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Updated Biermann-Lindner and Hartley-Sigmund Family Tree Now Available

I have uploaded another updated Gedcom (November 2022) to this site using Legacy Family Tree.  The old rootspersona data is gone. My file includes direct ancestors for me and for my husband’s family, as well as all descendants that I have recorded. Please understand that my research is always a work in progress.  I cannot guarantee that these data are mistake-free; however, I do have original research that may not be available elsewhere.  If you are going to use my information, please acknowledge me as a source.

Let me know if you have questions or corrections!

Ancestors of Cheryl Biermann Hartley

Ancestors of Gary Hartley

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Connecting to Martin Luther the Reformer – Exercise Due Diligence

31 July 2018    

Hello, readers.  I have learned over the past few years that the majority of visits to my blog come from people who are interested in whether or not Martin Luther the Reformer left any descendants.  (He did, and I am one. Read my story here: Martin Luther – Yes, THAT Martin Luther – 52 Ancestors #13; and here:  My Direct Line to Martin Luther – Yes, THAT Martin Luther ).

Some visitors to my blog are simply curious, but some are hoping to connect their ancestry to Martin Luther.  Sometimes their interest arises because they bear the surname Luther; sometimes family lore has suggested that Martin Luther is a progenitor; occasionally they have found a family tree that suggests the relationship.

It’s important to proceed with caution when doing family research.  Novice genealogists don’t always understand how many people have/had the same name; nor, does the fact that an ancestor appears in someone else’s tree assure that the information appearing there is correct.  The website Geneastar that connects people with famous relatives suggested that I am related to the Brothers Grimm of fairy tale fame.  Unfortunately, when I scrutinized the associated family tree, I learned that Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm were related to someone with the same name as my ancestor, living around the same time, but not in the same place.  Oh, well, easy come, easy go!  The important thing is to evaluate the underlying documentation for any claim to ensure that it isn’t a bogus relationship.  The claim should be supported by original records (always preferable when available), credible secondary resources, deductive reasoning and a healthy dose of common sense!

I found this kind of excellent research in a post from Debbie Fiumara on the Luther surname message board  at Ancestry.com.  One of the popular beliefs is that Margarete Luther, sixth child of Martin Luther and Katharina von Bora, married twice.  Debbie makes a compelling case that Margarete was married just once to Georg von Künheim, Jr.  With her permission, I am sharing her post of 1 Nov 2017 in it’s entirety:

“Hello to you, and to all the others who have asked about Anna Margaretha Luther’s marriage(s?) and descendants.

I have researched this question, and have no doubt in my mind that Margaretha’s only marriage was to Georg von Künheim, Jr.

That’s the short version. Here’s the extended version:

First of all, a simple Wikipedia search names no other husband. However, I wanted more definitive proof, since I am also a direct descendant of Emmerich Wagner, a butcher whose son, Ludwig, graduated from the University of Marburg and became a Lutheran minister around the turn of the 17th Century.

Like you, I have seen “Claus” named as Emmerich’s father, but I have found no proof. The sad and frustrating fact is: No matter how well the church (Lutheran or Catholic) may have kept records, written records are subject to the ravages of water, faded ink, ripped and fragile pages, war, and simple misplacement. Furthermore, in some parishes, written records weren’t even kept, or kept consistently, until after 1540 (https://www.familysearch.org/wiki/en/Germany_Church_Records).

If the records still exist (and are legible, and have been scanned/microfilmed at some point!), I have not been able to locate them via Ancestry. Also, if I may note, even if Martin Luther had “kept good records of baptisms and marriages,” he had passed away before Margaretha was 12 years old. Any records written after that time, would not have been kept by him….

Secondly, it has been established that Margaretha was born 17 Dec 1534. If she had been married prior to her marriage to Georg von Künheim, Jr. (1 Jul 1532 – 18 Oct 1611), she would have been about 15 years old when she allegedly married Claus Wagner, and barely 16 when she allegedly gave birth to Emmerich. In researching numerous family records dating back to the 1600’s, it was most common for my maternal ancestors to be at least 18-20 when they first married. The idea that Margaretha would have married at such a young age raised a red flag, but that just meant more research was needed.

