Sunday Search: Who’s Next?

With the first supplemental application nearly done it is time to start looking through the family tree to see which line I will be submitting next. Now that the “easy” ones have been documented, all of the other options are going to require some more work. That being said, now that I have traced one ancestor on my father’s side and one on my mother’s side, I can at least look at all possibilities without having to limit my options. With that in mind, I have to look and see what information I do have and how likely it will be to find the supporting documentation I need for the additional lines.

Looking back at the list I compiled in March, there are certain things that still need to be worked on for each of the ancestors listed. While we have already submitted documentation for the Redcross and Noblit lines, there are still twenty eight (28) other names on that list. However, from that list, I have at least narrowed the selection down to a few ancestors where the mysteries are minimal and acquiring the documentation is realistic pursuit given my limited time at the moment.  

Jacob Duffordt, Virginia Patriotic Service, Provided supplies to the Continental Army. We have the documentation of him paying the supply tax as well as, what I believe to be his service in one of the Flying Camps. Additionally, I have all marriage certificates and other documentation going back to his grandson, my 4^th great grandfather Jacob Teaford, whom I wrote about in May regarding his service at Norfolk during the War of 1812. The issue with this line is that we aren’t 100% certain as to the identity of this Jacob’s mother. It is a mystery that the family has been working on for decades but I believe that I am making some headway.

This is likely the next supplemental application that I will be completing but there are other patriots in the family that I will be researching at the same time including:

• Johann David Von Nida, Virginia Patriotic Service, Paid Supply Tax
• Frederick Boyer, Philadelphia County Militia
• John Snider/Snyder, Corporal, Flying Camp Maryland Militia; Wounded at White Plains.
• George Michael Wilfong / Wildtfang, Virginia Patriotic Service, Paid Supply Tax
• John Cook, Private, Logan County Virginia Militia
• William Terry, 3rd and 5th Virginia regiments
• John Philip Mumbauer, Private, Bucks County Pennsylvania Infantry
• John Norbeck, 1st Battalion, Berks County Pennsylvania Militia
• John Phillip Young, 6th Battalion, Philadelphia County Militia
• Rufus Cone, 7th and 17th Connecticut Regiments; Taken prisoner at the Battle of Long Island; Died aboard the prison ship off the coast
• Matthias Kerlin, Pennsylvania Patriotic Service, Paid Supply Tax

Again, all have their small gaps in the documentation but I am confident in tracing these names and we will eventually be able to verify them. The real question for me is whether we will be able to trace back through the Muhlenberg line as this requires my research on one generation to be supported through documentation as the maiden name is the one that I have traced. This will require a considerable amount of effort which is why it will be worked on in the future, after a number of other patriots have been proven. That being said, I welcome any information on the Muhlenberg family tree to get things started.

Sunday Search: Virginia Versus New Jersey

While searching through the pages and pages of Revolutionary War documents I happened to stumble across a very familiar name, Jacob Dufford. While we have been aware for some time of our immigrant ancestor providing supplies to the Continental Army on 17 December 1780, this document was completely different. This document which caught my attention was the “Names and ranks of those killed or taken on Long Island the 27^th day August 1776.” The second name on that list, clearly printed, is Jacob Dufford. While an exciting find to be sure, it was quickly tempered, as I am familiar with the various Dufford families in the colonies at the time which begged the question, is this the same Jacob Dufford?

First, let’s consider the candidates…

Given the death of their original immigrant in 1767, the New Jersey line of the Dufford family has one possibility, Jacob Dufford from Morris County who was born in 1745 and died in 1822. Note that Morris County is immediate west of Northampton County, Pennsylvania. When conducting a further search into records, no other reference could be found regarding this Jacob Dufford and the Revolutionary War. In the Virginia Dufford tree, given the fact that the second generation Jacob was only 12 at the time, there really is only one possibility being that of our original immigrant, Jacob Dufford who was born in Alsace Lorraine on 12 January 1734, arrived in Philadelphia on 27 October 1764, and died in Augusta County on 12 April 1800. At the time, Augusta County extended well beyond its current boundaries all the way to Pennsylvania. Those are the two possibilities, the only two names that match.

