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Shaking the Family
Tree
What could a 14th century French Marchioness and an 18th
century English theif possibly have in common? Well,
it's more a matter of who than what. Since 1989 I've been
shaking the family tree and some remarkable stories have fallen
to the ground. Altogether they compose the story of me, and the
story of some of you who will be reading this information. They
are the stories of our ancestors: French Huguenots fleeing persecution
by zealots, Palatine emigrants refugeeing from their Rhine River
homes for the same reason, fortune-seekers, adventurers, and younger
sons from England and Ireland, Scottish rebels, redemptioners from
the Netherlands and western Europe, and even convicts who's sentence
--transportation-- was considered "a fate worse than
death".
These are the stories of people who without exception
bid their homes and kin farewell and braved a long and arduous sea
journey to an uncertain fate. They were put ashore at ports like
New York, Philadelphia, Annapolis, and Charleston, where they were
left to make their ways in this strange, hard new land. (In some
cases it was either that, or be burned at the stake for a heretic!
Hmmm. Let's see... Be burned alive? Or travel to the New World?
Burned? Travel? Uh, don't stand between me and the ship!!) It is
difficult to imagine how momentous and desperate a decision emigration
was for many, even harder to imagine how difficult your situation
was if your emigration was involuntary.
It was a hard country, full of tough, fascinating
people who had risked --or sacrificed-- everything to make it here.
They are us, and we are them, right down to our
DNA. And we owe them everything.
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"At this time, I have no plans
to record my research in book form....my work can
be more widely shared, used, added to, and updated in electronic
format."
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The Need to Know
I don't remember a time when I wasn't aware that my great grandmother
was a Holbrook before she married my great grandfather. Or that
my great-great grandfather's mother was a Stokeley of the family
that would later operate a well-known cannery. Oooh! How exciting!
Holbrooks and Stokeleys! What else was hiding back there? I used
to ask my great-aunt Zella "Who was your grandfather?
... And who was his grandfather?" To my intense dissatisfaction,
she could not recite our pedigree backwards into infinity.
I can recall a very early childhood excursion
to Chatham County, NC, with my paternal relatives to see a decrepit
plantation house. It was a large crumbling gray manse (read: decent
sized two-story house) with a long porch and columns. (I have ever
afterward associated columns with grandeur and am still trying to
work out how to employ them on my chalet in the mountains...) It's
walls and ceilings had once been ornately and brilliantly painted.
Now they were faded, dull and weathered by time. My mysterious ancestors
had lived in the home prior to the American Civil War. But who were
they? My curious child's mind worked at the question until I had
a clear picture in my head of them in their hoop skirts and buff
breeches, standing on the front porch, stiff as pokers, shaded by
drifts of wysteria. There. Very satisfactory image.
These incidents created in me a real desire to
push past what was known and remembered by my elders and to really
know who my ancestors were. My aunt Thelma had done forty
years worth of work on my father's family, and had gathered a sizable
amount of information on some of the lines; just enough to tantalize
me on others.
When I was eighteen I began in earnest. My father
had bought me a dependable little gold Honda Civic, which became
intimately familiar with roads to research destinations (and some
cornfields and gulleys) all over the South. I think it could have
driven itself to any one of them. I knew every courthouse and library
in Southwest Virginia and central North Carolina, and some in Tennesse
and Maryland! I was on a first-name basis with archivists, historians,
and librarians on both sides of the Atlantic. I lived and breathed
research. I spent hours and hours and hours in state archives,
halls of records, and the LDS archives. I was the Queen of Microfiche.
I could read the decipher the spidery writing on wills as quickly
and accurately as I could read typed writing. I even pursued credits
at the university in American History (emphasis on southern colonial),
but stopped five hours short of a degree.