As I pursued the research further, I came across some German narratives. (For one such example, there is: http://kirche-muehlhausen.org/index.php?id=580). What I had read, seemed to indicate that Margaretha and Georg first became acquainted around 1552, when she was about 17/18 years old. At the time, she was under the guardianship of Philipp Melanchthon, living in his household after the death of her mother, which occurred in December 1552. Meanwhile, Georg was a student at the university in Wittenberg, having begun his studies around 1550. (Melanchthon knew both the von Künheim family, and the Luther family.) It is rather unlikely that Margaretha would have needed Melanchthon to be her guardian had she been married.

At any rate, Georg and Margaretha were engaged in 1554/1555 and married on 5 Aug 1555, when she was 20. She died in 1570, in her 36th year, while giving birth to their ninth child. In all, their marriage produced four sons and five daughters, of whom only two daughters and one son survived her (Representative sources:https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margarete_von_Kunheim
and
http://www.familienbuch-euregio.de/genius/php/show.php?tab=1….)

Even knowing this, I wanted more information. Finally, I came across a book on-line: “Philipp Melanthons Briefe an Albrecht, herzog von Preussen: von den originalen im geheimen Archiv zu Konigsberg, mit historischen Anmerkungen erlautert und zum dritten Reformations Jubiläo (pages 207-208).” You may view the pages for yourself at:

https://books.google.com/books?id=8-MrAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA205&…

The letter in question was written in Latin on 18 Dec 1554, in response to objections to a union between the young von Künheim and Luther’s daughter. In it, Melanchthon vouched for Margaretha’s character, twice referring to her as a virgin (“virginis filiae” and “Lutheri filiam honestam virginem”).

Melanchthon’s letter settled the matter for me. Unless there is another way to translate and interpret the words “virginis” and “virginem,” the best conclusion is that Margaretha was a virgin at the time of her engagement and subsequent marriage to Georg von Künheim. I don’t see how Melanchthon could have made those statements, if Margaretha had been married previously.

I did run the texts through Google Translate, since my German is rusty and I never learned Latin. If anyone out there has expertise in either, or both, languages, they are welcome to challenge my conclusions.

Personally, though, I’m satisfied that there is no historical evidence supporting a marriage prior to Georg and Margaretha’s; therefore, it is not possible that she was ever married to a “Claus Wagner.”

Hope this settles the matter to everyone’s satisfaction. Thanks.”

(End of post by Debbie Fiumara.)
This isn’t the only misinformation being circulated about the descendancy of Martin Luther, but I think this is enough to digest for now.
Resource:
Fiumara, Debbie, Response to “That Martin Luther from the 1500’s”; 1 Nov. 2017

https://www.ancestry.com/boards/surnames.luther/381.1.1.1.1.1.1.5/mb.ashx

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http://mysearchforthepast.com/person-index/rootspersona-tree/biermann-living/

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Lily Biermann (Terrell) Aultman – Lost Lily

Two children, who shared my maiden name, found in the Cincinnati Children’s Home in the 1900 U.S. census.  I passed them by – Lilly Bierman, age eight, and John Bierman, age two – they aren’t my family, I thought.  I knew of no orphaned Biermann children in my family.  I was looking for my grandfather, John Joseph Biermann, who was born in 1899, but this was the wrong one.  I forgot these children.

This is a story that comes from a place where genealogy, DNA and drama all merge.

Last year, a Lily Bierman turned up again in the tree of three of my dad’s DNA matches.  On closer inspection, it was clear that three  generations of women from one family had tested.  I searched Ancestry.com for Lily Biermann (Terrell) Aultman and realized that she was the Lilly from the orphanage, the one I had chosen to ignore.  In the family tree of our DNA matches, Lily’s father was shown as William Bierman and her mother as Anna Smith.  That didn’t seem to correspond with my family, even though I DO have a William Biermann who was my great-granduncle.  Again, though, I dismissed the possibility of a close relationship.