Second, let’s consider the service document…   

The document which I discovered listed Jacob Dufford as having been killed or captured during the Battle of Long Island on the 27^th day of August 1776. It also notes his enlistment date being 13 July 1776 and his discharge date being 1 December 1776 (the date on which the Flying Camps were disbanded). This information was confirmed when I was able to find his official service record. Despite his length of service being recorded as 1 month and 15 days, this second document, the only other document I could find and produced in November 1776 in Elizabethtown, provided me with some further details regarding the service of Jacob Dufford. As it turns out, he was a part of the Pennsylvania Infantry serving in Captain John Arndt’s Company of Colonel Baxter’s Battalion of Northampton County in the State of Pennsylvania of the Flying Camp… the Spartans of Long Island. While Baxter’s Batallion later fought at Fort Washington, it is doubtful that Jacob Dufford was present and/or able to fight as the prisoners taken by the British at Long Island were kept in inhumane conditions and nearly starved to death during their incarceration.

While this initial reading of the documentation suggests, based on county proximity, that this was a member of the New Jersey Duffords, I had to be sure and decided to look more closely into the history of the Flying Camps since I was unfamiliar with that term. Among the various writings on this obscure organization of militia forces during the Revolution, John Allen Miller’s article “The Flying Camp Batallion”, published on the Emmitsburg Area Historical Society webpage, proved to have the most complete history. In this article, Miller writes on the formation of the “Flying Camps”:

On June 3, 1776, the Continental Congress resolved "that a flying camp be immediately established in the middle colonies." For its part, Pennsylvania was called upon to provide a force of some 6,000 men. Delegations of one officer and two enlisted men from each of Pennsylvania's fifty-three associated battalions met in Lancaster, on July 4, 1776, for the purpose of selecting this force. Then, on July 10, 1776, the Bucks County Committee of Safety, citing "the Resolve of the late Provincial Conference for embodying four hundred of the Associates of this County," appointed the following officers to command. (Pennsylvania Archives, 5th Series, Vol. V; History of Bucks County, Davis)

The flying camp received little support from New Jersey. Pennsylvania sent some 2,000 associates, many of who were quickly drafted into service by Gen. Washington in New York. More men soon arrived from Maryland and Delaware, but despite the best efforts of Gen. Mercer the flying camp was fraught with difficulties almost from its inception, and never realizing its full potential was disbanded by the end of November, shortly after the fall of Fort Washington. (Pennsylvania Archives, 5th Series, Vol. V; History of Bucks County, Davis)

There was little mention of Virginia which seemed to strengthen the possibility of this being part of the New Jersey Dufford family history. And then I came across this paragraph later in the article which once again had me questioning which Jacob Dufford fought at Long Island:

A (Flying Camp) Maryland and Virginia Rifle Regiment was authorized June 17, 1776 in the Continental Army and was assigned to the Main Army. The Regiment was organized June 27, 1776 to consist of the three existing companies two from Maryland and one from Virginia, plus two new companies to be raised in Maryland, and four new companies to be raised in Virginia. The regimental organization was disbanded with the surviving Virginia portion being transferred on February 3, 1777 to the 11th Virginia Regiment and the Maryland portion provisionally reorganized in November 1776 as a single company under Captain Alexander Lawson Smith and attached to the 4th Maryland Regiment.

Taking all the evidence into consideration…

Given the later enlistment date of 13 July 1776 and the fact that few from New Jersey volunteered for service in the “Flying Camps” (and those who did volunteer would have likely done so in June and the early part of July, it is possible that the Jacob Dufford mentioned in this service record is, in reality, my immigrant ancestor. Of course, it would be nice to have additional evidence, even circumstantial, to now tilt the needle in one direction or another. While there seems to be little information about the Jacob Dufford from New Jersey (there is no service marker on his grave), there are a number of interesting facts regarding my Virginia ancestor that have swayed my opinion.

First, in looking at the family tree, there are no children conceived or born during the year 1776. Following his arrival through the Port of Philadelphia in 1764, he married his wife Christineh in Pennsylvania in the 1760’s and had his first child in the commonwealth as well. His subsequent children, Jacob and Johann (John), were born in Virginia and Maryland respectively. Later, the first mention of him owning land was when he purchased 268 acres in the newly formed Shenandoah County in 1778. He would later purchase 200, 205, 323 acre lots in Augusta County Virginia in 1780, 1788, and 1794 respectively. At the time of his death, according to the entry in the deed book on 29 October 1801, Jacob Teaford (Dufford) owned approximately 882 acres at the time of his death.

All of these things wouldn’t necessarily equate to anything except for the fact that when Jacob Dufford first arrived in the colonies he did so as a poor farmer. Somehow, over time, he amassed hundreds of acres by the time of this death. While much of this can be a testament of his work ethic, it is also logical to assume that some of this land acquired was from his service during the Revolution (not just a donation to the cause). This is why when considering both the hard evidence and the circumstantial facts surrounding the life of Jacob Dufford of Virginia, I believe that, despite his age at the time, he is the one who served in the Flying Camp as a member of Baxter’s Battalion and was captured at the Battle of Long Island.   

