James A. Ferrel-Soldier, Reverend, Farmer, Husband, Father

I chose James Ferrel as my first of the year history because of the obituary written about him that has been passed down through the family No one knows where it came from, but my guess is that it was written and published through the Methodist church. Perhaps they had a publication that it was published in. Since he died in 1864, it would have been a very old publication.

James A. Ferrel was born on 4 April 1795 in Lexington Kentucky to James and Hannah Kinnison Ferrel. It appears that he was the youngest of their four known children. His father later married Rosanna Ray and they had seven children. James A. Ferrel served in the War of 1812. He enlisted in Butler County, Ohio in December of 1813 and was discharged 1 February 1814 as a teamster under Jenkins in either the Kentucky or Ohio Militia. Later that year, in Butler County Ohio on the 15th of August in 1814, James married Martha “Patsy” Dickerson, daughter of Walter and Penelope Heaton Dickerson. The first three of James and Martha’s children were born in Ohio. Eleanor was born in 1815, Mary was born in 1817 and Elizabeth was born in 1818, all in Butler County, Ohio. Before 1820, the family, along with James’ father and siblings, had moved to Vigo County, Indiana. The fourth child, James, was born in 1820 in Vigo County, Indiana. The family of James Ferrel is listed in the 1820 Vigo County Indiana census, showing one son under age ten and three daughters under age ten.The next two children of James and Martha are recorded as having been born in Butler County, Ohio, indicating that the family had moved back there after 1820. Martha Ann was born in 1822 and Walter Dickerson Ferrel was born in 1824, both in Butler County, Ohio.The History of Vigo County states that “Walter was born in Ohio where his parents resided until 1825 when they returned to Vigo county”. Upon the family’s return to Vigo County, Indiana, daughter Nancy was born in 1826, and daughter Sarah Ann“ Polly” was born in 1828. A piece from "When Terra Haute Was Young" a series of articles from the Terre Haute Tribune by A.R.Markle, Volume I about taxes showed that "James Ferrill, Jr. had 127 acres just east of Riley and a horse;" (1828).

According to family tradition passed down, James was a Methodist preacher who traveled around on horseback. From Methodist records found, this seems to be accurate. James Ferrel Jr. is listed as attending the 2nd Quarterly Meeting Conference for Carlisle Circuit held at the house of John Jackson on the 31st day of January 1829. James was listed in the 1830 Vigo County Indiana Census with two sons and six daughters. James’ brothers, William and George are listed as living close to the family. The next ten years brought more children: Cynthia Ann was born in 1830, but sadly she died in 1833, the same year that Rose Ann was born. Daniel Dickerson was born in 1836, and Lurina “Lou” was born in 1839. James was listed as present at the Terre Haute Circuit held at Pleasant Hill Schoolhouse on April 22nd, 1837, and at the Terre Haute Circuit held at Herringtons neighborhood, on September 16th, 1837. James is listed as present at the Terre Haute Circuit held at Pleasant Hill Schoolhouse in February 1838 and at the Camp Ground on the 28th of July 1838. He was listed as present for Terre Haute Circuit on the 6th day of October 1838. James’ son Daniel died in October of 1838. 

In the Minutes of the fourth quarterly Conference of Terre Haute Circuit held at Mount Pleasant Meetinghouse on the 28th of September 1839, James Ferrel was

 

“severally examined, approved and their license renewed except George W. Creel his license were not renewed.....except H. D. Lee who was released by his Consent. JAMES FERREL was appointed Circuit Steward in place of H.D Lee........Infants Baptised: Lovina Ferrel...none;

 The 1840 Vigo County Indiana Census shows two sons and five daughters with the James Ferrel family. In 1843 William Henry Harrison Clay Ferrel (my great-great grandfather) was born, the last child of James and Martha Ferrel. James was listed as present at the Terre Haute Circuit held in the house of Samuel Hull on the 26th day of June 1841 and at the quarterly meeting conference for Terre Haute Circuit Indiana conference held in the Union meetinghouse Otter Creek on the 4th of September 1841. Minutes of the first quarterly meeting conference held at Bethel meetinghouse on December 28th, 1841 state that James Ferrel’s license was approved and renewed, and James Ferrel was released from his Stewardship. 

 The 1850 Riley Township, Vigo County Indiana Census shows James and Martha (listed with the surname “Feurl”) with children Rose Ann, Lurina, and William. James is listed as a farmer. In 1851, daughters Nancy and Elizabeth died, daughter Martha Ann died in 1857, and then in 1859, daughter Eleanor died. All four daughters were married when they died. Three of the daughters left young children. 

