Better Than Philately

I am an amateur genealogist and the unofficial family historian. I spend a lot of time researching family history and in contact with other folks who are doing the same. It is quite rewarding. There are some aspects of family history research itself that are quite amusing.

Lots of people want to establish American Indian ancestry, not to gain tribal membership or to open a casino or anything, but just for bragging rights. It has become a point of pride to have Cherokee or other Indian heritage whereas it used to be something folks concealed. In my own family, the quantum of Cherokee ancestry was greatly exaggerated, although I do have Cherokee ancestors. I do not know anything about my Cherokee ancestors or whether they were decent people, but I am interested in this heritage and am not ashamed of it. I reject the idea that all of my Indian ancestors were “noble savages” with an abiding respect for the Earth. In fact, it was common practice for some Cherokee men to raid other tribes and murder people for sport or in vendettas, and there were so few Cherokees that their impact on the environment was minimal. There was simply no need for much stewardship of resources.

Lots of people are keen to establish that their ancestors were “people of quality”, a term that is sometimes used to describe anyone in America before the Revolution. Part of this is because records for the wealthier 18th and even the 17th century settlers can be documented fairly well. Such folks were apt to own land and make wills and transfer slaves and other property, and these transactions were memorialized. It is quite satisfying to be able to connect to such families because you get to go back several generations further than you might otherwise do if your ancestors were poor mountaineers who left few records of their existence. It is also desirable for some to be connected to the colonial elites, although I confess that I am not as proud of my land grabbing, politically connected ancestors as I perhaps ought to be. Some of my ancestors were in the House of Burgesses, were officers of militia, were vestrymen, were landlords; however, I am prouder of the poor sods that eked out a living in the backwoods on land that they cleared and tamed and improved by the sweat of their brows.

One prominent researcher of the Morrow family was so keen to establish that my ancestor William Morrow was descended from an English family of quality that he argued that the tombstone inscription that claimed birth in Northern Ireland was a mistake. Surely his own children were in a better position to know where he was born, and it was hardly likely in 1830 for a family of English extraction to pretend to Scots-Irish heritage.

Finding ancestors in military service is also prized, partly for the sake of the record and partly for the sake of the connection to history that this affords. But I cannot be proud of some of the campaigns of my ancestors, especially those against the Indians or in evicting Loyalists, and I have come to regard my ancestors in military service as hapless pawns.

Ancestral slave owning is embarrassing as far as I am concerned, but some folks take pride that their ancestors had plantations and were among elites. Relatively few of my ancestors had any slaves at all, fortunately, and I am satisfied that any legacy earned from slave labor went to other members of these families and not to my ancestors in the next generation. In any event, nothing that I ever inherited can be traced directly to the exploitation of slaves.

The holy grail of ancestral research is connection to famous people, or, best of all, nobility or royalty. I am proud to count as a kinsman Audie Murphy, soldier and movie actor. The Morrow researcher mentioned above took pains to connect my family with Ann Morrow Lindbergh, but I am not convinced of the connection. I would love to be the cousin of the Lindbergh Baby, but it probably isn’t so.

Most of the supposed royal connections claimed by people appear to be mythical, but I can claim one connection to the English monarchy through the bastard child of a Bishop, himself a scion of a royal bastard. Having one’s royal connection mitigated thus by bastardy takes some of the sting out of it. My Scottish royal connection is not so mitigated but is so ancient that I feel no particular remorse for having descended from racketeers.

One of the most exciting finds in my research related to the Stone family where my great grandmother’s nieces and nephews were listed as mulattos in the 1900 census. Alas, my brief hope of an African-American heritage was dashed when I learned that this was apparently an error corrected in later census records.

My Edwards heritage has led me to become aware of the Edwards Fortune. The story is that a Mr Edwards owned most of mid-town Manhattan and let it on a long term lease. His heirs were defrauded of title, and the matter has been in litigation for almost two centuries. I cannot figure out whether this is an old con that is now moving to the arena of spam or whether I am, in fact, one of the rightful owners of the Chrysler Building. I prefer the latter and to look at that edifice with the pride of ownership.

In any event, genealogy on the web is becoming easier than ever, and it is quite diverting. It has piqued my interest in history and has formed the basis for some of the most interesting vacations I have ever taken. And I am proud to say that most of my ancestors were not so called people of quality.