Moving West in the 1800s

I still find it incomprehensible that my grandfather's parents and grandparents moved as much as they did in the 1800s. Here's a map:


View Moving West in a larger map

The PINK tabs are for the Valentine family.
The BLUE tabs are for the Newell family.
The GREEN tabs are for the Grow family.
The YELLOW tabs are for the Phillips family.

Valentine married Phillips.
Grow married Newell.

Phillips married Newell.

The Newell branch split - three children went to California, my ancestor moved south to Orlando, FL by 1910.
The Phillips moved to Orlando by 1910.

To find your ancestors, add or subtract a letter

I've been so stumped with the Phillips and the Valentine trees. What it's taken to find them is to look for Philips and Vallentines. Or find a sibling (if you know of one) and start tracing through them.

Today has been a banner day! I found so many things by searching through the pilot.familysearch.org site.
I entered "Lois" and "Valentine" ('my' Kate's older sister). Bingo! The search looked for "Vallentine". Yes, two l's. The 1850 census finally 'showed' up! Buffalo, Ward 5, Erie Co., New York

I finally saw the census where the mother Cathrine (as spelled by the recorder) was still alive. She is two years younger than William. He was b ~1812, Catherine b ~1814. Bonus: her mother was living with them: Elisabeth Mee, 74 yrs, b~1776. There were two children listed I didn't know of previously: Henry, 14 yrs, b~1836 and Martha, 10 yrs, b~1840.  Also, an Eliza Bramley, age 20, b NY was living with them. No relationship listed and she doesn't appear to be their servant.

Wait! Above the William Valentine family were two 'lone' Vallentine children: Albert, 6 yrs and Hellen, 3 yrs. [The recorder had a penchant for doubling l's, obviously!] I went to the previous page and discovered another Vallentine family. George, 40 yrs, is two years old than 'my' William, 38 yrs. Both born in England. The similarities convinced me that these are brothers. Entering that information into ancestry.com means I have potential parents and a birthplace for William through member connect. George's parents are listed as Thomas Valentine (1776-1830) and Elizabeth Barnes (1778-1809). But Elizabeth's death precedes 'my' George's birth. Hmm. Still I enter the birthplace in pilot.search and discover Thomas and Sarah had a son William in Essendon, Hertfordshire, England. So now I know where William was born, his birthday 15 Nov 1812, and that he is the younger half-brother of George!

Still not done! The clue about Katherine Mee Valentine's mother being Elisabeth Mee revealed hints about the Mee Tree. Another ancestry.com member had listed 'my' Katherine as b 29 Mar 1815 at Stanton under Bardon, Leicestershire, England. And parents' names! Her father is William Mee, 1779-1845 and Elizabeth Frost, b 16 Dec 1777. William and Elizabeth Mee, both born in England, had nine children and now I know their names, too! Oldest to youngest, add two years to each birth year: John b1800, Thomas, Sarah, Elizabeth, William, Joseph, Ann, Katherine (b 1815), Mary, b 1817.

I put newly found older female sibling Martha Valentine into the search engine. Martha M(ee?) Valentine married John C Burns on 30 July 1863 in Hamilton, Butler, Ohio. They returned to Buffalo, NY and they were living there in 1870. I found 'my' Kate there. She was living with her sister and brother-in-law, and listed as a 'domestic servant'!! The rest of Kate's family had moved west to Davenport, Iowa. I guess she wasn't ready to move west yet. Maybe she was engaged to Francis V Phillips and just waiting to get married?  Martha Valentine Burns had a daughter Mabel b 1872 who would have been 'my' Kate's cousin. Now I know who Mabel Burns is. If UPS ever delivers the missing box that was shipped in April, I can identify her!

So now I've gone back another generation for both Katherine Mee's parents and William Valentine's parents! More English roots!

Fifteen Miles on the Erie Canal

Anybody remember this song? It's known by several different titles: "Low Bridge, Everybody Down" and "The Erie Canal Song" and "Fifteen Years on the Erie Canal" and "Mule Named Sal" and last: "Fifteen Miles on the Erie Canal." It was one of my favorite songs when I was in third or fourth grade. Actually, I'm discovering a lot of things that held my fascination when I was eight or nine years old is proving to be relevant in my genealogical trekking. [I'll have to write about Pocohontas, too...]

Anyway, here's the song. You'll see the genea-connection below.

"Low Bridge" by Thomas S. Allen

I've got a mule, her name is Sal
Fifteen miles on the Erie Canal
She's a good old worker and a good old pal
Fifteen miles on the Erie Canal

We've hauled some barges in our day
Filled with lumber, coal, and hay
And we know every inch of the way
From Albany to Buffalo

Chorus:
Low bridge, everybody down
Low bridge 'cause we're coming to a town
And you'll always know your neighbor
And you'll always know your pal
If you've ever, ever navigated on the Erie Canal

Get up here Sal, We've past that lot,
Fifteen miles on the Erie Canal
And we'll make home before six a-clock
Fifteen miles on the Erie Canal

One more trip and back we'll go
Through the rain and sleet and snow
And we know every inch of the way
From Albany to Buffalo

Low bridge, everybody down
Low bridge for we're coming to a town
And you'll always know your neighbor
And you'll always know your pal

If you've ever navigated on the Erie Canal.....

We sang this song in Girl Scouts, and at school, too, if I remember correctly. I sang it everywhere. As I walked down the slope from my house to Lake Ivanhoe, as I walked to school and as I walked home. I still find myself humming this song.

Fast Forward 40 years. I discover that my great great grandmother Kate Valentine was born in Buffalo, NY. Huh? Buffalo? Near Niagra Falls? Ha. Another place I've always wanted to visit. [And the movie with Marilyn Monroe, Niagra (1952), that always held my fascination, too!] Kate was born in 1852 in Buffalo, NY to William Valentine and Katherine Mee.

