Glad to find this group!

[shanti]

I've always been interested in genealogy, but never had the time to put into it until this past year. Now that I'm retired, I'm jumping in! So I decided to sign up at ancestry.com after years of frustration at what information I could get for free. I've been doing my tree (what fun!) and have decided that the price of the membership is worth it.

I've been working on the tree for almost two weeks now and have made some astounding finds. My mother's side has been fairly easy to find so far, and has been delved into by many cousins already, but I haven't touched any info from the Piedmont region in Italy (they were ethnically French Waldensians) yet. How well were records kept in Europe? I'm finding that their naming protocols are confusing as often if a child died, they would name the next one after it.

As far as my father's side, they were all English, except for one line that was Dutch. THAT line is so interesting that I feel like I've hit the jackpot! One of them, Abraham Pietersen Van Deursen, was the original immigrant to America in 1631. No dead ends here! So far, I've traced his line all the way back to lots of royalty in France, Spain, England, and Holland at the time of the Crusades. Dad always told me that we had Templar Knights in the family, and I found one of them! Baudoin IX of Flanders was killed in a siege near Constantinople in 1206. I'm not even at the end of the line yet. This is so exciting! I just wish Dad was still alive to hear of it, but he passed three years ago.

I'm thinking of signing up to be a volunteer archivist at Ancestry. Actually, it's a perfect fit for me, as my former career was as an adoption consultant, and part of my job was researching background. So research is in my blood.

So glad DU has an area such as this!

[Rosie1223]

1. Welcome!

Check out our pinned links at the top to get you started.

Glad you joined us!

Rosie, Genealogy Group Host

[pipi_k]

2. Cool stuff!

One of the more frustrating aspects of doing the family history is, as you said, the habit of some families to name a succeeding child after one that died.

Often, if a child was born and died early in the year, it was possible for another one to be born within the same year, and given the same name, so that's when it gets real tricky.

I don't know about anyplace else, but the French Canadians tended to use "Marie" as a sort of first name for most, or all, of the girls in the family. For example, a great grandfather's mom was one of three sisters who all had names starting with "Marie" with another name after it.

I don't have any connections to royalty unless you want to count some of the females being "Filles du Roi"...or "The King's Daughters" They're not really King's daughters, but their story is interesting nonetheless.

So, one of the really cool things I managed to do was to trace a line all the way back to the very first ancestor to arrive in Canada in the 1600s...Pierre Auclair.

It's fascinating and the hours spent looking for ancestors fly by so quickly.

[shanti]

7. marie, yes

also, jean and david. those were some of the family names. my mom's middle name is also marie. my british paternal ancestors also arrived in canada, ontario.

that IS cool about auclair. he must have arrived in quebec? the history is very fascinating. i have stayed up until 2am reading stuff, but i have to stop that....


it's funny, i was telling her about my finds, and she said she had absolutely no interest. one of my sons did too. not everyone cares

[TuxedoKat]

3. Genealogy is so much fun

It's a giant puzzle that never ends. Incidentally, you learn alot about history too.

[pipi_k]

4. History...yes!

I'm learning so much about Canada

[kdmorris]

5. What a small world!!

Abraham Pietersen Van Deursen is my 10th Great Grandfather. (The Dutch in America kept meticulous records!!!!)

My Line:
Abraham Peiterszen Van Deursen is your 10th great grandfather
Pieter Abrahmszen Van Deursen (1642 - ) Son of Abraham Peiterszen Van
Abraham Pieterszen Van Deursen (1672 - 1759) Son of Pieter Abrahmszen Van
Hester Van Deursen (1718 - ?) Daughter of Abraham Pieterszen Van
Rachel Van Shaick (1752 - 1827) Daughter of Hester Van Deursen
Simeon Buchanan (1789 - 1863) Son of Rachel Van Shaick
William Spaulding Buchanan (1811 - 1848) Son of Simeon
Martha Jane Elenor Buchanan (1848 - 1934) Daughter of William Spaulding
Arminda Driskill (1878 - 1968) Daughter of Martha Jane Elenor
Herbert Delbert Carbaugh (1899 - 1950) Son of Arminda
Delbert Herbert Carbaugh (1923 - 2004) Son of Herbert Delbert
My Mother
Me

[shanti]

6. i took it back to Govert Van Doorsen

That's where the royalty connection starts. It seems Govert snagged a dutchess, lol! Funny thing, another branch of the family connects with the van dusens at Teuwis Abrahamsen VanDeursen. They were also dutch. This is during the time of the Dutch East India Company, of which many families were from. I also found connections with minor british/welsh royalty through my maiden name. they're all connected to my father, nothing from mom, nada. also, there was a connection to george washington, nothing direct though.

so interesting to read the history!

