Finding their names, part 2

May 2020

Before we lived through it, I could not have imagined our nation would be in a state of semi-quarantine due to a global pandemic. Nevermind that the public reaction to the killing of George Floyd, a black man from Houston, by a Minneapolis police officer would become such a watershed moment in the worldwide Black Lives Matter movement.

In the weeks after his death, Confederate monuments were removed from public spaces, the effort to rename military bases named for Confederate officers gained momentum, and Juneteenth, a traditional Texas celebration of the belated end of slavery here, was recognized in communities all around the country.

It was in this climate that I decided to return to the document I found the year before.

1865-1874

In the post-Civil War period in Texas, the Powers That Were began enacting untenable laws limiting the rights of the formerly enslaved. When federal Reconstruction got under way, Texas government officials were removed from office. Several tumultuous years followed, marked by political unrest, violence, and a destabilized economy.^[1] Those were among the repercussions of freeing what one newspaper report claimed was $85 million worth of slaves.^[2]

I don’t have any idea how close that is to a “real” number. But to try to put that into some kind of financial perspective, holding $85 million in assets in 1865 is equivalent to nearly $23.8 billion today.^[3]

Staggering.

In 2023, it boggles the mind, this repulsive assignment of a dollar value to human life. Some would have us forget this part of our collective history. So this is the moment when I circle back to the beginning of this story and tell you what I left out two years ago.

10 November 1874

A Justice of the Peace in Richmond, the Fort Bend county seat, met with a husband and wife. Their purpose: to record a list of the 23 people who had once been their “property” and were set free some nine years earlier.^[4]

This was what the list actually looked like, with their names, approximate ages, and values. (Full disclosure: Emma’s name appeared on the bottom of one page and the rest were on a second page. For simplicity and unity, I have combined those images here.)

Recorded list of (formerly) enslaved persons, their ages and values.

The reason the couple chose to record this in 1874 is not stated. Perhaps the tally at the bottom of the list has something to do with it: $18,950, which calculates to nearly $5.3 million in 2023 dollars.^[5]

I did not notice a flurry of similar recordings by other former enslavers, but to be honest I didn’t keep looking. I’ll save the conjecture for another time since I have not thoroughly researched the possibilities. (Perhaps knowlegeable readers can shed some light.)

On the one hand, this filing did not surprise me. Genealogists and historians understand financial records sometimes are the only records available for finding names of African-American forbears prior to the 1870 census.

On the other, this was not a will bequeathing human beings to heirs. This was not a bill of sale. This was an inventory—an inventory recorded more than nine YEARS after Gen. Granger’s General Order No. 3. Nine YEARS after the persons named gained their freedom!

I felt profoundly moved by this list. I saw mothers and fathers. Daughters and sons. Brothers and sisters. Perhaps even a grandmother or two.

And I wanted to do something about it…

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#juneteenth #emancipated #africanamericangenealogy

^[1] “Texas Reconstruction to the 20th Century, Part 1,” Texas Almanac, https://www.texasalmanac.com/articles/texas-reconstruction-to-the-20th-century, accessed July 2023.

^[2] “TEXAS IN A NUTSHELL,” Daily News (Denison, Texas), Vol. 2, No. 211, Ed. 1, 27 October 1874, p. 1; The Portal to Texas History https://texashistory.unt.edu, accessed July 2023.

^[3] MeasuringWorth, https://www.measuringworth.com/dollarvaluetoday/result.php?year=1865&amount=85,000,000&transaction_type=WEALTH, accessed July 2023.

^[4] Fort Bend County, Deed Records, deed book K, 1837-1878, p. 256-257, Family History Library microfilm 007903249, viewed digitally, https://familysearch.org, accessed October 2022.

^[5]MeasuringWorth, https://https://www.measuringworth.com/dollarvaluetoday/result.php?year=1865&amount=18950&transaction_type=WEALTH, accessed July 2023.

Finding their names, part 1

Two years ago today, I shared a list of 23 enslaved persons freed on 19 June 1865 by the issuance of General Order No. 3 in Texas. I meant to write so much more.

I frankly found myself overwhelmed with all the things I wanted to say and the reasons I wanted to say them. So I ultimately decided to simplify. The back story could wait. My thoughts on the momentous racial justice events of the summers of 2020 and 2021 could wait.

It felt a bit like being in the middle of a hurricane—a fitting analogy for an historic event where ground zero was Galveston. I needed to wait the storm out because I did not want these 23 people to get lost in the deluge.

And then life happened, as it does. Because I could not find the time to return to the story of these 23 people in the way I felt they deserved, I stopped blogging completely. I was paralyzed by my desire to do something meaningful. (Insert trope here about perfection being the enemy of the good.) I began working on it again a year ago. And life kept happening.

