have given birth to all 12 children, and I only know of the death of one before 1830.  Several children do not have death dates on Ancestry at this time,

Who was the female age 70-79?  Alexander's mother lived until 1836, but died and is buried in Somerset, Bristol County, Massachusetts, USA.  So perhaps Ruth Woodward's mother lived with them still.  A person that age would probably not have been a servant.

Male age 40-49 must be Alexander the father - check
Female age 40-49 would be Ruth the mother - check

There had been a first child named Sarah Lewellyn Swasey who died at one year. 1814 – 1815, and another of the same name born in 1827.

Ancestry gives us:
3 daughters (Mary Jane Swasey 1824 – 1833, Sarah Lewellen Swasey 1827 – 1853, Ruth Ann Swasey 1828 – )...while the census only gives us 2 under age 5
a daughter age 20-29 would be Delaney D. Swasey (1808 – 1833)

Now let's check the sons:
males under 5: 1
The closest Ancestry comes is 6 year old Marc Anthony, b 1824 and no other information on him. - possible check.
2 males ages 5-9 could be the 2 Ancestry says were born in 1822, James Henry and Charles A.- check
2 males between 10-14 could be William Pitt, b 1817 and Jerathmel A. b. 1820 - check
2 between 15-19 on census could thus be as Ancestry lists, Joseph Dean Swasey (1809 – 1843) and my ancestor - Alexander G. Swasey (Jr.) 1812-1866 - check.

So the problem is that there is one extra daughter according to Ancestry records which show 11 living as of 1830, while the census totals indicate 10 children...and a grandmother/auntie unknown.  (Incidentally, I know of no siblings of the Sr. Alexander G. Swasey, but it's always possible.)

Not knowing anything about Ruth Woodward Swasey's parents, it is quite likely one of them lived with them....more likely for a mother to move in with a daughter than a son, I think.

How do things look in 1840 census for Newport, RI?

A.G. Swasey (Sr.)

Home in 1840 (City, County, State):	Newport, Newport, Rhode Island
Free White Persons - Males - 15 thru 19:	2
Free White Persons - Males - 20 thru 29:	4
Free White Persons - Males - 50 thru 59:	1
Free White Persons - Females - 10 thru 14:	2
Free White Persons - Females - 50 thru 59:	1
Persons Employed in Commerce:	3
Persons Employed in Navigation of the Ocean:	3
Free White Persons - Under 20:	4
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:	4
Total Free White Persons:	10
Total All Persons - Free White, Free Colored, Slaves:	10

By 1840 Alexander Jr. was living in St. Johns County (St. Augustine) FL.
I'm sorry, my brain can no longer ferret out who was what age.  I like finding that 3 of the household were employed in commerce (and I believe father Alex was certainly one) and 3 were employed in Navigation of the Ocean.  They might be the same people.

And then there's her husband's parents.  One book of the Swasey Family says his mother was one name, and a grave stone in a cemetery indicates his father married to another named woman.  Oh my.
Quite a interesting roller-coaster ride, looking for answers to the mysteries of the facts of ancestors.

I just changed my Ancestry family tree status to private, rather than public.  When it was public anyone could add things to it...and somehow I ended up with a John Swasey listed at least 10 times, though his dates remained the same, he was his own father, grandfather and brother, not to mention married to his wife or mother a few times.  I deleted them all on my copy, and now will laboriously try to find who really did have some relationship to whom.

There is a book that google provides on line about the Swasey Genealogy, written in 1910...and some of it seems to have source documents indicated.  I have no idea how much other people's research is accurate.

It's like playing detective.  Some days I have the patience to do it, and some days I just throw up my hands and say, well, they were all alive once, and now they're not!

Margaret Beattie Hansford**

First, let me share a repost about the Kentucky settlers.  I'm on a roll apparently, and this post tells a somewhat different story than what I shared yesterday when talking about Margaret Beattie Hansford's husband, Rev. Thomas Hansford.  There are some new photos of census records at the bottom.

As far back as I can go...farther
posted originally on Tuesday, February 18, 2014 (with a bit of editing from today!)

Well, the fun of Ancestry took me back across the seas to Ireland and Scotland.

But I also found information suggesting this ancestress (Margaret Beattie Hansford) lived to be around 99 years of age.  That is if the census taker didn't mess up. Her son, who was head of the household, says he was 59 (born in 1800) and Margaret is listed as 97.

Anyway, that 1860 census is the source of her age, (until I found her grave marker later).

And the Ancestry folks connected her to parents as well, who came through Virginia and then the Cumberland Gap to Kentucky, actually to Somerset, Pulaski County, KY...as well as Crab Apple, KY.
So I've gone ahead and saved various tidbits from Wikipedia about the great trek of my ancestors from VA to KY.

