I am currently updating the chapter of the book for Aaron Davis and his descendants. Below is a link to the changes to the section about his son Andrew Jackson Davis. This section alone took about a week of working full time to update, so I decided that it would probably be best to post these smaller book section updates as I complete them, as opposed to waiting for full chapter updates. Aaron's chapter was the only chapter not fully updated in draft two, so I am hoping that the other chapters will be less time consuming to update (and I've already made quite a few changes to most other chapters). The PDF below uses revision marks - so it is clear what has been updated since the last draft and what hasn't. You will see that a very large portion of this section has been updated.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/xvw74kpr54htep6/Davis-Aaron-AndrewJ.pdf?dl=0
Hopefully one or more of you will have the time and inclination to review this and provide comments, suggestions, changes, deletions, additions, etc. For descendants who were born after 1940 I generally don't provide birth or death information, though I have included marriage information when I find a source for that.
Regarding source citations, I've tried to limit citations to the minimum necessary to prove the relationships between people. I generally won't source marriage records, except for licenses that list parents and other details.
I believe this is a fairly complete listing of Andrew Jackson Davis' descendants, though it is always possible that someone had moved out of state and has fallen through the cracks.
Descendant surnames in this section: Carter, Morgan, Gillespie, Blankenstein, Kasperzick, Asbury, Kuegler, Tucker, Chavaux, Dickhans, Sellers, Pobst, Mobley, Mabuce, Peterman, Hawn, Fishburn, Reed, Forbis, Criss, Robison, Zook, Bullinger, and Eakins.
Tuesday, October 31, 2017
Wednesday, October 18, 2017
Moore and Cumberland Counties, NC
I spent the afternoon in Charlottesville, NC and completed my research of Cumberland County records. There was a record of Mathis and others living east of Governors Creek around 1786, which could have been in Cumberland County. But their deed indexes are online and there was no deed where Mathis sold that property. It could also have been in Harnett or Lee County, but the former only has land records from 1855 and the latter from 1908. So it looks as though land records are exhausted, unless I find a source for surveys related to land grants (I found online records for the grants, so I suspect the surveys are not available).
I found where Mathis Davis was involved in at least two lawsuits, one against the state of North Carolina. I suspect these were both settled in Moore County, where the records have been destroyed, so I won't pursue those.
I found no grantor deeds from Mathis, only grantee deeds. The former would likely have required the signature of his spouse, since she would have a dower interest in the property. If such a deed had shown that his wife's name was Martha, it would have been another brick in the foundation proving that he was the father of James, Aaron and Amos.
I found where Mathis Davis was involved in at least two lawsuits, one against the state of North Carolina. I suspect these were both settled in Moore County, where the records have been destroyed, so I won't pursue those.
I found no grantor deeds from Mathis, only grantee deeds. The former would likely have required the signature of his spouse, since she would have a dower interest in the property. If such a deed had shown that his wife's name was Martha, it would have been another brick in the foundation proving that he was the father of James, Aaron and Amos.
Sunday, October 15, 2017
Book Progress
I believe I have finally researched most of Aaron Davis' descendants in my tree on Ancestry.com. As time allows, I will attempt to update the Aaron Davis chapter of the book. Once that is done I will share a link, seeking your help with comments, corrections, etc.
I have also been updating other sections of the book as time has permitted. My plan is to go back through each chapter, adding major reference citations to the descendants lists, and reviewing the 1900 and 1910 Census records for any wives who were alive at that time. The intent of the latter will be to see how many of the surviving children have been identified (since some are nearly always obscured by the lack of an 1890 Census). As that work is completed, I will send out links for each chapter, again with the intent to get your feedback.
Once all of that is done, I will publish a final draft for any final corrections or comments. During that time I will create the book's index and document all of the descendant surnames, which will be listed on the title page. Indexing will be incredibly time consuming, and is best not started until most of the final edits have been done.
If anyone is hanging on to information that might be incorporated into the book, now would be a good time to forward that to me. Send me an e-mail or contact me through the blog's contact form and I can provide an address where we will be residing periodically during this winter.
Since I don't intend to charge for the book, I can't offer to pay anyone for their help. But I will be certain to credit your contributions in the book's front matter.
If, once the final PDF is published, there is sufficient interest in purchasing hard copies, I might consider doing so as a fund raising effort to pay for copies to be donated to regional libraries. But the book will be formatted such that it can easily be reproduced at your local copy store or on your home printer.
I have also been updating other sections of the book as time has permitted. My plan is to go back through each chapter, adding major reference citations to the descendants lists, and reviewing the 1900 and 1910 Census records for any wives who were alive at that time. The intent of the latter will be to see how many of the surviving children have been identified (since some are nearly always obscured by the lack of an 1890 Census). As that work is completed, I will send out links for each chapter, again with the intent to get your feedback.
Once all of that is done, I will publish a final draft for any final corrections or comments. During that time I will create the book's index and document all of the descendant surnames, which will be listed on the title page. Indexing will be incredibly time consuming, and is best not started until most of the final edits have been done.
If anyone is hanging on to information that might be incorporated into the book, now would be a good time to forward that to me. Send me an e-mail or contact me through the blog's contact form and I can provide an address where we will be residing periodically during this winter.
Since I don't intend to charge for the book, I can't offer to pay anyone for their help. But I will be certain to credit your contributions in the book's front matter.
If, once the final PDF is published, there is sufficient interest in purchasing hard copies, I might consider doing so as a fund raising effort to pay for copies to be donated to regional libraries. But the book will be formatted such that it can easily be reproduced at your local copy store or on your home printer.
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