So I did not want to let yet another Juneteenth pass without picking up their story.

June 1865

A Galveston newspaper published the text of Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger’s pronouncement two days later.^[1]

Maj. Gen. Granger’s General Orders No. 3.

“All slaves are free,” he said. Former masters became “employers.” Formerly enslaved men and women became “hired labor.” “Idleness” would not be tolerated.

“The Freedmen are advised to remain at their present homes, and work for wages.”

July 2019

Halfway through my ProGen Study Group, an intensive preparation program for would-be professional genealogists, I embarked on an assignment to transcribe a deed or a will. I could either use one from my own research or find a new one locally.

I had long been curious about a Sansbury family who lived in Fort Bend County in the 1800s. Fort Bend lies southwest of Houston and encompasses part of the land granted to Moses Austin to help colonize the river valleys in this part of Texas.^[2]

In these pre-Covid 19 days, I spent several hours each Friday volunteering at the Clayton Library Center for Genealogical Research. As a FamilySearch affiliate library, while I was there I could peruse digitized records not available to me at home. So I pulled up some Fort Bend County records and looked through an index under the letter S, hoping to find a document related to the Fort Bend Sansburys.

I did find a document for my assignment. But in the process an entry jumped out at me for a record indexed beginning with the word “Slave” rather than a surname. I downloaded the relevant images and the document landed on my nebulous “to do” list.

To be continued. (I promise it won’t be two years before the next installment!)

#juneteenth #emancipated #africanamericangenealogy

^[1] “General Orders, No. 3,” The Galveston Daily News (Galveston, Texas), 21 June 1865, p. 1, https://newspapers.com, subscription database, accessed June 2022.

^[2] Virginia Laird Ott for the Texas State Historical Association, “Fort Bend County,” Handbook of Texas, https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/fort-bend-county, accessed June 2023.

Say their names

Emma, a woman, 50.

Nicholas, a man, 25.

Collin, a man, 20.

Erexine, a woman, 23.

Louisa, a woman, 18.

Martha, a woman, 16.

Burnell, a boy child, 3.

Caroline, a woman, 28.

Jack, a boy, 12.

Benjamin, a boy, 10.

Armstead, a boy, 4.

Mary, a woman, 45.

Harvey, a man, 20.

Adam, a youth, 18.

Eli, a boy, 16.

Chloe, a girl, 12.

Norah, a woman, 19.

Hester, a child, 3.

Amanda, a woman, 25.

Quibe, a boy, 3.

Major, a man, 30.

Jane, a woman, 30.

Nancy, a girl, 12.

These American women, men, and children enslaved in Fort Bend County, Texas, were among those who gained their freedom 156 years ago today when U.S. Maj. Gen. Gordon Granger issued General Order No. 3 in Galveston informing Texas slaves of their emancipation.

I honor them on today’s first official commemoration of Juneteenth as a federal holiday.

More to come.

#juneteenth #emancipated #africanamericangenealogy

Name’s the same, but Y-DNA shows SC, MD Sansburys not related

When you have an unusual surname, you can’t help but wonder whether you are related to everyone who shares it. In 1840, Ancestry tells me, 25 Sansbury families lived in America, spread out among nine states.¹

State	# of Sansbury families	% in U.S.
South Carolina	8	32
Maryland	4	16
Kentucky	3	12
New Jersey	3	12
Ohio	3	12
Massachusetts	1	4
Missouri	1	4
North Carolina	1	4
Virginia	1	4

In reality, this number is inexact. Alternate spellings may not have been captured. Some households may not have been counted. Still, we are talking about relatively small numbers so the possibility of genetic connections seems possible.

Fifty years earlier, in 1790, the First Census of the United States counted a grand total of 11 Sansbury households:²

State	# of Sansbury families	% in U.S.
Maryland	9	82
South Carolina	1	9
Vermont	1	9

As we stepped back in time, the Sansburys appeared more concentrated in Maryland. Heads of household Thomas, John, Eleanor, Francis, Electious, and Richard all lived in Prince Georges County. Another Richard made his home in Anne Arundel County, a Thomas in Montgomery County, and an Isaac in Charles County.

In South Carolina that year, there was only Daniel, counted in the Cheraws District. His 10-member household included six males under 16, one 16 and over (himself), and three females (no age ranges recorded).³

Daniel served in the Revolution in 1781-82 as a private.⁴ However, his origins have been elusive. A compiled genealogy speculates he came directly from England, possibly Wiltshire, and was not related to the Maryland Sansburys because the name Daniel was uncommon among the Maryland group. Naming patterns, or a lack thereof, can certainly provide clues. However, with no clear documentary trail, how can anyone know for certain Daniel’s line didn’t come through Maryland?