In July, I noticed that the three descendants of Lily Bierman were all now on Gedmatch.  For those who don’t know, Gedmatch is a DNA sharing website that gives you tools to compare your DNA to your matches by uploading their raw DNA to the website. One of Lily’s descendants was among my father’s closest matches.  I referred back to Ancestry DNA and recalled why I hadn’t made contact the first time around.   Even though this appeared to be a dead end, I decided to send a message to them.  This is when I learned that the matches were:  Louise, a contemporary of my 94 year-old father; Terry, Louise’s daughter; and Amy, Louise’s granddaughter.

Ancestry DNA was predicting a 4th to 6th cousin match between my dad and Louise. Because the projected relationship wasn’t close, I thought perhaps this family might be a branch that connected back in Germany.  True, my second great-grandfather was named William Joseph Beermann (the original spelling of the name), and he did have a son named William Biermann (born in Cincinnati in 1872); but that would make my dad and Louise second cousins, rather than 4th to 6th cousins.

I was about to write Terry and Amy a message to this effect, when I got an invitation from them to share DNA matches.  I only had to look at Louise’s matches for a few minutes to realize that she shared DNA with Maune descendants.  My second great-grandmother was Maria Elisabetha Maune and she married Wilhelm Joseph Beermann.  I suddenly had little doubt that Louise, Terry and Amy were descended directly from my immigrant great-great grandparents.  This had to mean that William Biermann, my great-grandfather’s brother, was the father of Lilly.  Here is the actual relationship between my dad and Louise:

John H. Biermann's relationship to Louise

John H. Biermann’s relationship to Louise

William A. Biermann was born on 22 February 1870 in Cincinnati, Ohio, and he didn’t die until 19 April 1951.  This was a bit disconcerting.  It means that his children were not orphans when they resided in the Children’s Home.  Further, William had living parents and siblings, including my great-grandparents, who didn’t take in Lilly and John.

While Terry updated her family tree, I began to search for records relating to Lilly Bierman.  I found what I was looking for among Cincinnati Birth and Death Records, 1865-1912, housed at the University of Cincinnati Digital Library and Repository.  I located Lilly born on January 14, 1892 in Cincinnati.  Her parents were given as William Bierman and Annie Schmidt.

Lilly Biermann - Birth UC Library

I kept hunting and discovered that there were four children in total.  We already knew about John from the Children’s Home.  He must be the male child known just as “J. Bierman,” born in January 1898.  The father was William and the mother —–Smith. It seems strange that the information on this record was so vague, but maybe the original was difficult to read.

John Bierman birth UC Library 1898

Additionally, there were two middle children, Anna and William, who were born between Lilly and John:

Anna Bierman - birth UC Library

William Bierman birth UC Library

There was also a death record for the child, Annie Biermann, and I found her burial in my family plot at St. Mary’s Cemetery.  She died of meningitis at the age of two:

Annie Biermann Death - Univ. of Cincinnati Library

My next question was whether or not William Biermann and Annie Schmidt were married.  I found that they married on 13 January 1892 one day before Lilly was born.  They were married by banns in St. Anthony’s Catholic Church.

Marriage banns - William Beermann and Anna Schmidt

We can draw a preliminary picture of this couple.  They don’t appear to have planned this marriage or, at least, their first child.  William is listed as a “laborer” on each of the children’s birth records, except the last, when his occupation is shown as “tanner.” His death record indicates that he was a “grave  digger,” further suggesting that he was an unskilled laborer.  When each child was born, a different address was given.  William looks like a man who may not have wanted to marry, who had no substantial occupation, and whose housing was somewhat itinerant.  What else could we learn about William Biermann and Annie Schmidt?