 The Appalachian Mountains form a natural barrier to east–west travel, from Pennsylvania to Georgia. Settlers from Pennsylvania tended to migrate south along the Great Wagon Road through the Great Appalachian Valley and Shenandoah Valley. Daniel Boone was from Pennsylvania and migrated south with his family along this road. From an early age, Boone was one of the longhunters^[3] who hunted and trapped among the Native American nations along the western frontiers of Virginia, so-called because of the long time they spent away from home on hunts in the wilderness. Boone would sometimes be gone for months and even years before returning home from his hunting expeditions

The route of the Wilderness Road made a long loop from Virginia southward to Tennessee and then northward to Kentucky, a distance of 200 miles (320 km).

From the Long Island of the Holston River (modern Kingsport, Tennessee), the road went north through Moccasin Gap of Clinch Mountain, then crossed the Clinch River and crossed rough land (called the Devils Raceway) to the North Fork Clinch River. Then it crossed Powell Mountain at Kanes Gap. From there it ran southwest through the valley of the Powell River to the Cumberland Gap.

After passing over the Cumberland Gap the Wilderness Road forked. The southern fork passed over the Cumberland Plateau to Nashville, Tennessee via the Cumberland River. The northern fork split into two parts. The eastern spur went into the Bluegrass region of Kentucky to Boonesborough on the Kentucky River (near Lexington). The western spur ran to the Falls of the Ohio (Louisville).^[8][9] As settlements grew southward, the road stretched all the way to Knoxville, Tennessee, by 1792.^[10]

Because of the threat of Native American attacks, the road was so dangerous that most pioneers traveled well armed. Robbers and criminals also could be found on the road, ready to pounce on weaker pioneers.^[11] Although the Transylvania Company had purchased the region from the Cherokee, and the Iroquois had ceded it at the Treaty of Fort Stanwix, other tribes, such as the Shawnee, still claimed it and lived there.

Often entire communities and church congregations would move together over the road to new settlements. Hundreds of pioneers were killed by Indian attacks^.

Defensive log blockhouses built alongside the road had portholes in the walls for firing at Native American attackers. They were often called "stations". No one knew exactly when the next attack would happen. The Shawnee came from the north, while the Chickamauaga (Cherokees who rejected the land sale treaty) came from the south. The tribes were resentful of the settlers taking their ancestral hunting lands, and the French and Indian War had further stirred up their passions against the white man.^[13]

The Scots-Irish were great fighters. They had lived in Ulster, an English colony in Northern Ireland, for a hundred years before coming to America. They had taken over land previously owned by the Irish and had much experience as fighters in defending their homeland.^[14]

In 1774, Richard Henderson, a judge from North Carolina, organized a land speculation company with a number of other prominent North Carolinians called the Transylvania Company. The men hoped to purchase land from the Cherokees on the Kentucky side of the Appalachian Mountains and establish a British proprietary colony. Henderson hired Daniel Boone, an experienced hunter who had explored Kentucky, to blaze a trail through the Cumberland Gap into central Kentucky. 

Judge Richard Henderson had made a treaty with the Cherokee at Sycamore Shoals in 1775, purchasing over 20,000,000 acres (8,100,000 ha) of land between the Cumberland and Kentucky Rivers. On March 28, 1775, he left Long Island (Kingsport, Tennessee) with about 30 horsemen on the grueling trip down the Wilderness Road to Kentucky. At Martin's Station 40 to 50 additional pioneers joined the venture. On their way, they met nearly a hundred refugees fleeing Native American attacks further down the road. Despite the danger, the party kept going toward Kentucky. Since some of the streams were flooded, the pioneers had to swim with their horses. On April 20, they arrived at Boonesborough, a fortified town, named by Judge Henderson in honor of Boone

After 1770, a surge of over 400,000 Scots-Irish immigrants arrived in the colonies to escape the poor harvest, high rents and religious intolerance of Ulster. Since the better lands had already been taken, they constantly pressed onward to the western frontier of the foothills of the Carolinas.

The flood of Scots-Irish, German, and others immigrants kept coming. Over 200,000 pioneers came over the Wilderness Road, enduring severe hardships. In the winter of 1778-79, the weather was so cold that the Kentucky River froze to a depth of two feet. The frontier settlements alongside the road struggled to survive. Many of the cattle and hogs froze to death. The settlers had to eat frozen cattle and horses to survive

Often the Chickamauga, under the leadership of Dragging Canoe, would hide in ambush for weeks between Cumberland Gap and Crab Orchard, a distance of 100 miles (160 km). They would not attack large groups but wait for weaker ones who were not able to defend themselves. More than 100 men, women and children were killed in the fall of 1784 along the Wilderness Road. Many families, even in ice and snow, crossed the creeks and rivers without shoes or stockings; they often had no money and few clothes. They lived off the land by hunting in the woods and by fishing in the streams.^[19]

Since they had hardly any money, entire families sometimes walked hundreds of miles after landing in America. They even used cattle as pack animals to carry their heavy loads. Cabins were built and land was cleared of trees and undergrowth so crops could be planted.

George Bingham's painting of Daniel Boone coming over Cumberland Gap

(Note: I posted this painting before, but didn't have the artist's name, so I'm giving you this recap with Bingham getting credit!)