In 1860, James and Martha are still listed in Riley Township and James is listed as a farmer. Lurina (listed as “Norma”) and William are living with them, as is granddaughter Martha Sanders. Estelle “Bess” Elizabeth Ferrel, granddaughter to James and Martha, wrote in a letter that James Ferrel

 

“...died Jan. 10, 1864. The war was on at this time and he wanted to see his son, so he went down South and they had a visit together and that was the last, for he died soon after."

 The "son" is William HH Ferrel, who was serving in the Civil War at the time. James was sixty-nine when he died. From an obituary handed down (source unknown): 

FERRIL-James Ferrel was born April 4, 1795 near Lexington,KY.At the age of two years his parents removed to Warren co., O. where he was married by Rev. J. Sirange to Miss Martha Dickerson, Aug. 16,1814, and where he resided till 1820. The same year he removed to Vigo co., Ia, and was instrumental in causing to be held the first religious meeting in the county.He was a classleader six years, and was then licensed to exhort, and continued to act as a faithful Christian in both these capacities till his death, Jan. 10, 1864.During his sickness he was heard to say that he never expected to die, but that he expected the breath would leave his body and he would exchange worlds; that he was at peace with his God and that his only desire to live was to see how this rebellion terminated, and to see his two sons who are in the army. He had great confidence that the Lord was with him and that he would die in grace, for which he had so long prayed. His loss is not only felt as a parent and citizen, but as a Christian and patriot, and will long be remembered and revered as such. JNO. CASMEL"(name unclear) 

 James and Martha are buried at Dickerson Cemetery in Terre Haute, Indiana. James and Martha had thirteen children; six of the children died before James. Martha died in 1877, at age seventy-nine.

Another New Year

I just looked at my blogging over the past year...only 3 posts.  That is disgraceful!  And what is funny, is that after about 17 years of doing genealogy, I still spend about an hour a day working on genealogy!  So, it's not as if I am slacking off there!  I really am going to try to do better.

Looking over the past year, there were some good finds, good contacts made and, in general, I have felt quite good about how my research has been going.  One of the best things that I did in 2011 is to go to my first genealogy workshop.  It was held in Springfield, Illinois (in September, I believe) and was a day put on by Ancestry.com.  It was very affordable and since Springfield is only about 90 miles away, I took the opportunity and drove myself there.  Yes, I attended it all by myself!  And I had a great time!  It was interesting...I have used Ancestry.com for years and there was still much for me to learn, or at least, review. I also enjoyed visiting the different vendors set up there.  The day was well worth my effort.  I will be watching for more workshops to attend.  I just wish that I had a genealogy friend to share it all with!

I also contacted GenSmarts to see about getting it on my computer.  I had purchased it a number of years ago and when I got my new computer two years ago, I forgot to have it put on.  The people I contacted were extremely helpful and I had no problem getting it back on. 

Now I am thinking about this new year and what I would like to accomplish in genealogy terms.

Today I updated to RootsMagic 5, so I will be spending some time exploring that, seeing what is new and different.  I also installed Personal Historian and will see if I find it helpful or not.

I make it a habit to check Ancestry.com at least every other day, both to check the Recent Activity and to check on Hints.  Both have been invaluable to my researching.  I also plan to start using GenSmart to help with my research.

One of my goals for 2012 is to edit my Sources in RootsMagic.  When I began doing genealogy, I was not as good about how I listed sources as I would have liked and now I find myself constantly correcting them when I am entering information.  A couple of things that I am working on with that is editing duplicate sources and editing how I listed places.  Early on I would list a source as Peoria, Peoria Co., IL".  Now that drives me crazy.  I want it all spelled out as: "Peoria, Peoria County, Illinois".  So that is going to take some time to get it all corrected.

I also want to keep up better with checking my Problem List in RootsMagic.  I spent a lot of time working on correcting all of it last year, so I want to periodically check it and not let the list get too overwhelming again.

I know that these goals sound like kind of mindless maintenance tasks (and they are to some extent), but I try to be mindful of when someday (hopefully in the far, far distant) someone else will be taking over my database.  I want it to be in good working order!

I had lunch with a friend several weeks ago who was enthusiastically encouraging me to publish some of my family history in order to give it to the appropriate local libraries.  That is playing around in the back of my mind.