I thought I would check the newspapers to see if Annie may have died, since that was often the reason that children ended up in orphanages.  A single working parent was often unable to care for the children, and so, they were given up.  I did find out the rest of the story, but it is not what Terry and I expected.  The first story regarding Lily and John appeared in the Cincinnati Post on 28 October 1899:

William Biermann-deserted wife and children-28 Oct 1899 Cincinnati Post

 

A few days later, this follow-up appeared in the Cincinnati Post:

William Biermann-dispute over children-31 Oct 1899 Cincinnati Post

An on the same date the post ran this:

William Bierman wants his children- Cincinnati Post-31 Oct 1899

Now here was something new!  The last line identifies Annie Schmidt Biermann as the daughter of a Mrs. Schmidt who apparently met with violence and died.  There seems to have been more to this story than a simple domestic argument.

Terry and I e-mailed back and forth as new findings continued to come to light.  I back-tracked to find the story that unfolded in the autumn of 1899:

Mrs Schmidt- Cincinnati Post-7 Oct 1899

Mrs Schmidt- Cincinnati Post-13 Oct 1899

The article incorrectly gave the name of the victim as “Annie” Schmidt, but we already knew that her name was really Lizzie.  Lizzie Schmidt, we later learned, was born Holtmeyer (Holtmeier) in Germany.  She had been married to Charles (Carl) Schmidt, but was a widow before 1899.  The coroner believed that her death was a homicide.

Lizzie Schmidt death - University of Cincinnati

Apparently, Annie Biermann was a witness to the assault on her mother and she, along with other witnesses, gave contradictory testimony about Lizzie Schmidt’s death.  The result was a 2 November 1899 news report of “No Indictment Found Against Pfitzer.”  From the dates, we could see that this was happening around the same time that Lilly and John were sent to the Children’s Home.

Lizzie Schmidt- no indictment of killer - Cincinnati Post- 2 Nov 1899

Lily and John Biermann were never returned to their biological families despite a November 3 article in the Cincinnati Post saying that the Children’s home was a capacity and overcrowded.  A few days later, the Children’s Home Society of Columbus Ohio ran this classified advertisement:

Children's home advertisement

This was the fate of Lily and John. We know that Lily was adopted upstate by an elderly couple of the surname Terrell.  Presumably, she became a servant/caregiver.  John went to another elderly family named Tousley.  In many cases, children were not much more than indentured servants to the families that took them in, although I am sure that some went to loving homes.

Lily Mae Biermann Taken at the Terrell's Home in Continental, Ohio

Lily Mae Biermann Taken at the Terrell’s Home in Continental, Ohio

And what do we know about Lily and John’s parents?  In the 1910 census, William Biermann was listed as divorced and a border in the home of Peter and Anna Hammer.   Five years later, William married Anna Darling Hammer, presumably the widow of  Peter Hammer.  The Hammer’s had several children and William became their stepfather.  In the 1920 census, William is listed as the step father to two grown Hammer boys and the adoptive father of a seven year-old Mary Biermann.  We aren’t certain who Mary Biermann is. Perhaps she was the daughter of one of the older Hammer children who was listed as widowed.  There is some irony to William Biermann rearing the children of other people when he didn’t rear his own.

We still don’t know what became of Annie Schmidt Biermann.  Did she remarry?  Did she have another family? Or, did she die before she could retrieve her children from the Children’s Home?

Finally, William Biermann, namesake of his father and his grandfather, seems to have vanished.  Was he adopted before the 1900 census or had he died?  These are the questions we are still trying to answer.

As Terry and I explored her grandmother’s story, we both felt like it was happening in the present.  We felt such grief for these relatives who were experiencing family tragedy. In the meantime, I am always grateful when DNA brings me together with new cousins. I want to thank Terry, Amy and Louise for sharing Lily’s story and Terry for helping me write this blog entry.

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Caspar Mayer – Who can read this?

Sometimes the record is there, but the technology won’t cooperate when you are uploading an image:

Who can read this?