How, indeed?!

Two years ago, I wrote about my father’s first Y-DNA match. Because Y-DNA is only passed down from fathers to sons, this was both a thrill and a huge relief. This fifth cousin of mine descended from Daniel’s son James Sansbury, brother to my ancestor Elias Sansbury.

Last year, the search for an ancestral home for Daniel took a giant leap forward when a Sainsbury researcher in Canada with known roots in Somerset, England, matched both my father and the other descendant of Daniel! We have no idea how many generations back we’ll find a common ancestor, but we know we have a shared Y-DNA contributor I’m hereby dubbing “Adam Sainsbury” sometime after the adoption of patrilineal surnames. Cousin Mike has since determined his Somerset Sainsbury line traces back to Wiltshire.

Now comes a new revelation! A direct male descendant of Richard Sansbury, who arrived in Maryland on the Crown Malaga in 1680, reached out to me via this blog.⁵

He took a Y-DNA test and the exciting results came through this past week! We can definitively say Daniel Sansbury of South Carolina was not related to Richard Sansbury of Maryland! The test-takers on those respective lines belong to different haplogroups (R-M269 vs I-M170) and their STR marker values do not correspond with each other.

In and of itself, this would not prove anything. After all, it would only take one misattributed father on either of the Sansbury lines to ensure a Y-DNA mismatch. Fortunately, though, FamilyTreeDNA processed the Y-DNA results for Richard’s descendant at the same time as the sample from another member of our Sainsbury-Sansbury project who tested to help trace the origins of a known Saintsbury ancestor in England. And they match!

In other words:

South Carolina Sansburys match one English Sainsbury line and this one Maryland Sansbury line matches a completely different English Sainsbury/Saintsbury line!⁶

If it sounds like I’m hedging a little on grouping all of the Maryland Sansburys together, it’s because I am. More testing is definitely needed on these and other similarly named lines to determine whether and how they relate to one another. More breakthroughs await!

Are you a direct male Sansbury/Sainsbury/Saintsbury willing to take a Y-DNA test to contribute to this project? Please get in touch!

#sansbury #sainsbury #genealogy #YDNA #52ancestors

Pandemic of the past

While doing my best to stay home and avoid exposure to the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, I’ve found myself wondering about my ancestors during the Spanish Flu pandemic. The most recent 52 Ancestors prompt is “Newsworthy,” prompting me to seek answers in a local paper serving the county where my Sansbury family lived.

Based on news items in The Southern Star, it appears the Spanish Influenza reached Dale County, Alabama, by October 1918. Schools shut down and public gatherings were discouraged. On 9 October, The Southern Star reported a Liberty Day celebration scheduled for three days later had been canceled.¹

19181009 Southern Star Big Day in Ozark Called Off p5 col5.jpg

The Southern Star, 9 Oct 1918

The following week, a short news item on the front page stated matter-of-factly “… it is th [sic] duty of every one to see that the instructions of the medical profession are carried out.”²

19181016 Southern Star Ozark Spanish Flu p1col5.jpg

The Southern Star, 16 Oct 1918

Interestingly, this shut-down did not appear to last long. (I won’t speculate on how much compliance with medical advice there may have been.) Within a few weeks, schools re-opened. In the newspaper style of the day, the one-sentence announcement without its own headline was buried in a column of local news snippets on page 5.³

19181030 Southern Star Schools Resume p5 col1.jpg

The Southern Star, 30 Oct 1918

Other activities quickly resumed in the community as well.⁴

19181106 Southern Star ban lifted p5 col4.jpg

The Southern Star, 6 Nov 1918

Although the editions printed around that time have scattered mentions of those who had taken ill and those who had recovered. I didn’t find any references to any known family members becoming victim to the Spanish Flu. However, I did rediscover a published letter from a cousin serving in the military. Sgt. Thomas B. Sansbury wrote the letter to his father, J.M.L. Sansbury.⁵ John Moses Leroy Sansbury was my great-grandfather’s older brother, neighbor, and business partner.

World War I had ended, but Thomas remained in France. He discussed some of his activities both before and after the armistice. He also revealed he had taken ill.

“I was in the hospital 14 days with the Spanish Flu last month. I sure don’t want it any more. I am getting along fine now …” – Sgt. Thomas B. Sansbury

So thanks to this letter, I do know at least one of my Sansbury relatives did get sick during the 1918 pandemic — and survived.

19190108 Southern Star Letter from Thomas Sansbury to JML p6 cols5-6 copy.jpg

The Southern Star, 8 Jan 1919

Please take precautions for yourself and those around you. Stay safe, everyone!

