Last week’s mission from Randy Seaver over at Genea-Musings was:
“What gift that you received for Christmas is your favorite for genealogy purposes? Book, magazine, hardware, software, website subscription, research time – what was it, and how will it affect your genealogy research?”
I have an ongoing quest to untangle the lives of several men with the same name during the same time period and in the same location. What a challenge! My “gift” was the result of an act of genealogical sharing that resulted in a couple of chunks being knocked out of one of my brick walls. Thank you John McCoy!
As background, I used the will of John Ward “Inspector” in a recent ProGen Study Group assignment. My group members suffered through helping me decipher and transcribe a poor copy of his will which had been printed from microfilm at the Maryland State Archives. I learned a lot from that assignment but I still didn’t know the name of John’s deceased wife.
Last week I stumbled on “Cecil County, Maryland Wills 1777-1810”. This was a PDF posted by John McCoy. He borrowed a copy of the microfilm of Cecil County wills with Books CC 3 to FF 6 from the Family History Library and briefly abstracted the information and posted it on his website. It is meant to be used as a finding aid to the full text on the microfilm.
The abstracted will of John Ward’s longtime friend and neighbor, Alexander McCloud, finally gives me the information I have been seeking for several years! This is a great example of why it is so important to research the friends, associates and neighbors (FAN club) of your ancestor.
I first noticed Alexander McCloud with John Ward (Inspector) on the 1766 tax list for Bohemia Hundred in Cecil County, Maryland. You can see that in this one small area there are four men with the same name. Fortunately they have identifiers that help to single them out.
1766 Tax List for Bohemia Hundred
Nathaniel Ward and 2 negroes
William Ward, Robert Pennington and 5 negroes
John Ward (son of Henry), William Hawkins and 5 negroes
John Ward (Surveyor), Richard Brown, William Calloishon and 6 negroes
John Ward (Inspector), Alexander McClouds, 4 negroes and 2 dogs.
John Veazey Ward, 6 negroes and 2 dogs
He also appears on the Assessment of 1783 for Cecil County, Maryland.
Alexander McCloud. CE 1st District, p. 6. MSA S 1161-3-7 1/4/5/46
Alexander McCloud(s)/McLoude then appears in the will for John Ward (Inspector). The abstract of John Ward’s will was obtained from John McCoy’s document. As I mentioned earlier, I carefully transcribed this will from my poor microfilm copy. John McCoy was working from a different microfilm copy which must have been much easier to read! His abstract includes a son named William that I did not see in my copy! Obviously I need to look at the original of this will. This new (to me) son named William may actually be the William Ward I was never able to place before. [William Ward (b. abt 1750) m. Rachel Ricketts (1752-1790).] One more project for 2011.
John Ward ―inspector (p. 81), 14 oct 1785, sons John, George, William, daughter Sarah Etherington, daughter Susannah Evertson. Executors sons John and George. Witnesses John Ward son of John, Joseph Stockton, Alexander McLoude. Proved 08 dec 1785.
Then I found the will for Alexander McCloud in John McCoy’s list of abstracts. I’m not sure I ever would have looked for it but Alexander McCloud’s will names John and William as sons of John and Henrietta Mary Ward. Could Henrietta Mary be a daughter of Alexander McCloud? Again, I need to obtain a copy of the original will and the administration of the estate to get more complete information.
167. Alexander McCloud (p. 291), 07 nov 1792, John son of John Ward and Hennerita Mary Ward, Elizabeth daughter of William and Sarah Walmsley, the said John Ward and Sarah his wife, James Logue, Sarah wife of Samuel Pennington, Elizabeth daughter of the said John Ward, William son of John and Henrietta Mary Ward. Residual heir the said John Ward. Executor the said John Ward. Witnesses Benjamin Porter, John Pennington, William Price. Proved 18 dec 1792.
I’ll also follow-up on the other people named in the will but it will be interesting to figure out why Alexander McCloud didn’t mention John Ward’s daughters Sarah and Susannah, and his youngest son, George. I suspect that John was first married to Henrietta Mary and married secondly to someone named Susannah.
According to a deed on 2 Feb 1767 John Ward of Cecil County and Susannah, his wife, granted to George Ward, 2 tracts of land situated on a branch of Duck Creek in Appoquinimink Hundreed in New Castle County former property of James Gano and on letters of administration on his estate granted to George Ward.
This cannot be John Ward and his wife Susannah Veazey since they had both passed away before 1750. Kind of a stretch to figure out these wives but it will also make a good project for 2011.
Next steps:
- Look for more information on the family, friends, associates and neighbors of John Ward “inspector” and Alexander McCloud.
- Obtain copies of the original wills and administrations for any of the FAN club.
- Transcribe and abstract these documents.
Any other suggestions?
Thank you to John McCoy and everyone else who works hard to provide finding aids and any other kind of genealogical information.
Remember to always check out the friends, associates and neighbors in addition to fully researching the family. You never know where you’ll find a gem of information. The other lesson to learn from this is to go back to the original document. I still want to make sure that William actually appears in John Ward’s will – I can’t believe I didn’t see him in my copy! If you can’t get the original, maybe another copy or micofilm has a better image of your document – as it did in this case. And last but not least, always keep checking! You never know when new clues will become available.
