Sunday Search: Lost Children

One of the things that many people overlook about genealogy is the fact that it is not always about making the remarkable link to some historical figure or event. Sometimes it is about making sure that people are not forgotten. This doesn’t just apply to those names that may not be part of the usual family discussions, it is about the names that may not have even carried over to the next generation. I have written about many of the people that lived interesting lives, some that may have died too soon, and others whom I simply wanted to learn more about. To date, the list is rather extensive and includes the following leaves from my tree:

• Samuel Ardis
• Jacob Wirth
• John Uttley
• Charlotte Noblitt
• William Jacob McKannan
• Percy Davis Teaford
• Cecile Teaford
• John Lewis Hallman
• William Edgar Yeagle
• John Redcross

Those are just a few of the lives that I have tried to bring back to the forefront of my family history. Many of the details were already known to various family members but there have been a few that have come as a surprise (at least some of the details). These stories are fascinating to me and I will certainly be adding to that list in the near future but, for now, I wanted to take the time to share some of the names that can too easily be forgotten. Some lives are cut short while other lives never had a chance to get started.

When looking through the census records it can be a little startling to see the two numbers listed a few columns over from the mother’s name. These columns stick to the factual… number of children followed by number of surviving children. The census is a form full of facts and numbers and doesn’t provide any additional insights as to the discrepancy. Seeing these do, usually different, figures has become routine for many of us conducting research on our families. However, when we dig a little deeper, when we find a name, that column is no longer filled with simple numbers. Below are just a few of the names that I have been able to find…

• I knew about my great aunt Frances Reba Teaford from the time I initially became interested in the family history. A few of her siblings are still around and have shared stories about her with me and the short life that she lived. Frances was born in Eagle Rock, Virginia to Harry Gilmore Teaford and Nettie Love in 1926. She succumb to the ravages of Tuberculosis a few years after the family moved to Pennsylvania in 1943. However, I didn’t find out until later about a baby brother that was born in August 1930. Unfortunately, he passed away three months later still without having been given a name.
• Samuel Ardis and Sarah Myers had three children together including twins born on April 18, 1902. Thomas died in July 1902 (a month before his father) and Edna died in March 1903 (seven months after her father).
• My great great grandmother, Susan Laura Corner, was one of nine children born to Jacob Corner and Tamise Culp. However, by the time she turned five year old, she had already lost three of her siblings including her twin sister. Calvin was born two decades before my grandmother and never made it to his first birthday. Hannah was six when her baby twin sisters were born but only knew them for five years. Emma Flora, Susan’s twin, was just over two years old when she passed away.  
• William McKannan and Susan Corner had three children, two sons and a daughter. Their youngest son, Reuben (named after Susan’s brother), was born in July of 1893. He was laid to rest in what would become the family plot in May of 1897.
• By the end of 1919, William Jacob McKannan (Reuben’s brother) and Helen Fulton had four children, two boys and two girls. By the close of 1922, William was a widower caring for two sons. His two daughters, Marion (1916-1920) and Helen (1919-1922), both preceded their mother in death. Helen succumbed to a stroke on September 7, 1922.  
• Over the course of a single year from 1879-1880, John Uttley lost both his first wife Sallie, who passed away in January 1880, as well as their only child Charlotte who was born in February 1879 and died three months later.
• Jacob Wirth and Mary Eppright had four children. By August of 1864, Mary was a single mother of one. Their oldest daughter, Emma, didn’t even make it to her first birthday passing away at 10 months old in October 1858. The day following her father’s death aboard the USS Tecumseh at the Battle of Mobile Bay, Laura died just over a month shy of her second birthday on August 6, 1864 and Mary succumb to her illness (likely yellow fever) three days after her sister on August 9^th.

Genealogy is about ensuring that the family history is passed down to future generations. Sometimes those facts and events are obvious and quite well known, other times it takes some digging to ensure that we have as complete a picture as possible. As many of you know, it is usually about the tiny details. Sometimes, even just ensuring that the name of a lost child it remembered is the greatest thing that we can accomplish. This is why I continue to try to make the connections and put the pieces together to tell the larger story but take the time to make sure that these children are part of the story and not forgotten. After all, each life is part of the family.

Sunday Search: Putting The Pieces Together

Picture taken during my visit to Leverington Cemetery in 2003. 

In recent months I have made a little bit of progress on the family tree tracing back a number of lines a couple of generations and finding out a few additional details of some of my ancestors. One line that I keep coming back to lately is that of my great great grandfather, John Uttley. While I never knew much about this line growing up (and I still kick myself for not talking to my grandmother about genealogy when she was alive), there has been a lot of progress made in finding out some of the details.

Last year, through online research, reading through a variety of books, sorting through brief mentions in the local newspaper, and calling various city offices, I was able to piece together a few facts about John Uttley and his career in the Philadelphia Police Department. It wasn’t much but I was able to find out that he was appointed to the police force by Mayor Stokley on May 6, 1876 and assigned badge #596. After over five decades on duty, he retired from the force in 1931 having reached the rank of Sergeant. Because the official records for the police department have long since been destroyed, this is all of the information that I could find on the career of the man who helped raise my grandmother.

The same record that provided me with his retirement year, his death certificate, also listed some very important information… the names of his parents. While I am still search for additional information on the Uttley line, his mother’s tree proved to be more fruitful. John Uttely obviously got his longevity from his mother, Charlotte Noblitt (also found at Noblit, Noblett, and Noblet), as they both died as nonagenarians. In fact, according to her obituary, she was believed to be the oldest living resident in Manayunk at the time of her death at age 93 in 1903.

While death certificates in 1903 don’t provide the same valuable information as later official forms, her obituary did offer some additional leaves as her father, Thomas Noblitt, was mentioned as having served in the War of 1812. This is always great information to find so, with those new details I started looking for his pension application. Days of searching and nothing was found. Could it be that the information in the obituary was wrong?

This happens more often than people realize, when obituaries are written, especially those authored by non-family members, there are assumptions made. Maybe Thomas was older than the reporter realized. Maybe it he wasn’t in the War of 1812. Once I made this adjustment to my search criteria, I found the answers I was looking for. The pension application and supporting documents from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania confirmed his service in the Revolutionary War. Charlotte was actually conceived later in life long after Thomas Noblitt’s military service… longevity it obviously part of the Noblitt legacy.

Recently, I also made an interesting discovery to expand the branches out further in this line. While attempting to learn more about this line I came across a book, Genealogical Collections Relating to the Families of Noblet, published in 1906 by John Hyndman Noblit. The surname was close enough that I had to take a look inside these digital pages and found that this was our family. Not only does the book contain the basic information that you would find in any family tree but it also has reproductions of the actual documents from the countries where the name was once prevalent. While it doesn’t have everything, it has given me a lot more information to sort through, digest, and add to this part of my family history. And, just think, this all started with a desire to learn more about a single leaf.