The Family Tree Problem Solver: Tried-And-True Tactics for Tracing Elusive Ancestors by Marsha Hoffman Rising Read Free Book Online

Detroit, Mich. 48266, no date.)
    2. Forbes, Harriet.
New England Diaries 1602–1800
. (Topsfield, Mass.: published by the author, no date.) Available at the Family History Library.
    3. Matthews, William.
American Diaries: An Annotated Bibliography of American Diaries Written Prior to the Year 1861
. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1945.) Diaries are listed alphabetically under the year the first diary entry occurs.

    Figure 2-1 Postcard announcing Justus Cobb's death.
    4. Matthews, William.
American Diaries in Manuscript 1580–1954
. (Athens, Ga.: University of Georgia Press, 1974.) Over 6,000 items of published and unpublished diaries from 350 libraries.
    The National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections (NUCMC) also contains many references to diaries and can be found in print at most large and university libraries. It is a gold mine of information on various unpublished works and where they are available. It is also available online through a subscription service, Archives USA, to which many libraries subscribe.
Tombstones
    The next most common substitute for a birth or death record is the date recorded on the tombstone. When you use such dates as corroboration, be sure you indicate that the source is the tombstone. The individual who was buried there probably did not order the tombstone, nor did he supervise the carving.
    There is a common sequence for purchasing a tombstone and a number of things can go wrong in the process.
The memory of the individual ordering the stone may not be accurate.
That individual may not transmit the information accurately.
The individual receiving the information from the purchaser may not record it accurately.
The individual producing the stone may not accurately carve the information transmitted to him.
The stone may not be preserved well enough to allow an accurate reading. Watch out for this problem particularly when you are reading a transcription of the dates rather than looking at the stone itself.

    Figure 2-2 Picture of Fleener tombstone.
    A tombstone I found clearly reads, “Sarah S. dau. of W. & S.A. Fleener born Aug. 24, 1885, died Aug. 5, 1867” (see Figure 2-2 ).
    As it is obvious the stone is wrong, the genealogist must analyze what the dates
should
be and try to find other records that support or contradict those guesses. Perhaps the birth date is wrong and should be 1865. Perhaps the death date should be 1887. Perhaps the birth and death dates were reversed, and Sarah was born in 1867 and died in 1885. What other records could help us to determine which date is correct? The census is our first stop and here, we luck out. Sarah does not appear on the 1870 census with her parents and there is a space between Lydia, age seven, and William, age two. It fits that the birth year could have been 1865 and Sarah did not live to be in the 1870 census.
Church Records
    The records maintained in many churches are another common alternative for both birth and death records. It seems that clergymen were more prone to record baptisms than births, probably to ensure that the newborn babe would be prepared for heaven if premature death should occur. Churches that have particularly good vital registration records include Quaker, Lutheran, Dutch Reformed, Catholic, Episcopalian, and Presbyterian congregations. A tremendous array of religious denominations and sects exist in the United States and their records are usually more difficult to locate here than they may be in European countries, where only one or two denominations are common.
The Source: A Guidebook of American Genealogy
edited by Loretto Dennis Szucs and Sandra Hargreaves Luebking, rev. ed (Salt Lake City: Ancestry, Inc., 1997) provides some suggestions on where to begin your search for the records of specific denominations. Too often we assume these records don't exist because they have not been published or microfilmed.
    It is always worth checking for records at the church, library, and historical society in the