Did you have any relatives who contracted the Spanish Flu? Did it make the news? Please share your story in the comments!

#52Ancestors #genealogy #newsworthy #SpanishFlu #MaskUp

Serendipity at the cemetery

The best walks through cemeteries are the aimless ones, wandering the rows out of pure curiosity. Taking a random right here or an arbitrary left there can lead to intriguing discoveries that more than once have left me wondering whether I was being reeled in by a decedent hungry for a visitor.

During my most recent trip to Dale County, Alabama, I paid a visit to Union Cemetery, also known as the City Cemetery, in Ozark. I knew some of my Sansbury ancestors were buried there and I wanted to photograph their gravestones. I had last visited probably 20 years earlier, but had no real recollection of where to find them.

I had barely stepped foot in the cemetery when I found myself looking at the graves of James Carroll and his wife, Pennie, my 3X great grandparents on a different line! My old car (RIP) is clearly visible in my photo of this Carroll plot I wasn’t looking for.

20170801 AL_Ozark_UnionCemetery - 2 Carroll_James-Pennie 6x4 300ppi copy

I found the plot where my great-great-great grandparents James and Pennie Carroll were buried as soon I started walking through Union Cemetery.¹

Next I found those Sansburys I WAS looking for, and then, near them, my Matthewses. But this story isn’t about them.

Clearly this had not been a well-planned visit to this cemetery or I might have known how many ancestors I would find there. I felt a little euphoric, which may sound highly relatable to fellow genealogists and a little creepy to some other readers.

I had a little more time on my hands, so the wandering began. I walked the perimeter of the cemetery until I reached an adjacent one called Morning View Cemetery. I was tempted to explore it as well, but the hot sun had risen high in the sky. I decided to make my way back. Rather than returning the way I’d come, I headed toward my car on a somewhat diagonal route.

About halfway back, I felt a little tug, as if someone had whispered “Hey! Over here!” which gently led me away from my path. Several yards to my left, I noticed the name “Byrd” on a grave marker along the fence line. As my readers may recall, this was my paternal grandmother’s maiden name and my Byrd family was a huge one. However, I knew my direct Byrd ancestors were not in this cemetery, so I wasn’t expecting to find anyone with a familiar name. Still, I drew closer.

20170801 AL_Ozark_UnionCemetery - 154 BYRD_WF and Sallie Mae copy

This Byrd plot along the fence line reeled me in.²

I saw a flat stone engraved with “Walter Franklin Byrd” and couldn’t quite place the name. He was definitely not in my grandmother’s immediate Byrd family. Then I read his wife’s stone: “Sallie Mae Byrd.”

: Sallie Mae Brown Byrd³

I started to laugh, which I realize may sound a little indecorous given the setting. But it was the laugh of someone appreciating a serendipitous moment.

I knew exactly who she was! I didn’t know her as a Byrd; to me, she was a Brown. And she wasn’t my grandmother’s relative at all, she was my grandfather’s aunt!

She died when I was about 4 years old, so I have no memories of her.⁴ I don’t know whether I ever met her, although there’s a decent chance I did. Although I don’t recall any particular stories, I remember often hearing both of my grandparents refer to “Aunt Sallie Mae.”

20170801 AL_Ozark_Union Cemetery Byrd_WF-Sallie Mae IMG_0794 edit 6x4 300ppi copy2

I stumbled on the resting place of Aunt Sallie Mae and her husband, Walter Franklin Byrd.⁵

Sallie Mae was the youngest child of Stephen Commodore Decatur Brown and his wife Selathia Mozetta Townsend “Townie” Matthews.⁶ My great-grandmother, Myrtle “Mertie” Brown, was nearly 15 years old when her baby sister Sallie Mae was born in 1902.⁷

Sansbury_Mertie sisters Sallie Mae and Mabel crop 300ppi copy

Sisters Sallie Mae Brown Byrd, Mabel Brown Pierce, and Mertie Brown Sansbury.⁸

A few newspaper articles reveal some key moments in her life. Sallie Mae received her teaching certificate in 1923—along with her sister-in-law Verna Brown—and taught second grade in Daleville.⁹

19230829 Southern Star New Teachers Sallie Mae Brown p7col7

The Southern Star, 29 August 1923

Just a few short months later, she married Walter Byrd.¹⁰

19240102 Southern Star Brown-Byrd marriage p5col6

The Southern Star, 2 January 1924

Sadly, Walter died in 1944 at age 46.¹¹

19440406 Southern Star Funeral for Walter Byrd p1col7

The Southern Star, 6 April 1944

No children were mentioned in Walter’s obituary and to my knowledge, Sallie Mae had none. But she took an interest in those close to her. When my great-grandmother Mertie Brown Sansbury died in 1952, her three children had young children of their own. One of my cousins described Aunt Sallie Mae as “an absolute angel.”¹²

