Mom's DAR Process - Associated & Supplemental Applications for Francis Smalley

Mom's Patriot Ancestor Francis Smalley has several associated and supplemental applications associated with him at the DAR's database.  However, only two of them are through his daughter, Thirza, which is our line.

One is from Gertrude Holbrook Winslow Merwin :

1. Search»     Darwin Cordenio Winslow born on 22 - Feb - 1834 at Charlemont MA      died at Gilroy CA on 18 - Aug - 1914 and his ( 1st ) wife   Martha Waldron Hatch born on 13 - Jan - 1840 at Port Leyden NY   died at Long Beach CA on 15 - Mar - 1921 married on 10 - Oct - 1859

2. Search» The Said Martha Waldron Hatch was the child of   Jethro Hatch born on 27 - Jan - 1791 at Duanesburg NY      died at Aurora IL on 17 - Feb - 1875 and his ( 2nd ) wife   Minerva Peirce born on 25 - Jan - 1805 at Chelsea VT   died at Aurora IL on 14 - May - 1882 married on 6 - May - 1829

3. Search» The Said Minerva Peirce was the child of   Gurdon Peirce born on 31 - Aug - 1770 at Brimfield CT      died at Sugar Grove IL on 10 - Nov - 1861 and his ( 1st ) wife   Thirza Smalley born on 8 - May - 1771 at Norwich VT   died at Pitcher NY on 19 - Apr - 1830 married on 1 - Dec - 1796

4. Search» The Said Thirza Smalley was the child of   Francis Smalley born on bp - Oct - 1744 at Kent CT      died at Norwich VT on p - - 1811 and his ( 1st ) wife   Sarah Hutchinson born on - - at _______________   died at Norwich VT on 29 - Mar - 1780 married on 17 - Nov - 1767   ** Additional, but unverified lineage is listed on the application. **

The other applicant was Hazel Hatch Steele :

1. Search»     Jethro Ayres Hatch born on 18 - Jun - 1837 at Pitcher NY      died at Victoria TX on 3 - Aug - 1912 and his ( 1st ) wife   Sarah Schaeffer born on 28 - Jul - 1861 at Fairfield Co OH   died at Knox IN on 9 - Dec - 1947 married on 26 - May - 1881

2. Search» The Said Jethro Ayres Hatch was the child of   Jethro Hatch born on 27 - Jan - 1791 at Duanesburg NY      died at Aurora IL on 7 - Feb - 1875 and his ( 2nd ) wife   Minerva Peirce born on 25 - Jan - 1805 at Chelsea VT   died at Aurora IL on 4 - May - 1882 married on 6 - May - 1829

3. Search» The Said Minerva Peirce was the child of   Gurdon Peirce born on 31 - Aug - 1770 at Brimfield CT      died at Sugar Grove IL on 10 - Nov - 1861 and his ( 1st ) wife   Thirza Smalley born on 8 - May - 1771 at Norwich CT   died at Pitcher NY on 19 - Apr - 1830 married on 1 - Dec - 1796

4. Search» The Said Thirza Smalley was the child of   Francis Smalley born on bp - Oct - 1744 at Kent CT      died at Norwich VT on p - - 1811 and his ( 1st ) wife   Sara Hutchinson born on - - at _______________   died at Norwich VT on 29 - Mar - 1780 married on 17 - Nov - 1767   ** Additional, but unverified lineage is listed on the application. **

Both of these lines come through Thirza through Gurdon Pierce to  daughter Minerva Pierce who married Jethro Hatch.  So at least a couple of generations of the lineage are already established, and we just need to get mom documented back to Gurdon Pierce.

Already working on gathering all of the birth, marriage and death records for the latest generations and have given mom an assignment to go to the Madison County health department to request the ones we don't have.

Obituary : Mrs. Thomas Crane, Bloomington Telephone, May 7, 1924

Thanks to the folks at the Monroe County, Indiana Public Library, I was able to obtain a copy of the obituary of my maternal 3great-grandaunt, Mary Florence (Gilliland) Crane (1887-1924).  The obituary appeared in the May 7, 1924 edition of the Telephone in Bloomington, Indiana.