Meanwhile, I am going to try hard to keep better track of what I am doing and writing more about my genealogical activities in this blog.  I know that I often get good ideas from other when I read other blogs and hopefully, I can help someone else also!

Christmas and Genealogy

Each year at Christmas time I try to think of a genealogical project that might hold interest for my family members. One year I wrote the story of my mother's great-grandfather, who had been a great mystery for many years. Another year I wrote about my father's family. Both were received with interest. Two years ago, I printed up (what I considered) a quite attractive recipe card for family members that I included in with my Christmas cards to them. The recipe card was Scandinavian in appearance with a small picture of my great-grandmother (who came from Sweden) and her original recipe for Swedish Cardamon Bread. I was very pleased with how it turned out. However, not one single person ever commented on it. So I'm not sure that it was appreciated or enjoyed at all. It was disappointing, because I had thought that it was such a good idea! And I spent a lot of time on it! But I don't give up easily, because here I am approaching the holidays and trying to come up with another clever idea! So I am searching for ideas...and will report back here if and when anything comes to me!

It's A New Year

I just looked at my stated genealogical goals from last year and I am feeling pretty satisfied with how well I completed them. That's certainly a good feeling! Now I need to contemplate on what my goals will be for 2011! 

 I noticed that I only had 10 blog entries for 2010. One of my goals is definitely to blog about my genealogy efforts more often. It is especially helpful when I receive feedback from others on my efforts. And that will only happen if I am actually blogging! In trying to identify great/happy genealogical moments over the past year, a couple of things come to mind. 

Probably the best one was finding that one of my mystery Missouri Adamsons had children before he died! I did not know that there were any descendants. And I happened to learn about this from keeping an eye on "Recent Activity" on Ancestry.com. Since that time, I have checked the activity at least a couple of times a week, if not every day! You never know when people are looking at your tree and adding something from your tree to their tree. It may end up that they have family knowledge that you don't have. 

I often contact people if I see that they have been looking at/copying from my tree. I want to share and compare information with them. Another happy incident occurred when I was searching for information about Westfield College in Illinois. Both of my grandparents graduated from there and the college no longer exists. I came across a graduate student who is writing a book about the college and its graduates. I was able to share several pictures of my grandmother and her peers from their college days with him. 

 For Christmas, I gave my three children each a scrapbook that I made detailing the history of our family cabin/summer place in Indiana. The lake was built in the late 1930s and a cabin (named "Atlasta") was built for my grandmother in 1939 on the lake. There were a few pictures from the late 1930s, and then the history included when the newer cabin/home was built, etc. I thought that it turned out well, and hopefully, my kids enjoyed it. There are certainly years and years of memories there!

 There have been contacts with Murphy/Ryan descendants this past year, and we hope to meet up together this spring. I am really looking forward to that!

Persistence and Diligence Pay Off!

I have written several times in this blog about my ongoing search for the Allen and Elizabeth Saunders Adamson family. As a reminder, this is the family who had twelve children and lived in Texas County, Missouri. Around 1858, the mother, Elizabeth, died and the children were parceled out to her relatives. The father, Allen, went to live with his father in Kentucky, leaving the children in Missouri, and apparently never returning. 

I have spent quite a few years trying to track down what became of all of the children. Something about this family grabbed my heart and I continue to research them. They are not my direct line. Allen Adamson was a brother to my great-great-grandfather, Aaron W. Adamson. 

 One of Allen and Elizabeth's sons was Elijah Adamson, born about 1851 in Missouri. After his mother's death, Elijah and his sister Catherine went to sent to live with one of Elizabeth's sisters and her family, and they are listed with the family in the 1860 Pulaski County, Missouri Census. Elijah is then listed in the 1870 Phelps County Missouri Census as a boarder and laborer. In 1876, Elijah married Martha Elliott, and they were listed in the 1876 Texas County Missouri Census. That was the last record I had found of Elijah or Martha. What became of them? Did they ever have children? Did Elijah die before the 1880 census?

 I just could never find any information on Elijah after 1876. Then one day a couple of weeks ago while I was on Ancestry.com, I noticed that someone had copied my marriage record for Martha Elliott. However, they had her marriage listed as being to Elijah's brother Edward.