“Having missed out on knowing our maternal grandmother, she stepped into that role for us. When we found ourselves in need, she was there,” this cousin wrote. “She visited often, especially at Christmas. We loved her dearly.”¹³

Another relative, who descends from one of Sallie Mae and Mertie’s brothers, provided a copy of Aunt Sallie Mae’s will, which had been filed among his grandfather’s papers. Although I do not know whether this was the final such document, it showed she had made provisions for her “beloved” Sansbury niece and nephews at the time.¹⁴

: A young Sallie Mae Brown¹⁵

Because she has no descendants, it’s very likely she gets few visitors. Sure, someone came in 2005 and photographed her headstone for her Find A Grave memorial page, but that’s not the same as a visit from family. I like to think she called me over that day in the cemetery so she could meet her great-great niece. I spent a few minutes chatting with her before I went on my way. Next time I’m there, I will make a point to drop by.

My cousin with fond memories of Aunt Sallie Mae sent several pictures of her at different ages. I love the photo of her in a white sailor dress, smiling as she leans against a fence under a tree on a sunny day. I can easily imagine her laughing and calling out to a wandering passerby, “Hey! Over here!”

Have you been reeled in by a relative at a cemetery? Please tell me your story in the comments!

#52Ancestors #genealogy #cemeteryserendipity

Please, go do your census

The U.S. Census Bureau has mailed multiple reminders to respond to the 2020 census. (Photo illustration by JenGenX)

One of the cheesy jokes in the genealogy world goes something like this: “Eventually, all genealogists come to their census.” You can find it on memes, T-shirts, coffee mugs, key chains, you get the idea.

A long wait

Taken quite literally, however, I won’t come to my census for quite some time. After all, it’ll be 72 years from my first enumeration in a census before it becomes a publicly accessible record.¹ I’ll be almost 81 years old when the release of the 1980 census rolls around in the year 2052. With any luck, I’ll still be around to see my own entry.

Anyone researching yours truly will be able to learn my address, gender, race and whether I am of Hispanic descent, the highest grade of school I had attended, and something of utmost importance to future genealogists: who I lived with at the time and our relationships to one another.² If the household in which I lived was selected to complete a long form survey instead of the short form, there would be a slew of additional and more interesting facts about us.

This hypothetical researcher 32 years from now also will be able to glean from the 1980 census housing questions whether my family rented or owned, entered our abode via an exterior door or an interior entry way, and had indoor plumbing and a flushable toilet.³I suppose this might be of some interest, in the same way I am intrigued by the column in the 1930 census that reveals whether a household had a radio set. (Some of my great-grandparents did, but some did not.)

Decennial documentation

Genealogists count censuses among their first go-to records when researching ancestors and recreating families. These snapshots every ten years enable us to scaffold their lives and provide clues to help us fill in the intervening time. Where did they live? Where did they live five years earlier? How long had they been married? What kind of work did they do? I’m sure I’m not alone in having solved a little family mystery thanks to the 1900 and 1910 census questions asking women how many children they’d had and how many were still living.

So I felt a great responsibility when I sat down on 1 April 2020 to make sure everyone living in my home was accurately counted and described because the census provides a rare opportunity to leave breadcrumbs for posterity, not to mention the chance to impact the distribution of political and social benefits for millions of Americans.

Having full participation in the census is vitally important because the results will be used to apportion and draw boundaries for political districts for Congress, the state legislature, and other local jurisdictions with elected representation. The data also drives government spending on everything from human services to infrastructure. Your favorite chain restaurant may use it to determine whether to open a new location near you.

As of Wednesday, the most recent date for which information is available, the national self-response rate was only 51.8 percent.⁴ If you haven’t responded yet, you still have plenty of time to do it on your own before a census worker comes knocking on your door. Thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, the deadline has been extended to Oct. 31.⁵ Since most of us are living in a state of semi-quarantine right now, why not take a little time to make sure your household is included? If you don’t have your mailings handy, you can respond online or by phone.⁶

Simply disappointing

I had followed the news enough to know that, after much controversy, the government wasn’t going to be inquiring about my immigration and/or citizenship status, or that of anyone in my household. But beyond that, I’ll confess, I didn’t know what to expect on this year’s questionnaire.

From a genealogical perspective, it felt like a big let-down.

In a nutshell, the census asked who lives in my home, whether we rent or own (and whether we have a mortgage), gender, race and ethnic origins. When it came to relationships among the members of the household, the online form offered inadequate choices for our living situation, offering four different ways of identifying my life partner but forcing me to categorize my nieces as “other relatives.” In a digital world, the inability to allow me to be more specific about a very common and close relationship is mind-boggling and disappointing.

