ORGANIZING THE CHAOS

 ORGANIZING THE CHAOS

Source: Bing clip art

I am confessing right now to a mountain of family papers and pictures. Time for filing has been at a minimum the last several months.

What genealogy time I could make was spent searching on two family members: Winfield Scott APPLEBACH, and Susanna BOEHM.

I have dug around through Family Search, Ancestry, Fold 3, Newspapers.com, and Google collecting all the info possible. And worse, it has been saved as both digital and paper. Can we say no real organization?

This morning I decided it was time to tackle the issue and organize the chaos now that I have two computer screens to work with again.

I find it so much easier to have a file open on one computer screen while I move documents and photos into it from the second screen.

Since I actually have computer files for these two people already, it was easier to start with the downloads that were on the computer. So, two and half hours later, the APPLEBACH and BOEHM files have been updated. One success!

Now to the second part of this mess. So, the first step was making piles of all the last names. Obviously, this mess started before limiting my search to just the two above names. Seven stacks later, I look at the clock and realize that time is quickly passing.

I pull the BOEHM and APPLEBACH folders and piles of papers out of the stacks. It makes sense to me to start with the "A" family. 

More stacks by first name within the "A" family yields 10 piles of miscellaneous papers. Well ok, I found the two divorce decrees of my grandfather from his first and second wife. That is progress...

Another hour passes as I continue adding papers to the correct stacks by first name. Now I have 10 file folders of 10 individuals. Some of the files need to be divided into two because they are bulging. A few only have one or two pieces of paper in them.

Back to Winfield Scott APPLEBACH - known to me as "Uncle Scott". His file needs to be divided - all that research paid off in the form of information. But what a mess to organize. 

Scanning in the documents will take more hours than I have today. However, I have been using a naming system that I like and will stick with. Surname-Firstname_yyyymmdd_Location_item.

Moral to the story:

Keep up on your filing - whether digital or paper. It requires much less time than all the sorting later on. I saw on a genealogy blog a suggestion for spending 15 minutes a day doing filing. It certainly makes more sense than the mess I am currently dealing with.

Source: Bing clip art

Tomorrow is a new day, and I have the papers I want to scan in sitting on the scanner already to go. I am going to have to do better at committing 15 minutes most days to scanning and organizing. Especially on the days I do not do any research.

Organize the chaos before it becomes chaos.

All the content writing of this post is my own unless I state otherwise.

SUSANNA BOEHM (c. 1775 - 1848)

 SUSANNA BOEHM (c. 1775 - 1848)

Susanna BOEHM - she has been a mystery person as far as parents or childhood information.

Growing up, I was told she was the daughter of Abraham BOEHM/BEAM or that her father was not known. Her mother was named Barbara. It was almost like her life started when she married Jacob RESSLER.

There is another Susanna RESSLER in the family that overlaps some of the same years as my Susanna's life. I have been stumbling over that Susanna for years. Any time I asked questions or looked for documentation that was the Susanna I was directed too. It got very frustrating because that Susanna did not fit with my Susanna. She has been a brick wall.

I was at the genealogy library in Vincennes, IN last month. I got off on a rabbit trail (that never happens to you right?) and looked up Susanna BOEHM on Ancestry. Sure enough, the other Susanna popped up. I scrolled through the first 3 or 4 pages just to see what I could find. 

Suddenly, a family tree popped up that had possibilities. Could this be my Susanna?

I still need to do more research, but it is possible her parents were Johann Balthasar BOEHM and Barbara (last name?). He shows up in records as Balthasar BOEHM and may have been a saddle maker. If this is the correct Susanna BOEHM then she may have been born in 1770, instead of 1775 as my family says. That would make her closer in age to Jacob RESSLER, who was born about 1767. 

Notice this Susanna has a mother named Barbara. And nowhere in this tree is there an Abraham old enough to be her father - although she may have a younger brother named Abraham.

