Monthly Archives: September 2023

Forest Lawn Cemetery Burial Records

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Forest Lawn Cemetery, Buffalo, New York. Photo by user Druszaj on Wikimedia Commons.

I have been researching a group of Irish folks who came to Buffalo, New York by way of Montreal. Although the State of New York did not mandate vital registration until 1881, the city of Buffalo began keeping its own vital records decades earlier—deaths starting in 1852, marriages starting in 1877, and births starting in 1878. Encouraged by this broad availability, I ordered three death certificates from the city clerk’s office to verify my research subjects and (hopefully) learn the names of their parents.

Of the three that I ordered, Jennie Franklin’s is a model death certificate. Dated 16 Jan 1916, it lists her birthdate as 10 Jul 1868, her birthplace as Montreal, Canada, and her parents’ names as John O’Leary and Catherine Masterson. But most impressive of all: rather than merely naming the parents’ country of origin as Ireland, as I had expected, the record also lists their counties of origin: Tipperary County for John and Dublin County for Catherine. 1 Their parishes of origin were not listed, but I felt good about my research progress already. The informant on the death record is Jennie’s husband, Arthur C. Franklin, who presumably supplied the information in Jennie’s death notice as well. Next, I managed to locate the records that corroborated Arthur’s knowledge of his wife’s family: baptismal records for Jennie and her siblings, census records, and obituaries for other members of her family. Continue reading Forest Lawn Cemetery Burial Records →

Quaker Marriage Records

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1736 marriage of Joseph Brownell and Leah Lawton (1)

The upcoming summer issue of the Mayflower Descendant includes an interesting article by Mark Wentling entitled “Joseph Brownell (1699-ca. 1773) of Dartmouth, Massachusetts, and Little Compton, Rhode Island: Corrections to the Identities of His Wives and Children.” The article examines conflicting claims in past genealogical literature and goes through numerous contemporary sources to show that one Joseph Brownell, a fifth-generation descendant of Mayflower passenger Francis Cooke, was married five times and had eight children by his first three wives.

Of particular usefulness for Mark’s article were Quaker records from Dartmouth, which are now digitally available through the Dartmouth Historical and Arts Society, including the record shown here of Joseph Brownell’s second marriage in 1736 to Leah Lawton. This marriage is also included in our three-volume database Dartmouth Vital Records to the year 1850, but the abstract therein lacks much of the above information. While Quaker records are a great genealogical resource, when I began my research in the early 1990s, they were largely not available at NEHGS. Instead, I’d rely on William Wade Hinshaw’s Encyclopedia of American Quaker Genealogy. Continue reading Quaker Marriage Records →

A Kingdom of No Ends

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Photograph of Philipp Prinz Von HessenThe truth is, I’ve rewritten this post about five times. Who really wants to lead with an image of a German royal in official Nazi dress? What could a guy like this possibly have to say? Lately, though, I have been looking for something bigger in the “unusual connections” department. I’ve been wanting one of those Paul Harvey moments, in which a family connection leads you to a broader perspective on the world—something that reveals “the rest of the story.”1

Recently, while watching a randomly stumbled-upon TV program, I learned about diamonds stolen during World War II. These particular diamonds were purloined by American service personnel from members of German royalty with Nazi connections. The story piqued my interest, and I had to wonder—could I have any genealogical connection to this fairly recent history of stolen diamonds, some “likely Nazis,” and the German royal family? Continue reading A Kingdom of No Ends →

The Ashen Skeleton in the Closet

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Not too long ago, I shared my experience of joining American Ancestors’ recent Scottish Heritage Tour. In that post I briefly introduced you to an intriguing ancestor of mine—John Lynch Breslin, Jr., who was imprisoned for attempted arson. Today I want to discuss how I discovered him, how I learned more about his story, and how I went about emotionally confronting such a noteworthy skeleton in my family’s closet.

My Ancestor John Lynch Breslin Jr’s entry in the Perth prison records (Aberdeen prison records were detailed in Perth’s books).

It is important to acknowledge that understanding Scottish records is relatively straightforward, particularly from the 1800s onwards. Records are organized in a clear and manageable manner, including information such as register number, sex, admission date, prosecuting court, previous incarcerations, name, age, height, birthplace, current residence, occupation, health status, committed offence, trial date, conviction sentence, and release date. This absolute wealth of information can provide a comprehensive view of an individual—the depth of which I struggle to match for the non-criminal members of my family tree, which unfortunately includes many individuals who are remembered only by a series of names and dates.

Continue reading The Ashen Skeleton in the Closet →