There are no questions about our occupations or even the industries in which we work. Marital status is only addressed in relation to the person filling out the form. The census doesn’t even ask whether other adults in the home are single, married, divorced, or widowed. Future genealogists will still have plenty of digging to do.

The only customizable fill-in-the-blank is for race, where I could select White, Black or African American, American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian, Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander and then elaborate on those origins. At last, an opportunity to drop some breadcrumbs! At least our DNA test results came in handy!

Reality check

Don’t let my bellyaching dissuade you. What governmental entities use the data for over the next decade or so is far more important. So please, go do your census!

Ultimately, I realize, how genealogists will use the personal data from this year’s census in the year 2092 doesn’t affect me. But 70 years ago, our great-grandparents, grandparents, and/or parents (depending on your age and family) completed the 1950 census and that information will be released less than two years from now. Now that’s something I can look forward to!

Have you filled out your census yet?

#genealogy #census #shapeyourfuture

Sources

1. “The ’72-Year Rule’,” United States Census Bureau (https://www.census.gov/history/www/genealogy/decennial_census_records/the_72_year_rule_1.html : accessed 13 April 2020).

2. “1980 (Population),” Index of Questions, U.S. Census Bureau (https://www.census.gov/history/www/through_the_decades/index_of_questions/1980_population.html : accessed 13 April 2020).

3. “1980 (Housing),” Index of Questions, U.S. Census Bureau (https://www.census.gov/history/www/through_the_decades/index_of_questions/1980_housing.html : accessed 13 April 2020).

4. “2020 Census Self-Response Rates,” U.S. Census Bureau (https://2020census.gov/en/response-rates.html : accessed 23 April 2020).

5. “U.S. Department of Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and U.S. Census Bureau Director Stephen Dillingham Statement on 2020 Census Operational Adjustments Due to COVID-19,” released 13 April 2020, (https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2020/statement-covid-19-2020.html : accessed 22 April 2020).

6. “How To Respond,” U.S. Census Bureau, (https://2020census.gov/en/ways-to-respond.html : accessed 24 April 2020).

A Sansbury snapshot

It’s hard to believe it’s been almost 11 months since my last post. I certainly never intended for my blog to go dormant, but as many genealogists know, life happens. I hope to spend more time blogging in 2020. In that spirit, I want to pick up the #52Ancestors challenge again. The theme for the first week of January was “Fresh Start” and for this week it’s “Favorite Photo.” So I’m hereby rolling them into one.

I don’t know that I could ever pick just ONE favorite photo, but today I’ve chosen one of my favorite pictures of my paternal grandfather, George Ivan Sansbury. He died 27 years ago today.

As I mentioned in a previous post (“Election recollection”), he served as a military policeman in the U.S. Army during WWII. He was stationed in Korea and assigned to drive a general around. In this picture, I think he looks quite dapper posing with his vehicle!

George Ivan Sansbury served in Korea during WWII.

Grandpa has been on my mind a lot lately because my Sansbury search has gained traction in an interesting way. Here’s the very short version of the story: a Canadian researcher working on his Sainsbury line reached out to me. I encouraged him to consider Y-DNA testing and … BAM! My father got his first close Y-DNA match who did NOT descend from Revolutionary War patriot Daniel Sansbury!

Cousin Mike writes about his research on his blog, The Mystery of Richard Sainsbury. His ancestors hail from Somerset, England, so there’s a good chance my peeps came from the same region. Through a combination of autosomal DNA and Y-DNA and genealogical research, connections are being made between different clusters of Sainsbury/Sansbury descendants. So stay tuned!

If you have landed on this page because you are a Sansbury or a Sainsbury (or some other variant spelling), please get in touch! Also consider joining us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/Sansbury.Sainsbury/

#Sansbury #Sainsbury #genealogy #52ancestors

‘My spice in life’

Not surprisingly, this week’s 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks theme is “Love” and today is Valentine’s Day. So it seems a perfect time to write about my maternal grandparents and a Mother’s Day long ago.

: Joyce Walker and Warren Tinseth cut their wedding cake, 1952.

It was Sunday morning, 11 May 1975. I imagine my maternal grandfather, Warren Tinseth, waking up at “oh dark thirty” to start a pot of coffee. My grandmother, Joyce, loved her coffee. While the rest of the house slept, Warren held open the front door at 628 Infantry Post Road on Fort Sam Houston for Bowser to run outside to do his business. He stood on the wooden front porch, letting the screen doors shut behind him as he perused the neighborhood and made sure the dog didn’t wander too far off.

Warren took a few steps down to the sidewalk to pick up that day’s edition of the San Antonio Express-News, whistled for the dog and went back inside.