And I learned a lot. A lot about
Colonial America, a lot about the South, a lot about my family,
and a lot about myself. [TOP]
Taking a Break
to Live
1995 was my summer of discontent. I had worked for two years at
a job which allowed me two day's off per week (in addition to the
weekend) which I used for research. But the job was too crazy, the
pay too low, and it wasn't feasible to continue. I had to move on,
and as a result, the time and attention I could devote to research
was drastically reduced. I struck out for the Washington DC area,
and when I arrived, I had to focus all my energy on making it on
my own in a strange new place (my own little real-life version of
transportation to a new colony). I hustled hard, and I'm
proud of where it' got me, and of the things I've seen and done.
But I regretted that the research that so many people in my family
had looked forward to learning about had fallen by the wayside.
[TOP]
Eating the
Elephant
Since January of 1996 my work sat on the bottom shelf of the book
case in my office. Binders and boxes glare at me accusingly each
time I sit down to work on other projects. Finally in 2000 I received
the genealogy program Reunion
7.0 as a gift. I was thrilled, but even so, it took me about
six months to psyche myself up to the point where I was ready to
get started with keying all my research notes into my computer.
The sheer volume of the work to be tackled was too daunting. Six
years worth or photocopies and handwritten scrappets, photographs
and letters, histories and family group sheets to be transcribed!
And at a time in my life where I was so busy with other things.
But I decided to go ahead and take that first step. It would be
like eating an elephant, I decided; one little bite at a time
until it was done. [TOP]
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"The sheer volume of the work to
be tackled was daunting...but I decided to go ahead and take
that first step. It would be like eating an elephant, I decided;
one little bite at a time until it was done."
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Genealogy
in the Information Age
Something revolutionary had happened while my notes hibernated.
Internet access had come into American homes and offices, and communication
between researchers and access to document repositories became astronomically
easier and faster. Imagine my delight when I idly typed in a set
of names and got a number of hits listing pages built by distant
relatives who could often supplement my lists of descendancies,
and better yet, add to my list of ancestors.
Many researchers look askance at information
gleaned from the net. While I will admit I've seen a fair number
of errors in online research, I wouldn't necessarily say I've
seen significantly fewer errors in written (or oral) family histories,
or family group sheets filed in local libraries. More often
than misdirecting me, the internet has provided valuable leads to
follow (and the ability to verify or discard them much more quickly
than with traditional methods). Online research has allowed me to
definitively disprove a number of very old and dearly held misconceptions
on several lines, and to do so quickly. Furthermore, the access
to reliable databases (such as those run by the Library of Virginia,
and many local county genealogical societies) are miraculously helpful.
I still work hard to verify my research, and to use primary source
documents where possible, but I also enjoy and use resources available
to me on the internet where I feel they are helpful or valid. Nevertheless,
I am unable to vouch for some of my information which has come to
me second-hand (through old history books, family histories, or
online GEDCOM files), so it is critical that everyone do their own
research to prove or discard relationships found on this site. If
you do find mistakes, I urge you to contact me with proof of errors.
[TOP]
Documenting
My Work
My biggest regret in regard to my genealogy is that when I began,
I was young and impatient, and I failed to document a great deal
of my early research. Hours and hours in courthouses and libraries
all over North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia yielded a wealth
of information. I copied the information down faithfully, but often
skipped the "tedious" process of sourcing. I trust my
work, because I gained much of it first-hand in old Deed and Will
books, cemeteries, bibles and the like, but I realize that it may
be difficult for you to trust it without attributions. Where possible,
I have tried to recall where I found information. Now that many
records are available online through state agencies, I am very much
more careful to devote the time and energy to documenting and providing
sources with my research. [TOP]
The Hunt of a
Lifetime
I laughed earlier when I mentioned that I planned to take the genealogy
slow and steady through to the end. Anyone who knows genealogy knows
it is the hunt of a lifetime, and that it never ends. Literally.
Whenever I break open my books and notes, my husband has become
a widower. My household chores suffer, my mail goes unopened, my
bills unpaid, my hair uncombled, as I am seduced by the siren song
hum of my computer. Work and travel are nuisances, as they interfere
with the more important business of research. I would much rather
sit and enter names and dates until my eyes will no longer focus.
As I move forward with my research, I'm often
asked questions about my intentions and my methods. Here are the
answers to a few...