 I contacted the submitter and together we worked to determine that Martha had married Elijah. It turned out that by 1880, Martha was widowed and living with two small boys, James and William Adamson! (The tricky part was that they were listed as "Adams", not "Adamson" in the 1880 census). The family was listed in Yell County, Arkansas. So did Elijah and Martha move there before Elijah died? The youngest son was born in 1878 in Missouri. As I learned from the submitter, shortly after the 1880 census, Martha remarried and went on to have seven more children. It is really because one of her descendants knew that Martha had a son, James Adamson, that the whole mystery came together! 

 It continues to surprise me how some genealogy questions can be answered by showing diligence and patience! And it surprises me even more how satisfying it is to me to learn that Elijah had children and that he had descendants! I am sad that Elijah died so young. To my knowledge, only two of the twelve children born to Allen and Elizabeth Adamson were alive after 1880. It appears that five of the boys died in the Civil War, and two more sons died of accidents at ages 33 and 22. I still have not learned what became of two of his daughters. The other two daughters lived until 80 and 83 years of age. I am always saddened to think of how the children's mother would feel to know that 10 of her 12 children did not live long, happy lives. As far as I know right now, Elizabeth had 21 grandchildren, that were born long after she passed on. Knowing that, however, gives me hope that sometime I may locate some of her descendants and perhaps learn even more about what became of the family! Never give up!

Update and past genealogical Christmas projects

It has been a while since I have posted anything on this blog, but not because I have not been working on my genealogy! I just devoted about 2 weeks to going through all of the hints on ancestry.com, so that now I can keep up with them as they arrive!

I learned and found many new discoveries about family members as I went through all of the hints, and the best part was finding some family pictures that are posted on other people's trees! I posted numerous pictures on my tree over the past summer. I have also been in contact with new to me researchers and that is always a blessing! 

 I have decided on what my genealogical project for Christmas will be this year, but am not sharing here until after the holidays! In the past, I have done a couple of different stories of family, one from my Dad's side (the Adamson family) and another from my Mom's side (the Seg/Seeber family). Last year I did a recipe card that had a picture of my great-grandmother with her original recipe for Swedish bread that I sent out to family members. It was really fun to do. I would love to hear about ideas that others have done for projects. I don't know if my family appreciates the projects as much as I do, but it is fun!

Trying to Solve Family Mysteries

Some of the biggest brick-wall-type difficulties I have run into in my fifteen years of genealogical searching are those of children either adopted or informally placed with families. 

 The first case that I ran into was that of my grandfather’s “sister”. The family story was that she was adopted by Moses and Lydia Bullard Adamson, my great-grandparents. What I found odd, however, was that Moses and Lydia were in their late 60s when they “adopted” Edna. They had already had twelve children. And the Civil War had effectively comprised Moses’ ability to earn a living. He was incapacitated both physically and mentally ever since he returned from his War service. He never worked upon his return. Why would this family adopt an infant given these circumstances? 

 Edna was born in 1897 and was living with Moses and Lydia’s family in the 1900 census. She was listed as age two. Edna lived until 1982 and died at the age of eighty-five. She had married and had one child. Edna was always considered to be one of my grandfather’s sisters and the family was very close to her She even seemed to look and act like the other family members. Upon Edna’s death, it was found that she had not been adopted formally and her son found some documentation that indicated that her real name had been Edna Norris. This meant nothing to the family and it wasn’t until ten years later, when I became interested (a nice word for obsessed) with genealogy that the mystery was possibly resolved. 

By that time, all of Edna’s adopted family had died, leaving no siblings to answer the question of who Edna really was. But almost one hundred years after Edna’s birth, I may have found the answer. What I learned was that Mary Etta Bullard, one of Lydia’s first cousins, had been married to Oliver Norris. Mary and Oliver had a daughter, Elmira Norris, born in 1879. My speculation is that Elmira became pregnant, had the baby, and Lydia Bullard Adamson agreed to take the infant in. In the 1900 census, Elmira Norris is listed, as age twenty, with her mother and step-father in the same area as Moses and Lydia. It appears that perhaps Lydia raised her first cousin’s granddaughter. 

 Shortly after I had first posted this blog post I received a response that the person who responded knew who Edna’s mother was. I was quite excited and responded back, but sadly I never heard from the person again. 

 Two other cases involve people who are (probably) still living and who would be around sixty years old. But people aren’t talking. And some of the involved persons are not living. One involves a child given up for adoption; the other appears to be a case of the child not being raised by the mother. All of these types of cases take extreme patience. In my experience, nothing is ever a secret. There are always people who have information and someday I hope to solve the last two cases that have plagued me!