Part of image still needing translation.

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My Direct Line to Martin Luther – Yes, THAT Martin Luther

One of my most popular blog entries is Martin Luther – Yes, THAT Martin Luther – 52 Ancestors #13

I have been surprised to learn that there are a lot of people wondering is Martin Luther has any living descendants.  He has, and I am one!  Here is my direct lineage to Martin Luther, who is my 11th great-grandfather:

Direct Line to Martin Luther

Please read my original post to see my documentation for my ancestry claims.

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Revisiting My Mitochondrial DNA

Exactly one year ago I posted “Katrine – REALLY Far Away – 52 Ancestors 2015 #6.”  The theme for the week was “So Far Away,” and I thought, who is more distant than my female ancestor who purportedly gave rise to the mitochondrial haplogroup K?  My subclade is K1a2b and it is no surprise that this group is found in Germany.

I haven’t found much new information from the last year on my haplogroup or my subclade, but I do have an important update to my maternal ancestry.  I wrote this last year:

My mitochondrial DNA followed this path:

Catharina Helfrich – born about 1814, probably in the Rhine-Pfalz, Germany (2x great-grandmother)

Julia Magdalena Stephan – born 1858, Ripley, Ohio (great-grandmother)

Alma Elisabeth Maier – born 1893, Cincinnati, Ohio (grandmother)

Alice Claire Lindner – born Cincinnati, Ohio (mother)

Me

As it turned out, my second great-grandmother’s maiden name was not Helfrich.  This information came from the death certificates of two of her daughters, but it was wrong.  This year I learned that he true name was Catharina Elsässer and she was born in 1813 in Vinningen in the southwest Rhine-Pfalz of Germany.  This major breakthrough gave me a far more extensive maternal line:

Margarita (unknown) – wife of Joannes Eisner

Catharina Eisner – born 1704, Germany (6x great-grandmother)

Maria Appolonia Ringe – born 1733, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (5x great-grandmother)

Catharina Schatz – born 1759, Kröppen, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (4x great-grandmother)

Anna Odilia Greiner – born 1790, Vinningen, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (3x great-grandmother)

Catharina Elsässer – born 1813, Vinningen, Sudwestpfalz, Germany (2x great-grandmother)

Julia Magdalena Stephan – born 1858, Ripley, Ohio (great-grandmother)

Alma Elisabeth Maier – born1893, Cincinnati, Ohio (grandmother)

Alice Claire Lindner – born Cincinnati, Ohio (mother)

Me

This is a lot of progress to have made in one year, although I am looking for additional sources for Maria Appollonia Ringe and her forbears.  The line of Catharina Schatz and forward is well-documented.  I have autosomal DNA that connects me back to Catharina Schatz or her husband Joannes Greiner.

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52 Ancestors Redux

52 Ancestors Redux

Last year I attempted to complete a second year of 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.  The goal was to write about an ancestor a week all year.  I found myself bogged down by optional themes that didn’t always fit my research interests.  I fell about seven ancestors short of my goal.  I may still write the missing posts sometime this year, but I have decided to move on.  I have decided to resurrect some of my earlier subjects.  In many instances, I have updated information that I really want to share.  For some of my posts, I want to improve the citation of my sources.  So, on Grouondhog Day 2016, I am embarking on a new endeavor – 52 Ancestors Redux.

I want to thank the many visitors to my blog as my 2nd blogiversary passed without my noticing.  This has been a challenging, but rewarding experience.

