Researching Update

Ten thousand miles begins with one step

I saw that on a Facebook ad and thought how profound… Our ancestors took that first step to survive and make their lives count for something………..

Here’s a portion of what Monique posted on her blog:

“I have been researching my family for a while but just lately I connected with a cousin “Joyceann Gray”.  We didn’t know we were related, but during the course of our research we found several names that matched up through marriages.  One day I happened to mention that (Solomon H Thompson the grandson born in 1870: Grandma Frances brother) has some family papers at the University and I had a quote from the University but I hadn’t ordered it yet, so she responded send me the email, well I sent Joyceann the email and she responded once again and said I went on and ordered it I hope that was ok.  I was surprised and excited!!!   We were both excited because since we’ve been finding connections we both figured we might find some family information that would help.  I never expected to find what we found when the documents came back. I’ll let Joyceann tell you her side and what she found, but my ENTIRE family history from the Thompson side was written out on just a few pieces of paper.”

http://genealogybreakingdownthewalls.blogspot.com

My side of the story:  During our collaborating,  Monique and I  discovered we had Dr. Solomon Thompson in both our family trees. (I mentioned this in my Jan 5th post) From my research  I identified Dr. Thompson as a cousin to my maternal great-grandmother Charlotte Baldwin Hatter.  I was as excited as Monique to find out more about him and our family relationships. So when Monique said here’s the email, I jumped at it and sent the request and check into the Spencer Research Library and Impatiently waited for the response. When we finally got the emails with the attached copies of papers, it really was a great day. That email contained a gold mine for Monique. God is Good. Although I didn’t get the answers I was looking for Monique did and that makes it all worth while. 

Then just this past week, Monique finally got her DNA results and found that Skip Mason was a cousin, so back to the trees we went and again found that the three of us have the same ancestors.  Although I don’t share DNA with Monique or Skip they are still cousins since we do share four plus (4+) relationships through marriage. Their people and mine lived, worked and traveled in the same circles. They toiled the lands of the Samuel Walter and Bushrod Washington plantation’s back in the early 1800’s and made their marks after the war of the states.  All our ancestors contributed to their families, communities and to history!

They may have been born during slavery but that didn’t make them slaves.