 Kentucky the 15th State

According to a 1790 U.S. government report, 1,500 Kentucky settlers had been killed in Indian raids since the end of the Revolutionary War.^[27] In an attempt to end such raids into the state, George Rogers Clark led an expedition of 1,200 drafted men against Shawnee towns on the Wabash River in 1786, one of the first actions of the Northwest Indian War.

After the American Revolution, the counties of Virginia beyond the Appalachian Mountains became known as Kentucky County.^[29] Eventually, the residents of Kentucky County petitioned for a separation from Virginia. Ten constitutional conventions were held in the Constitution Square Courthouse in Danville between 1784 and 1792. In 1790, Kentucky's delegates accepted Virginia's terms of separation, and a state constitution was drafted at the final convention in April 1792. On June 1, 1792, Kentucky became the fifteenth state to be admitted to the union. Isaac Shelby, a military veteran from Virginia, was elected the first Governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.

The Wilderness Road served as a great path of commerce for the early settlers in Kentucky. Horses, cattle, sheep and hogs found a waiting market in the Carolinas, Maryland and Virginia. Hogs in groups of 500 or more were driven down the Road to market. Beef in Eastern markets had become a main source of income for farmers in Kentucky.^[22]

A postal road was opened in 1792 from Bean Station, Tennessee through Cumberland Gap to Danville, Kentucky. This was due largely to the efforts of Governor Isaac Shelby of Kentucky. This connection of Kentucky to the East was a great advantage. Frontier settlers considered the postal riders heroes and waited eagerly for their arrival for news from settlements along the trails as well as getting their mail and newspapers.[23

I'll next post some info about her father, Francis Beattie (born 1715 in Ireland, died 1791 in Washington County, VA) who wrote a will, which summarizes well what his holdings were, and who his children were.  His wife, Martha Tate Beattie was also born in Ireland in 1720, and died before he did, but there's no documentation of her death.  They had around 8 children, all born in VA.

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* Here's the census of 1850 with Margaret's age as 85, in a housefull of women, Margaret Erskin and probably her children, all Erskins.  Margaret Hansford is the head of the household (her husband had died in 1841).

It is interesting to note that Margaret gives her birth-state as Pennsylvania. She is living in Lincoln County, KY.

And another interesting fact, is that her 60 year old son William an his wife and family live right next door to her...with the Erskins, who I have yet to find a relationship to the Hansfords!

And here's the 1860 census.

She was living with her son, J. S. Hansford, age 59, and Margaret is 97 on this document, as well as having been born in Virginia. Though J. S. is a farmer by occupation, they are now in the Crab Orchard town in Lincoln County, KY.  Crab Orchard is one of the oldest towns in KY.  It is also where Margaret and her husband were buried.

And another thing about my great times 5 grandmother, Margaret Beattie Hansford's parents came to America from Ireland.

Making new trees

A friend came over for dinner last night, with the promise that we'd look into her family history. I'm no professional genealogist, but enjoy delving into the documents that are available on Ancestry sites.

So we plugged in her data about her parents, knowing where and when they were born and died.  And then the little "hint leaves" started appearing.  That meant that Ancestry had found their data from some available data source.  The best information came from census reports.

Early census data just counted how many people were what age ranges

We saw such wonderful detail of family members that had lived in the early 20th century.  The census reports are available up until 1940. We wondered when 1950 would be available...is this a limitation from the federal government? Well, for now, the 1920 and 30 census data was great.

And just in case you didn't know, the data is not just a list of who lived in a household.  We got to see the actual census reports, hand written by the census takers on the date listed on the form.  It was like reading the interview with these ancestors.

My friend's family data from 1920 is somewhere on this census!

We learned how long they had been married, where they were born, what language they spoke, where their parents were born and the languages they spoke, and what their occupation was, and perhaps who they worked for.  And we learned about a person living in the household who was listed as a lodger, but turned out to be really the grandparent of the wife...but since she wasn't head of household, the census taker didn't have that category to use.  Thus this grandfather had an age given, which gave us his birthyear within a 2 year possibility based on whether he'd had his birthday for that year at the time of the census.

And then we got to see the actual draft registration cards for several of the men for WW I and WW II.  These told us how tall they were, their physical attributes like bald, color of hair and eyes, and general shape (slight, medium or stout).

So it was much better than looking at old scrapbooks.  In an hour we had looked at original documents that verified where her ancestors lived. We also were able to screen out people with same names and birth years who came from the wrong area of the country, or married the wrong name person.  That was the advantage of having my friend sitting there with me. If she hadn't been, I could have added a lot of data that was misleading.  She did have a few relatives with unusual names, and then one with a more common one.

So that was an entertaining evening, and I have her family tree started for her. It was like meeting Uncle Joseph and Aunt something-or-another at a family reunion, but we didn't have to smile and balance a plate of cake with a cup of coffee at the same time we shook hands!

Who says genealogy can't be fun!