He had plenty of quiet time to read the paper. The kids wouldn’t wake for hours. On any other Sunday, he might skim the headlines on the front of each section and then start reading the one with the most interesting news.

But not this morning. Before he settled into his reading routine, there was something he had to find.

The front page screamed “CIA spy network found in U.S. firms,” but he wasn’t interested in that just yet. The top of the B section had a picture of a custom car with a bunk bed for a roof. Page 1-C had an odd mix of photos of a Silkie terrier dressed in unusual duds, a story from England about motorcycle-riding vicars, and a report from Havana about the state of Fidel Castro’s Cuban Revolution. He moved on.

Then he reached the D section. The nameplate at the top read “The Golden Twins” and underneath was the slogan “Largest classified and real estate section in South Texas for more than 100 years.” He wasn’t in the market for a house or a job. Army quarters served just fine for now and the career helicopter pilot wasn’t quite ready to retire.

He flipped past articles about new developments, floor plans for new apartment complexes, and advertisements for condos and houses touting tax credits and financing deals. Finally, on page 7, he found Category 110 of the classifieds, the Special Notices. The top left quarter of the page sported the headline “Mother’s Day Messages.” He started skimming.

Some of the little ads were as short as one line: “GAYLE I Love You Mommy! Holly.” Some were an inch tall. He quickly realized all the messages were alphabetized by the first word and his eyes skimmed for the J’s.

There it was in the middle column, sixth message down. Just as he had written it:

Mothers_Day_message_to_Joyce_from_Warren SAEN 11 May 1975

My grandfather’s Mother’s Day message to my grandmother.

“Joyce Carol Tinseth; Mother, Sweetheart, Lover, Wife. You have been my spice in life, Warren.”¹

Satisfied, he took a sip of coffee and pondered his next step. Should he put the newspaper back together again and see if she’ll find it? Or should he leave this public declaration of love out for her to see?

I imagine he settled on the latter, folding the paper just so, ensuring the special section couldn’t be missed. Maybe he even took a pen and circled it, then set it in on the table in front of her usual seat.

Mother’s Day Messages in the classified section of the San Antonio Express-News, 11 May 1975.

As he went back to his routine and started reading the paper, she shuffled into the kitchen, making a beeline for the coffee pot. He played it cool, trying not to grin. She poured her cup—no cream, no sugar, always black—and made her way to the table.

“What’s this?” she asked, setting down her cup.

He stood up, wrapped his arms around her, and planted a big kiss. “Happy Mother’s Day, JC!”

“Oh, Warren!” she replied, and kissed him back.

TINSETH_Joyce and Warren Infantry Post house edit crop

Joyce and Warren Tinseth at Fort Sam Houston, mid-1970s.

Of course this is a completely fictionalized account of that morning, but imagining it makes me smile. Growing up, I never doubted my grandparents’ love for each other. They found each other as teenagers and stayed together their whole lives. The benefit of having young grandparents is I had them in mine for many years.

They didn’t leave a treasure trove of old love letters—at least not that I know of—but Grandpa said so much about their relationship in those three short lines.

I ran across this classified ad last year and wanted to write about it for their anniversary but didn’t have a chance. When doing newspaper searches, whether online, on microforms, or hard copies, we often look for obituaries, wedding announcements, birth notices, and, of course, news articles. But we shouldn’t forget that we also can find rich, personal genealogical gems in the classifieds!

Have you ever found an ancestor in a classified ad? What did you learn? I’d love to hear about it!

#52ancestors #genealogy

Sources

1. “Joyce Carol Tinseth,” Mother’s Day Messages, San Antonio Express-News (San Antonio, Texas), 11 May 1975, Newspapers.com (http://newspapers.com: accessed February 2019), page 7-D, col 3, item 6.

‘Scrapbook on steroids’

This week’s #52Ancestors prompt, “At the Library,” gives me a chance to write about something wild that happened in the summer of 2017.

I had spent a week in Athens, Georgia, at the fabulous Institute of Genealogy and Historical Research (IGHR) taking a beginning DNA class. Afterward, I stayed with friends in Atlanta for a few days. My next stop before driving home to Texas was LA, as in Lower Alabama—Enterprise, in particular, to visit with a cousin and do a little research on my paternal lines.

The drive would take several hours and I had queued up all the episodes of the short-lived genealogy podcast “Twice Removed.” Sometime after I’d exited I-85 and turned south on U.S. Highway 231, Episode 2 started. Host A.J. Jacobs was featuring Ted Allen, host of “Chopped” on the Food Network.

Jacobs began the journey through Allen’s ancestry with his great-great grandfather, a Confederate soldier named Thomas Andrew Byrd. Allen recalled that a photo of him had hung in his grandparents’ home.