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Fred N. Hartley -The Visit – 52 Ancestors 2015 #48

This will be my entry for the theme of “Thankful” and it should become clear why I am thankful as this story unfolds.  A few days ago I was finally able to do something that had long been on my genealogy wish list. My husband accompanied me to Mount Moriah Cemetery in Philadelphia to look for his Hartley family. I had long been aware that the family had a plot there as early as 1868, which is when Frederick Hartley, Senior, died. I had found his final resting place among the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Death Certificates database on FamilySearch.org. Thanks to Find-A-Grave, I knew that a number of Hartleys were buried at Mount Moriah. Here are the 11 who are listed:

HARTLEY   Frederick 1868 FEB 15 203 50 N. E. 1/4
HARTLEY   Janet 1867 APR 26 203 50 N. E. 1/4
HARTLEY   Rebecca 1874 NOV 17 203 50 N. E. 1/4
HARTLEY   Timothy S 1884 APR 6 203 50
HARTLEY   Frederick 1911 SEP 18 203 50
HARTLEY   Margaret 1907 JUL 25 203 50 NE 1/4
HARTLEY   Mary A 1893 JUN 2 203 50 NE 1/4
HARTLEY   Ruth 1906 OCT 13 203 50 NE 1/4
HARTLEY   William G 1906 DEC 10 203 50 NE 1/4
HARTLEY   Fred N 1954 JUNE 2 203 50 NE 1/4
HARTLEY   Frederick 1902 AUG 2 203 50 NE 1/4
HARTLEY  Mary C Walker 1911 SEP 15*

*Not listed but funeral directive states that she was to be placed by Timothy S Hartley

The problem with making a visit to the cemetery is that it had been virtually abandoned even before the last known member of the Mount Moriah Cemetery Association died in 2004. The sad tale of Mount Moriah Cemetery was told September 2014 by Allison Meir at the website Atlas Obscura. It wasn’t so much what Ms. Meir said that made me apprehensive about visiting, but it was the photos. My husband was even more cautious. He did not think I should go there and certainly not alone.

More recently, however, we were encouraged by news that Mount Moriah is undergoing a cleanup. A September 2015 article by Matthew Christopher in Subaru’s magazine Drive gave credibility to the restoration in my husband’s eyes.   I looked online and located the website for the Friends of Mount Moriah Cemetery and learned that they have a Facebook group, which I immediately joined.

FB Friends of Mount Moriah

Facebook group for Friends of Mount Moriah (Click the photo to go there)

We were visiting family in the Philadelphia area over the holidays, when my husband asked me if there was anything special I wanted to do during our visit. I quickly responded, “Yes, I want to visit Mount Moriah Cemetery.” He was still a bit hesitant.  I promptly added that I could check with the Facebook group to see if it would be safe and find out the details about where and when to go.  I did this and had an immediate response from volunteer Ken Smith. He suggested that we meet him there on Wednesday morning, “the earlier the better.” I felt bad about taking up his valuable time. After all, I had a map and the section and plot number for the graves. Was a guide really necessary? Nevertheless, I accepted the generous offer.

My husband and I arrived at the cemetery and met Ken Smith at the Kingsessing Avenue gate at 7:50 a.m.

Gate on Kingsessing Avenue

Gate on Kingsessing Avenue

Looking back through the gate

Looking back through the gate

The rules

The rules

We used the address 6201 Kingsessing with our GPS and had no trouble finding the location. Ken was waiting for us as promised, and we followed his pickup to the road nearest to the Hartley plot, parked and walked a short distance. The weather was gray and the temperature about 45 degrees. I think this made it a good time of year to visit. We encountered no ticks, which I understand are thick in the area. Also, a lot of the vegetation has died back and it is easier to see the markers.

I have to say that we were glad we took Ken up on the offer to show us where to go. I am pretty sure that we would never have found the plot on our own. First, it is pretty small in scale to the overall size of the section. Ken told us that the dimensions are 16 feet by 26 feet. Second, the area is really overgrown with vines, brush, bushes and small trees. Ken had already checked out the plot and cut the brush using a heavy duty weed wacker before we arrived. He located two gravestones for the dozen or so people buried there.  Here is a view of Section 203 from the road:

Section 203 of Mount Moriah Cemetery from the road

Section 203 of Mount Moriah Cemetery from the road

The bad news is that two gravestones were all that could be found and one was unreadable.  The one that could be read was for Fred N. Hartley, 1875 to 1954.