Jacob RESSLER and Susanna BOEHM married in 1793, and proceeded to have numerous children, starting in 1794 with John RESSLER.  I was aware of 8-10 children, but according to this tree there are 15-16 with several who died young. However, according to this tree, Susanna was 50 when she had her last child - which is questionable. So more research needs done.

Per my grandma, Susanna (BOEHM) RESSLER was blind when she died, which may or may not be a helpful clue. Per Grandma, her first name may have been Mary in the family Bible, which I do not have access to.

I always take those family trees as clues, not gospel. Depending on their documentation, and what documentation I can find I will piece together the history based on available facts.

My point is simply that I was excited to find something that may get me on the right track for the correct Susanna. With this information, I may be able to connect her to her actual parents, and grandparents.

Time will tell as I have time to work on it. 

Finding family trees on any website is great but consider it a clue to be proved or disproved - do not think that it is correct just because someone took time to put it together.

My family has many, many repeat names - both from parents to children and from those children to their own children. Unless the details are carefully combed through, it is easy to be looking at the wrong person completely. Or end up combining information from more than one ancestor into one ancestor profile. 

The Susan/Susanna I was constantly finding was from the approximate years of 1820 -1910, which is not even really close to my Susanna. Yes, they had overlapping years and may have even known each other since they are from the same local. But can I say that with 100% certainty? Absolutely not.

AMERICAN REVOLUTION DESERTER?

Source: Bing clip art

AMERICAN REVOLUTION DESERTER?

If you have been doing family research for more than a few days, you have found interesting, funny, or ironic things. I recently ran across the "GRAFF" name in a book titled: He Loves a Good Deal of Rum...Military Desertions during the American revolution 1775-1783...Volume One 1775 - June 30, 1777 by Joseph Lee BOYLE. 

 The title alone caught my attention. Um...I had ancestors in the American Revolution. Would this book have anything about any of them? I flipped to the index and started looking for any familiar name: BOWMAN/BAUMAN, GROFF/GRAFF, BOEHM/BEAM, STOVER, WOLF, METZLER, MUSSELMAN, RESSLER. Some of the names I had to look for alternate spellings. 

Um....GRAFF, Jacob. Maybe a possibility?

The below had been published in the Pennsylvania Evening Post on May 13, 1777:

This is to certify that Frederick Shinkle and Jacob Graff, two militia men of this city, brought me a man named John M'Cartney, the 21st ult. 1777, as s substitute for them, agreeable to a resolve of the Hon. Continental Congress, but the said John M'Cartney proves to be a deserter from another regiment, and of course no recruit, there the said Frederick Shinkle and Jacob Graff can derive no advantage from the resolve of Congress - Joseph Wood, Col. Third P. R.

Could this be an ancestor? Maybe. There were Jacob GRAFF's in Lancaster County. But it will require more research and digging far deeper than I have time for right now.

Source: Bing clip art

However, it made me chuckle because I (actually all of us) have characters in our families that for one reason or another prove that people will try to get out of doing things they don't want to do.

As I dig around in family history, I find that a necessary tool is a sense of humor. While most of them are names and dates to us, they lived as real people with lives. Depending on the documents or memories available, I will never know how my ancestors thought or why they acted as they did. 

Our people were far from perfect. Neither am I. 

What happened to these two men after their "substitute" did not pan out? Would they fight in many battles? Would they just walk off and leave the militia behind? Would they get drafted again at some later date? Would they live thru the war and return home, or die forgotten in some field?

As for the book, it is a fascinating look at how people acted and descriptions of their clothing or personal items when they deserted. Many had rewards of a few dollars on their heads if found or arrested. Note: I found the book at a genealogy library, however, I found several books by this author, including this one, on Amazon.

Family history is not dry and dusty. It is full of people who have stories to tell us. 

All the content writing of this post is my own unless I state otherwise.