Frequently Asked Questions
Are you
going to write a book?
This is a question I am often asked by members of my family interested
in learning more about the research I've done over the last decade.
At this time, have no
plans to record my research in book form.
When I began researching, the internet was not yet a widely used
medium, and I had thought that a book (or booklet) on each line
would be the only way I could share my information among the family.
The cost of writing and publishing four books which would be of
pertinence to each line was daunting. Since the mid '90's, use
of the internet in homes has exploded, and along with that, the
sharing of genealogical information across America and the world.
My research can be more widely shared, used, added to, and changed
in electronic format. [FAQ's]
Are you
finished with your research?
Absolutely not. I am always interested in learning more, and in
pushing the family lines further and further back where possible.
That is why this website is a much better alternative to a book
-- it's a constantly growing work-in-progress. Entering many year's
worth of copied and handwritten notes into my new Reunion
software is sometimes an overwhelming task, but after a four-year
hiatus, I am digging my boxes back out with the intention of tackling
a little bit at a time until finallly, one day in the future,
everything will be in share-able electronic format. Even then,
I am always open to new finds. As you can see from the sparse
state of many of family entries, I have only just begun to fill
in the Person Sheets with notes, research, and documentation.In
many cases, I am in posession of additional information and research,
but have not had a chance to add the information to the website.
[FAQ's]
What if
my research doesn't agree with yours?
I have done the best I can to collect information from a wide
variety of sources, and make sense of the facts I've found.
I make no guarantees that my work is 100% accurate,
only that it is as accurate as I could make it given the time
and resources available to me. I'd rather provide too much information
and hope that it contains valuable clues than too little (for
fear of recording some wrong fact). I am reasonably comfortable
with most of the information on my site, but I have no doubt that
there are gaps and indiscrepancies. I would really appreciate
your input where you feel I have made mistakes or drawn erroneous
conclusions. I would also like to ask you to send me your information
so that I can replace or make notations where there are mistakes
or disagreements. [FAQ's]
What
if I have additional information about people on your site?
I would be thrilled to have your input or additional information.
One of the reasons I am going ahead and posting my site with the
many "bare-bones" entries, is to have a starting point
for collecting more information. I am hopeful that other descendants
of the people I've found in my own history will share their family
histories to me. If you can provide any family stories, photographs,
facts or other information about any of the individuals
listed on this site, I
implore you to send me your GEDCOM files, or even an email containing
the information you wish to share. [FAQ's]
Why
isn't my line of descent from John and Jane Doe listed?
Because I simply do not have the time or the resources to follow
every line of descent from every child of every spouse set I've
come across as I've researched my ancestry. Where I have had available
information I have sometimes tried to enter parellel descendancies,
but this gets extremely time-consuming. The primary focus of my
work has been to research and document my and my sister's direct
ancestry. However, I would very much
like to add other descendants to these couples with
the hope that one day my database is as complete as it can be.
As many of you know, keeping careful track of descendancies can
provide valuable clues to a family's migration and intermarriage
patterns. If you have a GEDCOM file which lists lines of descent
in addition to the ones currently on my site, please email me
and I will do my best to add them. [FAQ's]
Can
you send me paper copies of your research?
I would be happy to export records as GEDCOMs or other electronic
files and e-mail them to you to print on your printer, however,
printing and copying my files could quickly turn expensive (in
terms of time and money). In the mean time, please enjoy access
to my genealogy web site, into which I put much time and effort.
[FAQ's]
Can you send
me copies of photos from the Family History?
Feel free to download any of the photos on the site which are
attributed to me (ie: those bearing the words "From the private
collection of Laura Henderson". (Please do NOT download,
reproduce, or distribute any photos which do not bear this attribution,
as they do not belong to me.) The time and cost of reproducing
photographs is such that at this time I cannot provide reproductions
of actual photographs, however, I am working (slowly) on scanning
all the family photographs in my possession. I am scanning them
at photo-quality printing resolutions, and I plan to eventually
transfer them to CD's, where I will offer them for sale at cost
to family members. [FAQ's]
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