Fred N. Hartley Tombstone

Fred N. Hartley Tombstone

The other was a simple marble monument which had snapped off at the base and was lying face up. Because of this unlucky circumstance, all of the writing on this marker has been obliterated. Ken even rinsed it off with some water, but nothing is readable. He explained that the marble is softer than granite and that marble deteriorates just from exposure to the elements.

Worn and unreadable Hartley Stone

Worn and unreadable Hartley Stone

My husband’s camera doesn’t take geo coordinates, so he did this separately with his phone, so we can find the plot again.

Geo Coordinates

Geo Coordinates

We could discern the approximate area of the plot by reading the names on the monuments in the surrounding area. This photo shows a step to a monument that borders the Hartley plot. We know from the name Givin that this is one edge of the lot 50.

Givin monument step

Givin monument step

Ken, then, used a metal rod to probe the ground in the Hartley plot. He unearthed a marble fragment, but there was no identification on it. It could have been from our plot or an adjacent one.

Ken Smith Probing for Buried Stones

Ken Smith Probing for Buried Stones

Since I told Kathy Watson Freeman that I would look for Freeman family and collateral surnames, I asked Ken where plot 51 would be. He pointed me in the right direction and it was extremely overgrown. There was not even a path through the thick brush. After Ken left us, I waded into the heavy growth looking for stones that might be visible.

Me Looking for Lot 51

Me Looking for Lot 51

I didn’t find anything that gave me an orientation that I was in the Freeman plot. I couldn’t say if there are any markers or not, but I couldn’t find them. I photographed some stones with my phone, but I didn’t have gloves, so I couldn’t do much about the vines other than to push them aside with my boots. I wouldn’t go back without work gloves, even though the volunteers have tools. Some of these vines may be poison ivy.  I lost my hairband and my hair came down from the little knot I had tied it in.  On my way back I found the hairband dangling from a branch!

We drove around the cemetery for a while keeping our GPS unit on. This was helpful, because all the roads are on the GPS map, so we could tell where we were going. We saw other people who were visiting and members of the Friends organization who were working. We did not feel unsafe at any time, nor did we see anyone who looked out of place. We finished up by 11 a.m. and as my husband said, mornings are not a time of heavy activity for people with criminal intent.

The contrast between the areas that have been reclaimed from nature and those that haven’t been is striking. You really have to commend the volunteers who are taking on this massive project.

Ken Smith and Cheryl Hartley

Ken Smith and Cheryl Hartley

Reclaimed

Reclaimed

Unreclaimed

Unreclaimed

And, what did I learn about Fred N. Hartley? Since he has the only surviving marker in the Hartley plot at Mount Moriah, I will give a summary of what I know about him here. His full name was Frederick Norman Hartley and he was born 9 April 1875 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was the son of Timothy Suttcliffe Hartley and Mary Walker (although Fred’s death certificate gives his mother’s name as Mary W. Conner). This appears to be an error since Timothy S. Hartley married Mary C. Walker at All Saints Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on 25 March 1874. Perhaps Mary’s middle name was Connor and the informant on Fred’s death certificate transposed the information.

Frederick’s father, Timothy, was the older brother of my husband’s paternal great-grandfather, George Dix Hartley; his grandfather was Frederick Hartley who emigrated from Yorkshire, England to Philadelphia. Probably because George Hartley also had a son named Frederick, Frederick Norman became known as Fred N. Hartley. Fred married Clara V. McCune in and they had two children, Rebecca (born 1900) and Walker (born 1906). As often happens as families grow, they also grow apart. I don’t think that anyone in my husband’s family stayed in touch with this branch of the family. With my husband’s father deceased, I have no one that I can really ask about them. I am also thankful that the family decided to place a granite memorial for Fred N. Hartley. It is the only way that we were sure we had correctly identified the Hartley burial plot at Mount Moriah.  Here is a general view of the Hartley plot as we left it on the morning of December 30, 2015.

