The Family Tree Problem Solver: Tried-And-True Tactics for Tracing Elusive Ancestors Read Online Free PDF Page A

as a single man. A man named Joseph D. Rogers also arrived at that time and purchased land next to the other two. 11
    The 1860 census (see Figure 1-4 ) gave more information but confused the situation. Lemuel's wife was now Martha instead of Mary Ann. In addition, the only Blanton tombstone inscription I could find in Fannin County was for Martha Blanton, born 18 January 1816 (death date gone from the stone). This matched the census ages for the woman in both 1850 and 1860. No marriage records for Lemuel Blanton surfaced in Fannin County.
    I decided to check for probate records. Joseph D. Rogers left a will in 1842, naming sons Joseph J. Rogers and Edwin C. Rogers, but no daughter named Blanton. Lemuel Blanton, however, did serve as a witness to a codicil drawn at the same time, reconfirming some connection between the two families. I next looked for a combination of the surname Rogers and Blanton in Tennessee. Another dead end. Rogers was simply too common a surname and no one named Joseph Rogers was listed on the 1830 census index in Tennessee. Dead end.

    Figure 1-3 1850 census, Fannin County, Texas.

    Figure 1-4 1860 census, Fannin County, Texas.
    We need to more carefully analyze what we know so far:
    1. Lemuel Blanton's wife was Mary Ann Rogers in 1831 in Missouri.
    2. One of the children living in the home in 1850 in Texas was born in Missouri, and she was the eldest, born about 1833, so the Texas and Missouri family was linked.
    3. There is an age gap between the second and third child on the 1850 census. Perhaps there was a second marriage. Perhaps the new wife was a Britton or Stephenson, the other surnames in the 1850 household.
    4. There is little doubt that the Edwin and Joseph Rogers and the Blanton families were connected, probably through Lemuel's marriage to Mary Ann Rogers, but neither were on the 1830 census in Missouri, nor could either be located before the marriage. We need to go to the next steps.
    Step 5: Look for a trail.
    When you have analyzed each record concerning or involving the ancestor you are researching, you are likely to see a pattern of behavior, clues to other places or records to search, and a recurrence of names to be tracked. We have a trail from Missouri to Texas, and we have a number of families that are connected, both in Missouri and Texas. We have two new surnames — Stephenson and Britton — to check. I did, but nothing helpful surfaced. I studied the Rogers family. I learned a lot, including the fact that in his later years, Edwin C. Rogers became a Christian mystic. But he never passed on any revelations to me about where he came from.
    I had followed the steps, looking at all the records I could find, pursuing a trail of clues and recurrences of names and associates, eliminating some people while keeping others on the back burner. Nothing. It was time to return to Step 1. I had to construct a new hypothesis, and that required examining what I already knew to see if I could locate new people and new records to pursue.
    Remember, Step 1 is to determine what you already know. This means a careful analysis of every known and documented fact about the individual or family. What had I missed the first time? I looked again. There was one association I had not followed. In 1831 Lemuel and Mary Ann were married in Campbell Township by John P. Campbell. Lemuel was on the 1833 Greene County tax list. That means Lemuel and Mary Ann were living in Greene County, while Ledwell Blanton, although in what was Crawford County, was relatively far away (see Figure 1-5 ).
    In 1831 there was only a small settlement of pioneers in the part of the state where John Polk Campbell and Lemuel Blanton were living. Most of these settlers were from Tennessee. They were ignored by the 1830 census taker and few records were available. Among the small number of families living there was a man named Joseph Rountree. Like John P. Campbell he was from Maury County, and he kept a diary about his journey from