[Spider Jerusalem]

8. Some advice

A lot of the info available via sites like Rootsweb's Worldconnect database and the LDS Familysearch database needs to be taken with a pretty large grain of salt; from what I've seen there's a tendency for people to make questionable assumptions based on little to no evidence. I wouldn't accept anything as credible without finding supporting documentary evidence. For instance, searching for Abraham Pietersen van Deusen, I find that while he was himself a relatively prominent individual (being one of the governing council of New Amsterdam, and being an ancestor of Martin van Buren and Franklin Roosevelt), he doesn't have ancestry traceable back more than three generations, nor does he have any royal ancestry. See Gary Boyd Roberts' "Royal Descents of 600 Immigrants to the American Colonies who were themselves notable or left notable descendants" (unwieldy title, but it's generally considered to be the best source for documented colonial immigrants whose ancestry traces back to royalty; Abraham van Deusen's name is absent, which, considering that he appears in the same author's "Ancestors of American Presidents", is more likely to be because Abraham van Deusen has no such ancestry than from oversight).

[pipi_k]

9. That's one of the good things

about doing French Canadian genealogy. They generally kept very good records there, and you can view the originals, which was what I did yesterday when there was a question about the names of an ancestor's parents. I looked up the marriage record and saw the original with both parents' names. It's in French, yes, but it only takes a rudimentary knowledge of French to figure out the real important parts.

[shanti]

10. bear with me here

i'm still learning

[pipi_k]

11. Just wanted to add...

I nearly got suckered this past weekend when I was searching out a particular branch of the family tree...specifically, Sarah Allen, whose family was killed in the Deerfield (MA) massacre.

She was kidnapped and brought to Kaughnawaga, where she was turned over to a merchant for domestic work, but five years later married Guillaume Lalonde, and was baptized with a French name, had 13 children and forever lived as a French Canadian woman.

Anyway, some people had her line going back to Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine.

I was thrilled...until I started really examining the "evidence".

Well, one of her "Allen ancestors" was, supposedly, a Cardinal of the Catholic church! But from him down there was no real evidence of any children, although going backward, his line did appear to reach back to royalty.

I'm so glad I checked this out before announcing to my family that we were related to Kings and Queens.

As it turned out, her grandfather was not born in England. He was born in Scotland, and most likely changed his name from Aluinn to Allen.

You really have to be careful...also what I notice a lot is that people will have ancestors in their trees and their parents are listed beneath them (the part where you can click to add people to your tree) but the parents' dates of birth are years after the birth of their alleged children. I saw one the other day where the kids were born in the 1500s and the "parents" were listed with birthdates in the 1800s.

Crazy! I would rather have the truth, even if it means my ancestors are NOT royalty.

[Spider Jerusalem]

12. I've found a few instances of things like that tracing my own ancestry

there's a lot of mistaken identification based on "the name's the same, so they must be related". One of my immigrant ancestors was a Samuel Handy who came to Maryland from England in 1665; he married a woman named Jane Sewell in 1679. Someone who did the Handy genealogy in the 19th century identified her with Jane Sewall, daughter of a Henry Sewall (who was secretary of the colony under the second Lord Baltimore) and his wife Jane Lowe, who was descended from Edward III of England. The only problem with this is that Jane Sewall was married to someonee named George Brent, and having children by him, at the same time as Samuel Handy and his wife Jane were having children, so it obviously wasn't the same woman.

Even so, the odds are that anyone of European ancestry is descended from European royalty; very probably anyone with any English ancestry at all is a descendant of William I, and anyone with European ancestry is almost certainly a descendant of Charlemagne. Whether one can trace back to it it something else, though, since in most cases the records just won't be there. I can trace a lot of my ancestry back as far as the original immigrant to America, and in most cases know where they emigrated from; in some cases, a few generations back on the other side of the Atlantic; and there are one or two lines that go back to medival nobility and royalty, but those are very much the exception.

[pipi_k]

13. Yeah, that's what I was thinking the other day

when I got to wondering about the possibility of being related to royalty/nobility at some point.

The population going way back was not what is is today, so the possibility does exist.

People with English ancestors who have French-sounding last names likely are related to those who went to England with William the Conqueror and given Knighthoods and land. I have a few of those.

I've been looking for evidence of First Nations ancestors because of the family stories told by my dad of having ties there (he always said it was Penobscot) but haven't been able to find anything concrete even though a cousin has given me family info that says our g.g.g.g. grandmother was a full blooded Micmac who married a French Canadian man in the early 1800s.

You just never know where this stuff will lead you....