DEATH OF MRS. THOS. CRANE

Mrs. Thomas Crane, at Unionville, died Tuesday afternoon of uremic poisoning after being sick 3 weeks, age 37.  The husband and six children survive, including an infant.  She was a member of the Baptist church and the daughter of Mary Gililan and sister of Mrs. Daniel Stevens of this city.

Funeral Thursday at 10 o'clock at Baptist church of Unionville and burial at Payne cemetery.

There were a couple of spelling errors on the names - her mother's name was Mary Ellen (Swafford) Gilliland and her half sister's name (Delia) was Mrs. Daniel Stivers.  Curiously, her brother William Everett Gilliland was not mentioned in this obituary.

Mom's DAR Process - Picking an Ancestor

Met with mom on Monday to discuss the process for DAR membership and talked about which Patriot ancestor to choose from.  

Decided to use Francis Smalley-A105541 as the Patriot ancestor to start the process with for a number of reasons.  One reason is that his line comes through our Pierce line which should allow us to gather the necessary documentation.  Another reason is that Francis' father, Joseph Smalley and Francis' father-in-law Samuel Hutchinson Sr. are both recognized as Patriots by the DAR, so mom could later do supplemental applications for them.  Additionally, it is through the Smalley line that mom has a connection to the Mayflower and Stephen Hopkins, a future project.  So if we can get all of the documentation together on the descent from Francis Smalley we can take care of several things at once.

Mom filled out the contact form on the DAR main website and within a few hours was already contacted by the local chapter.  She has given the registrar a line of descent from Francis Smalley and hopes to meet with her next week for initial discussions on how the application process works.

In the meantime, I'm putting together a list of documents that I'm sure we will need and will work with mom on collecting the birth/death certificates, etc. 

If you have experience with this process and have any advice, I'd appreciate hearing it.

If you are related to any of the families on the line, I'd love to share information and update my database.

Our line of descent from the Patriot ancestor, Francis Smalley :

Francis Smalley & Sarah Hutchinson
Thirsa Smalley & Gurdon Pierce
Francis S. Pierce & Rebecca Page
Edmund G. Pierce & Catherine Groenendyke
William F. Pierce & Clara A. Penisten
Edna M. Pierce & Virgil L. Wright
William L. Wright & Bonnie M. Lambertson
mom

The Wright spelling?

One of my memories of my grandmother, Bonnie (Lambertson) Wright was when we were on a trip in Chattanooga, Tennessee at Ruby Falls/Rock City.  At some point, my grandma was buying a ticket or something and the cashier asked her for her name.  When she said "Wright", the cashier asked her how she spelled it.  My grandma answered "W-R-I-G-H-T, how else would you spell it?"

Good thing grandma didn't look at these records in the FamilySearch collection of Massachusetts Revolutionary War muster rolls.  These are the variations for the Wright surname, including : Rite, Right, Writ, Write, Whright, and Waright, just to mention a few.

Shaky Leaves : Marriage of William E. Gilliland to Florence Arthur, 1922, Monroe County, Indiana

Found the index record of the marriage of my maternal 2nd-great granduncle, William Everett Gilliland to Florence Arthur in Monroe County, Indiana through Ancestry's hints in my LeMaster & Allied Family Tree.  The wedding took place on May 13, 1922 in Monroe County, Indiana.

This was a second marriage for William Everett Gilliland, his first wife was Maud Nell Arthur.  I'm not sure at this point if she might be an older sister of Florence.

Shaky Leaves: Death of Peter Swafford, 1885, Owen County, Indiana

Found additional information at Ancestry regarding Peter Swafford, my maternal 4th great-grandfather and his date of death.  According to the WPA index, his death occurred at age 58 on August 18, 1885 in Spencer, Owen County, Indiana.

Name:	Peter Swaffar
Date:	18 Aug 1885
Location:	Spencer
Age:	58 Yr
Gender:	Male
Race:	White
Source Location:	County Health Office, Spencer
Source notes:	The source of this record is the book H-12 on page 70 within the series produced by the Indiana Works Progress Administration.