Valentine and Mee

I'm pretty sure Katherine Mee Valentine died giving birth (or soon after) to her daughter ('my') Kate. Katherine was only 38 years old, born in England in 1814.  She and William had had four children: George b 1834, Lois b 1843 (nine years later--were there children in between who died young?), Matilda "Tilly" b 1849, and 'my' Kate b 1852. The picture to the right is of these girls, left to right: Tilly, Lois and 'my' Kate. What I don't know: Where did Katherine and William meet and marry? When did either of them immigrate to the United States?   Note: cousin Ginny O'Neel graciously sent me this digital photo of our ancestor sisters just a month ago!

Their eldest child, George was born in 1834, in Buffalo. Essentially William and Katherine were living in Buffalo while portions of the Erie Canal were being completed. William was a mason and a bricklayer. I wonder if any of the buildings he worked on are still standing there in Buffalo today?

William remarries and moves to Davenport, Iowa

After Katherine's death, William remarried Mrs. Sarah Ann Baker (a widow who had a daughter Sarah, the same age as 'my' Kate). William and Sarah had a daughter Ida b 1857 (but she never appears in a census after 1860, so I assume she dies before then), and a son Frank b 1861. Then they move west! To Davenport, Iowa where George has married a Mary Snow. George has established himself as a brickmason and businessman. He and a business partner designed many early historic buildings there. The photo to the left is one of his many buildings.

All Valentine Children Move Westward
Eventually, all the Valentine children moved westward.
Lois married Joseph Sandman and they move to Chicago, IL. Tilly married Joseph Kemmerer and lived in Nora Pct, Nebraska, where they had their first son William V, 1879. Later they moved to Davenport, IO. The 1900 census states Tilly has had six children, but only her eldest William is still living. My Kate married Francis V Phillips; they had their daughter Harriet “Hattie” Ellen Phillips in London, Middlesex, Ontario, Canada in 1877 and by 1880 they are living in Chicago, IL.

I found the above photo of The First National Bank at this link (where you can search for more buildings):
http://www.umvphotoarchive.org/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/scdpl&CISOPTR=148&CISOBOX=1&REC=6

Back to the Erie Canal

More images of the Erie Canal, Buffalo, NY are at this link: http://www.eriecanal.org/
Buffalo and Erie Canal images

And one last coincidental bit: Between Buffalo, NY and Niagra Falls is Tonawanda, NY. My mother Lois was a camp counselor at Camp A-Ton-a-Wonda in western North Carolina one summer! I can't wait to go see Buffalo, NY, now!

Ohhh, the inconsistencies!

Sometimes it's the inconsistencies that make finding your ancestors so difficult!

Here are two recent inconsistencies:

1. My grandfather Paul Lee's middle name. It's Haid. Not Henry. But my grandmother didn't like "Haid", so she changed it to Henry. Not legally. She just did it. Named their youngest son Paul Henry Lee, Jr. Just like that. I had always HEARD that granddaddy's middle name was Head or some alternate spelling of it. I finally found proof of it. May 6, 2010. Took me several years. I was googling the name of the orphanage my grandfather had lived at approx ages 2-14. Nazareth Orphanage in Belmont, NC.

Article about Nazareth Orphanage and source of the photo

Googling led to an article about Father Thomas Frederick Price who had convinced Bishop Leo Haid that an orphanage for boys was needed. My eyes opened wide! There was the name! Haid! A little more digging revealed that one of my grandfather's brother Peter's middle initial was "L". Could his middle name have been Leo?? Hmmm... I discovered that my great-grandmother Mary Troublefield Lee had given two of her son's middle names undoubtedly to honor Bishop Leo Michael Haid! Mystery solved.

2. My great-great grandfather Francis E Phillips. It has taken me forever to learn more about Francis. I knew he was born approximately 1854 in New York. I knew he'd moved from Cook Co, Il to Orlando Florida in the early 1900s. But I kept coming up short on where in New York he started from. His wife Kate Valentine had been born in Buffalo, NY in 1851/2. Maybe Francis had been born there, too? I knew they both died in Florida. It wasn't until my cousin William "Billy" Morgan, another family gene-bug, suggested two sites. He suggested searching Greenwood Cemetery, Orlando, FL, which I had done previously, but he had a book that gave a detail that helped me find Francis' death date. THEN I was able to find his burial information at http://www.ucf.edu/ through the Carey Hand Funeral Home archives. Having that information, I was able to find out his place of birth which was indeed Buffalo, NY and that his father's name was Thomas B Phillips (also the name he gave his son). Here's where it got interesting. Billy also gave me another link to search Orange County, Florida's Comptroller's site. Honestly, I'd looked for a site like that, but I couldn't find it! http://or.occompt.com/recorder/eagleweb/docSearch.jsp  There I discovered that Francis' middle initial was NOT "E" but was "V" instead. I began searching for Francis V. Phillips and began finding more. My cousin Billy did another amazing thing. He thought to search for Philips with only one 'l' instead of two. Bingo! We found Francis with his parents in Buffalo in 1860. Thank you, Billy!

Here's cousin Billy's blogpage: http://sockdryer.blogspot.com/

I still have one more mystery about dear old granddad.  He listed his name as "Frank Rosburgh Phillips" on his daughter Harriet Ellen Phillip's birth certificate. She was born in Middlesex, Ontario, Canada. I wonder if I'll ever find out if they traveled while Kate was pregnant, or stopped and lived in Canada for a while. Were they on their way to Illinois? Kate's family lived in Davenport, Iowa. Did any of Francis/Frank's family move the mid-west?

If you don't ask the questions, you'll never find the answers!