Re: John Burl Harger, 1803 - 1885, Washingto County, AL
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In reply to:
Re: John Burl Harger, 1803 - 1885, Washingto County, AL
Penelope Monroe 6/10/12
Well, hate to tell you this, but a man could have the same surname as his mother's maiden, IF she didn't marry. You might look for bastard records or bonds. Often the county would require the mother to tell who the father was so the county could make sure the father took financial care of that child and it wouldn't end up being cared for by the county. Oh, wouldn't that be great today??LOL
And, there's the possibility his mother married a cousin. My gr gr gr grandparents were first cousins. Their fathers were brothers so she had the same maiden name and same married name.
In an area such as Memphis there's probably a Family History Center near you, too. All FHCs have a library subscription to Ancestry.com and you can use it for free. You can look at just indexes on Ancestry for free at home, then you have a list of what you what to follow up on when you get to the FHC.
Some items are posted on the public portion of Ancestry. My cousin has a personal subscription and found a family group picture of our gr gr grandparents Alexander Fleming Walker and wife Mary Yates. By entering his full name I can view that same photo for free at home. First time I've ever found anything really special on Ancestry. What they do have on my lines I already have, but I've been researching for years. All sites, free and subscription, are growing, some by leaps and bounds. Find a Grave has jumped 2 million more entries in just the last few months.
I'm willing to bet Burwell is a family name somewhere in the tree. If not the mother's then one of the grandmothers.
My gr gr grandfather James Rice named a son James Miller Rice (my gr grdfthr). And sister to James named a son Miller Standefer. I figured there had to be a reason both of them named sons Miller. Turns out it was the maiden name of their mother. With common surnames every little bit helps.LOL
Almost forgot, VA State Library has some records online -- www.lva.virginia.gov/public/using_collections.asp -- Pack a lunch this one will take some time browsing. Some records will be at the state level, such as chancery court records, this takes you directly to them -- http://www.virginiamemory.com/collections/chancery/http://www.virginiamemory.com/collections/chancery/. Those are important to us as that's where arguments over estates were settled. All kinds of names show up in those records. Don't enter names in boxes for Plaintiff or Defendant, but in Surname box. I found a man as the husband of an heir to her father's estate and he wasn't a P or a D. See, everyone in the document was indexed.
Happy Hunting (^_^)