I would almost bet that I already had this information, but for some reason it wasn't in my database. I find it strange that his death occurred in mid-August and yet it took until the first week of September for any mention of his death in Bloomington paper.  Perhaps there was a Spencer newspaper that would have more information.  Now that I have his exact date of death, I can seek this out.

The spelling of the surname also gives me an indication of how the name was pronounced, likely without a hard 'd' at the end.

DNA : Crockett connection

Made a connection through Ruby's DNA for a match (Elizabeth) who had Crockett listed in the list of surnames.  I reached out to her and heard back quickly that she is a descendant of the Joseph Crockett, who was the brother of David Crockett - the ancestor of Ruby and I.

In her email, she stated she was in contact with another Crockett researcher who I was familiar with and mentioned that DNA had tied our Alexander Crockett into the line of David Crockett the elder, the grandparents of Davy Crockett of Alamo fame.

There is a Crockett DNA project at FamilyTreeDNA, if you are male Crockett descendant, I would encourage you to join and do the Y-DNA test.

Here is how Ruby compares with Elizabeth, the largest match is on Chromosome 11.

I don't have all of Elizabeth's line yet, so the exact relationship is not known, but the prediction would be 2nd-4th cousin to Ruby.

I'm looking forward to continuing the correspondence and see what the Crockett DNA group has found out about the ancestry.

DNA : Ruby's Top Matches at FamilyTreeDNA

These are the top eight matches at FamilyTreeDNA for my maternal great-aunt Ruby's by relationship range.  I've removed the last names of the matches. Of course, I am her closest match at 998cm with a predicted relationship range of 1st cousin, half sibling, grandparent/grandchild, aunt/uncle, niece/nephew. 

The next closest match is Mildred, who matches Ruby at 272cm and is predicted to be a 1st - 3rd cousin.  Mildred is a known relative, a 1st cousin once removed with common ancestors being Mary Ellen Swafford.  Mildred comes from the Gilliland side of the family, so actually she would be a half-1st cousin once removed.

The next two matches, Judith and Thomas, are the children of Mildred and match Ruby at 173cm and 135cm respectively.  These would be Ruby's second cousins (technically half-second cousins).  Interestingly, Judith and Thomas do not share the same amount of DNA with Ruby, which just shows why you should test as many people as you can as not even brothers & sisters will share the exact same amounts of DNA.

The next match, Justin, is the son of Judith.  He shares 108cm with Ruby. He is also predicted to be a 2nd - 4th cousin, but is actually 2nd cousin once removed.

The next match, Elizabeth, shares 81cm with Ruby and is predicted to be a 2nd - 4th cousin.  She doesn't have a family tree on the site, but in the list of surnames was Crockett, the name of Ruby's 2nd-great grandmother. I've heard back from her and she descends from Alexander Crockett & Elizabeth Watkins through Joseph, the younger brother of Ruby's ancestor David Crockett of Owen County, Indiana.

The next match, Sherrol, shares 77cm with Ruby and is predicted to be a 2nd - 4th cousin.  She has a family tree on the site, but I didn't see any names that looked familiar.  Will have to reach out and see if we can compare notes for the connection.

The next match, Mark, also shares 77cm with Ruby and is predicted to be a 2nd - 4th cousin.  He has no family tree or surnames listed.

The next match, Dale, shares 75cm with Ruby and is predicted to be a 2nd - 4th cousin match.  Dale is Ruby's 3rd cousin, a descendant of David & Ellen (Lambertson) Mengle.  Dale and Ruby's common ancestors are John Lambertson & Sarah A. Willson.

The last match on the first page, Vaughn, shares 74cm with Ruby and is predicted to be a 2nd-4th cousin match.  No family tree provided, but several surnames listed - none that are familiar.  Will have to reach out to see if we can make the connection.

At first blush, there are some known relatives and good potential matches in the list of the first page of highest centimorgans shared.