I found it interesting because Byrd was my paternal grandmother’s maiden name. The fifth of 10 children, Virginia Byrd Sansbury came from a close-knit Byrd family. I credit her and her oldest sister, Maud Byrd Windham, with kindling my interest in genealogy at a very young age. When I was about 7, Grandma proudly showed me a huge new book called “Byrd History and Related Families of Averett, Calloway, Chancey and Goff.” The book traces the descendants of Redding Byrd and Bright Byrd, two brothers (sons of Richard Byrd) who migrated to southeast Alabama from North Carolina. The author, Tera Byrd Averett, descended from Bright. “Our Byrds” descended from his older brother, Redding. Although she wasn’t credited on the cover as an author, the research of the Redding line in the book was a labor of love for Aunt Maud.¹

The Byrd book

The book features pages upon pages of newspaper clippings and photographs as well as birth, marriage and death information for what must be thousands of Byrd descendants.

I was in awe.

And then Grandma showed me page 103 and blew my mind.

My NAME.

Was IN.

A BOOK!

An ACTUAL book! And a BIG book at that, with a hard, black cover. In my eyes, it looked like a very important book. Seven-year-old me naturally concluded this must have meant I belong to a very important family.

Eventually, Grandma gave me my very own copy, which remains my most treasured book. I pressed flowers in it after my Sweet Sixteen. I’ve used it to flatten curled old photographs. It’s full of sticky notes and scraps of paper. I started my genealogical journey with it.

The author’s 3X great-grandfather Curtis Byrd and his wife, Elizabeth Harper, are pictured at the top left of p. 658. A photo of their headstones appears on the bottom of the page.

But I digress.

So there I am driving down 231 to visit a Byrd cousin, listening to this podcast, when I hear A.J. Jacobs say:²

So Ted it turns out there’s this really amazing resource about your family. It’s an obscure book that chronicles the life of your ancestors. There’s only one copy in New York. So we went and found it.

The audio shifted to an on-location recording.

Here we are in the Milstein Division of the New York Public Library, surrounded by thousands of obscure books, and we’ve got one of the most obscure right here in front of us, Byrd History and Related Families of Averett, Calloway, Chancey, and Gough, by Tara Byrd Averett, Enterprise, Alabama.

THAT’S MY BOOK!!! I screamed and I screamed and I slapped the dashboard and I finally had the good sense to pull over. My heart raced and I just sat there trying to get my head around the moment:

I was driving home from a genealogy institute and a genealogy podcast was citing the book that inspired me to become a genealogist.

WHAT?!

Once I calmed down, I continued listening. The audio and the entire transcript can be found on the Gimlet Media site. Here’s what came next:

Now the first thing I should say is that this book is massive.

(Loud thud)

AJ: That’s a good thud.
Ted: I thought you’d been shot. (laughs)
(laughs)

AJ: No, that was the actual thud.
Mm.

Now Ted, this book is more than 900 pages. It’s basically a scrapbook on steroids, and there are newspaper clippings about your family going back centuries.

Ted: Well I’m flabbergasted. I had no idea about that. [laughs] I wonder if my mom knows.

AJ: Let me take a picture of that

So this book, this massive tome was compiled by a distant relative of yours named Tara Byrd Averett, and amidst the hundreds of Byrds, hundreds of pages, on page 542, we found lots of stuff about your great-great-grandfather,

Ted: Thomas.

AJ: Right.

When I arrived at my cousin’s house, I found the podcast online and played it for her. She got just as excited as I had and then pulled out the copy of the Byrd book that had belonged to her father, my great-uncle.

She looked up Thomas Andrew Byrd—and darned if he wasn’t HIGHLIGHTED! (But there was no obvious indication why her father had been interested in him.)

It turns out Thomas Andrew was the grandson of Redding Byrd through his son Benjamin Bertis.³ I am descended through Redding’s son Curtis. It appears Ted and I are fifth cousins. (Hi Cuz!)

Fortunately for any other Redding or Bright Byrd descendants who might want to see what the fabulous Byrd book might have to say about their specific line, WorldCat.org shows there are copies in about 100 libraries all over the U.S. It is, indeed, a “scrapbook on steroids” and well worth the time to track it down.

#52ancestors #genealogy

Sources

1. Tera Byrd Averett, “Byrd History and Related Families of Averett, Callaway, Chancey and Goff,” Enterprise, Alabama: Wiregrass Printing Company, 1978, p. 93.
2. Twice Removed, “#2: Ted Allen,” https://www.gimletmedia.com/twiceremoved/2-ted-allen : accessed 3 February 2019.
3. Averett, p. 116.

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