Section 203, Lot 50, NE Quadrant

Section 203, Lot 50, NE Quadrant

 

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William Walton – GeneaStar Reveals an Unusual Relative – 52 Ancestors 2015 #39

I am going back now to pick up the week 39 theme of 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks. As I mentioned before, I am not doing these in order anymore. It is also unlikely that I will finish this year. That’s okay, I did the challenge last year and I have a lot of other demands just now.  I will still finish all 52 at some point.  The optional theme for week 39 was “Unusual.”  I had written something else for this theme, but I was never happy with it, so here is my substitution.

I recently canceled a subscription to Newspaper Archives for a number of reasons, but it was mostly because of the price. It just wasn’t a good value for me. Instead I decided to subscribe to a premium membership of Geneanet. This site is primarily French, but a number of Germans have contributed trees, and I often find clues to my German family here.

GeneaNet, it seems, owns the website GeneaStar.org. I have heard a lot of buzz about GeneaStar; it matches your family tree with the family trees of celebrities. You can access this site for free, but I don’t think that you can do an automated match without being a member of GeneaNet. (If you know otherwise, please leave a comment below.) I have to say GeneaStar really wasn’t on my radar in any serious way. It sounded a little frivolous.  In fact, I may be one of the last people to have not tried Geneastar; but today I decided to give it a whirl. I had previously run the index for my family tree which is pretty extensive, so it didn’t take very long to come back with results.

I’m not sure I was expecting to find any connections, but I was surprised. There was just one hit for my mother-in-law’s family and a couple for mine. William Walton and his wife, Alice Martin, were the first to pop up with one result found. I knew that William Walton was the progenitor of the Byberry Waltons of Bucks County, Pennsylvania.  I have written about this family before. William Walton was born on August 19, 1629, in Oxhill, Warwickshire, England, to Thomas Walton and Anne Hurd. William married Alice Martin on 30 September 1657 and together they had four sons: Nathaniel, born about 1656; Thomas, born about 1658; Daniel, born about 1660; and, William, born about 1662. William Walton, Sr., died in Oxhill on February 10, 1681. The following year, the four brothers, all Quakers, set out for the New World.

With anticipation I clicked the GeneaStar link under William Walton to see who my husband’s famous relative is. Oh, no, I groaned. This can’t be. Gary’s famous relative is Sarah Palin!

Sarah Palin - photograph courtesy of Gage Skidmore

Sarah Palin – photograph courtesy of Gage Skidmore

(If you don’t know who Sarah Palin is, she is the former Governor of Alaska and Vice-presidential running mate of Senator John McCain in the 2008 U.S. Presidential election. She is also a TV commentator and author, who endorses Tea Party politics. I consider her to be one of the most unusual characters to come out of politics in a long and that’s saying something! If you need to be reminded, just Google “Palinisms.” Here’s a roundup of some good ones.

My mother always reminded me that you can choose your friends, but not your relatives. Sarah Palin and I do not see eye to eye about much of anything. She is among the last people that I would want to welcome to my family, but here I was, spending the afternoon extending the descendants of William Walton down through the generations to ultimately include Sarah Louise Heath, born 11 February 1964. She married Todd Palin in 1988. From everything that I can tell, the tree provided on GeneaStar appears to be reasonably accurate. I added documentation as I worked my way through Sarah’s ancestors. Ancestry.com now tells me that Sarah Palin is the 9th cousin once removed of my husband…sigh.

Here is how the two trees look together:

12 Generations from Sarah Heath Palin to William Walton

12 Generations from Sarah Heath Palin to William Walton

Gary Hartley Ancestors

11 Generations from my Husband to William Walton

So, I guess the good news is that I didn’t find any mass murderers and I was a lot more pleased with my famous relatives. I’ll write about them another time. On another positive note, I’m not expecting an invitation to the Palin house for Christmas dinner, nor will she be receiving one from me!