Answering An Unknown Number

It grazed my mind that I should call a couple of the places I sent emails to just before the holidays regarding membership. I reached out because in order to become a member of these heritage based organizations you need to prove your lineage as well as have a member sponsor your application. However, like so many thoughts in the midst of a hectic day, it quickly evaporated in the bitterly cold dry air not to touch upon the gray matter for the remainder of the working hours. At least that is what I thought….

Toward the end of the day my phone began to ring as I was waiting for my email to refresh on the screen. Not recognizing the number I questioned, I swiped my finger across the screen and answered in a usual authoritative business-like manner. While the accent caught me off guard, I quickly realized that the one of the tasks forgotten during the early part of the work day was about to take care of itself. And so our conversation began.

While trying to rekindle the genealogy research that has been put on hold in recent months (upon months) I began looking for different groups and heritage societies in the area where I might be able to, at a minimum, learn a little bit more about the culture in the deep and distant past of my family (most of our long standing heritage could easily be described simply as American). The two dominant cultures in my family histories (yes, there are numerous blood lines, stories, and histories) are of German and Irish origin with Germany having a substantial percentage lead. Honestly not knowing much about either I looked for different groups where I may learn a little more. That led me to the Irish Society and the German Society of Pennsylvania (both located in Philadelphia). Because you need a member to sponsor you for each I sent out emails in late December.

Today, when I answered the phone, I knew what the call was about as soon as I heard the thin German accent. IT was an interesting conversation because this was a man I had never met before but you could tell in our dialog that we shared a common interest and at some level and ancestral bond. Making the connection even stronger is the fact that the Society was founded about two months after Jacob Duffordt arrived in Philadelphia aboard the Hero on the 27^th of October 1764. My family and this proud society share the same anniversary and we will both be celebrating 250 years.

While there are blood lines that I can trace further back in this land and even a few that were here since before the colonies were even a consideration, the celebration of your surname, your family name, does add a tremendous amount of appreciation, pride, and humility. I am proud to be a very small part in the story of my family and I am hoping to bring things around full circle by honoring our heritage and appreciating a bit of the culture we carried with us on that prolonged and exhausting journey across the ocean from Rotterdam to Philadelphia. Just goes to show that sometimes you have to take a step back or return to the beginning in order to keep moving forward.

I’m Still A Green Dot Bastard

Green Dots in 1992

As has been made evident in the past week or so, I am actively working on my family tree. I have been working off and on for about a couple years now and I am glad every day that I started on this project. With that in mind, there are some days/weeks/months that I want to pull my hair out and I have had to take breaks here and there on the research side but, overall, it has been satisfying to see the colors being filled in on many of the leaves.

When it comes to genealogy, everyone has gaps and mysteries in their family tree and mine is no different. They are the most frustrating and rewarding aspects of this kind of personal research. You can spend days trying to answer one question and not find a darn thing. However, when you find that missing piece of the puzzle buried deep in the pages of a book or in the far corner of a database it is an amazing experience.

Sometimes you just have to collect all the records, all the facts, lay them out in front of you and figure out how everything works together. This was the case when I had to put my mind to work and figure out where the third generation came from in my family. Who was Jacob Teaford’s (III) mother?

My earliest memories of learning about my family history go back to the Teaford family reunion in 1987. This is not your usual family reunion as this encompasses all branches of the tree. Anyone who can trace back to the original ancestor that came to the colonies on 27 October 1764 is welcome. Each of the six branches was assigned a colored dot on their name tag which also contained the numbered lineage below their name… I was a green dot with a question mark making us all green dot bastards.

With greater access to records in the digital age (most notably through ancestry.com) I have been pulling bits and pieces together to add to the hard copies of other, more obscure documents, which sit in a binder on my shelf. Combined with the work of previous generations and the smaller items I have been able to find I finally came up with a plausible scenario… I think I figured out the mystery. Based on the evidence, most notably minor sections in court documents, it seems likely that Jacob number three was born out of wedlock and cared for by his father and grandparents. So, we’re still bastards but at least I am comfortable in eliminating the question mark.

Of course, this was only the first of many questions that are throughout my tree and, sometimes, I wish I was still working on the first. There are many gaps in the digitization of records and I am nearing the end of the line when it comes to the information that is available online. I guess it’s time to put some miles on the car and get some dust on my hands. Who’s up for a road trip?

What mysteries are in your family tree? What questions have you been able to answer? What tips do you have when it comes to finding the facts?