Update 03-04-2023 I checked the DAR website to see if Jacob Graff was there. There is a Jacob Groff listed as an ancestor from Philadelphia. Three of the five in the ancestor search are from Lancaster County, PA. This man is ancestor #A048820 with dates of 1751-1824. Probably not my direct ancestor, but he has been used by someone to get membership in the DAR.

JAMES C. FINDLEY 1834/35 to Aug. 1899

 James C. FINDLEY was the grandfather of Reba (RESSLER) GARNER. He has somewhat difficult to track due to the last name being spelled as FINDLEY and FINLEY. The constant spelling issues became a frustration, and I would put his file back in the file cabinet for "another day".

I wish that I had questioned Grandma more about her grandparents, but I failed to do so. Plus, James would have been dead several years when she was born. Whatever she may have known about him would have been told to her by other, older relatives.

I suspect his parents are Samuel and Sarah FINDLEY, but so far have nothing to confirm this for sure. I have found family trees on Ancestry that state Samuel and Sarah (GOOD) FINDLEY/FINLEY are his parents, but none of them have documentation. Um...it does make me wonder if I am on the right track though.

I have not found a Samuel FINDLEY on Find a Grave that is the right age or with the correct spouse in Pennsylvania. This despite trying various years and places within Pennsylvania. However, on Find a Grave, there is a Sarah (GOOD) FINDLEY buried in Glen Run Cemetery of Chester County, PA. She is listed as 77 years old. No spouse is connected to her memorial (#21720749). She might be a possibility to return to later.

So, what do I know about James?

Per the 1850 census, he was 14 and lived in the household of Samuel and Sarah FINLEY. He had siblings: Enos (16), Samuel (13), Mary (11), Lewis (9), and John (7). His father is listed as a farmer, so James would have grown up working hard helping with this. The census says they were in Sadsbury, Lancaster County, PA, which is in far southern Lancaster County.

He must have gotten married in 1859 or 1860, since Andrew Edwin FINDLEY was born in 1860. Per the 1860 census of Colerain Township, James FINDLEY is listed as a farmhand and age 25. Martha is 24. 

In 1863, James was drafted into the 9th Pennsylvania Volunteer Calvary. 

Per Wikipedia, the campaigns for this regiment included: Battle of Richmond, Battle of Perryville, Chickamauga, Sherman's March to the Sea, and various campaigns in the Carolinas. 

Source: Ancestry (James is the first line)

I found this photo on Wikipedia of a reunion for this regiment in 1893 at the same link as above. I have no idea what James FINDLEY looked like so cannot possibly identify him in the photo, if he is there.

The 1870 census lists James FINDLEY as age 40 with Martha his wife as 37. They have children: Edwin (Andrew) age 10, Mary age 8, Sarah age 6, Wilkes age 4, and Ann age 1. The family lives in Strasburg Township. James is a farmer with $1300 value in real estate, and $400 in household goods.

In 1880, James FINDLEY and family are living in Eden, Lancaster County, Penn. The household consists of: James (head), Martha (wife), Andrew (20), Mary (18), Sarah (16), James (14), Martha (12), Clarressa (10), Margaret (8), Susan (6), and Emma (3). 

Notice there is no "Wilkes" but there is a James the right age. I think Ann in 1870 and Martha in 1880 are the same child.

The 1890 census does not exist for this area that I am aware of. 

His life tragically ended on 02 August1899 in an accident. According to the obit, he was hauling wood in a wagon down a steep hill, fell out of the wagon, and the wagon ran over his head killing him instantly. It lists the children noting that there were still three at home. It also lists his siblings: Samuel FINDLEY of Parkesburg, Martin FINDLEY of Mechanicsburg, John FINDLEY of Christiana, and Enos FINDLEY of Quarryville.

Source: Intelligencer Journal Newspaper, Lancaster, PA (Page 1) 3 August 1899

Find a Grave has this photo of his tombstone in Greenwood Cemetery. His memorial is #104526541.  

PLEASE NOTE: 
ALL PHOTOS AND WRITTEN CONTENT ARE MY OWN UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED.