Mixture of Thoughts

After having a class on finding death certificates and such I find myself feeling a little despondent, I am not sure why I feel this way.  I have found many death certificates online and am comfortable finding them but the ones I really want to see or find are the ones that are missing.  I find myself also having to write to England for copies of some records which is not to appealing but necessary.  Along with that the time that it takes to do this work and search out the missing pieces, I referenced it as a treasure hunt earlier today and that it truly is, a grand treasure hunt.  But as the time I have now grows short I wrap up this post as one that is more gloomy than others but at the same time one that is needed to show that there are not always rainbows at the end of everyday.

Another day, another marriage in England found

After posting my help wanted rant (help is still wanted) I have had a bit of good luck, hard luck but luck none the less.  For  a quick history of what I mean by hard luck is that in England there are parishes, who unto 1837ish kept records of all that went on for the Church of England.  By doing this they have a stash of vital stats that are indexed online.  Here is where the hard comes into play.  One, the best way to find these stats is by using Ancestry.com (fee website) or Family History Centers (most commonly the one in Utah) or two, go to England and spend a summer backpacking around to each of the suspected parishes and delve deep into their archives and gamble that you might actually find something.  But I, after many long hard hours, (not really many) have found a marriage register for George Charles Parsons and Martha Maria Syphus, my (I am checking to make sure this is accurate) third great grandparents who were married in England, the Pancras Parish.  Imaging Hyde Park in London and go west a ways.  Knowing this information I can now send off to England and for 15 pounds they will send me a copy of the certificate, that is pretty cool.  I am hoping from this I will be able to get a birth record for Sylvanus Walter or Walter Sylvanus, depending on the record being looked at or how he decided to spell his name.  All of this aside, it has been a very good few days and is looking better at every turn.

HELP!!!!

After talking to my cousin Dan tonight on the phone I am asking for help, this is a plea. If anybody who glances over this has any information on the Parsons family who traveled from England to Salt Lake please, please let me know. It is a hope of ours to make as accurate record as possible about our family. The members are we are looking for are Walter Sylvanus (Sylvanus Walter), Lucy Parsons, George Charles, William Benjamin, Emily Parsons or Walter Franklin. Most of the people listed were born in Utah. I have searched various records but I am searching for the fate of Walter and Lucy in Salt Lake or anywhere else they may have been. Any help in this matter will be good help. Thanks.

GOLD MINE!!!!

It is one of those nights.  I started looking for some information on my work line and was striking out at every turn, not a good feeling to have.  As I was searching I felt I should look at some information on the Perpetual Fund for Emigrants.  The reason for this is on my Parsons line they are thought to have come to America through that.  The document I found listed no Parsons but Thirza Long Syphus who emigrated when she was 25 years old.  But the gold mine is this, from that I was able to find a lot of information on Mathew Syphus and Mary Long, my fourth Great Grandparents who are converts to the Church.  (I had a picture of them but it is not working to well getting it moved over from the site or word document.)  From the research I found I was able to see immigration records, census dates, birth dates and also church records.  I find it so very amazing how whenever I start getting discouraged searching I am able to be prompted to a place or a line and find so much good information.  I know that they are connecting with me as I connect with them.  I hope to find out more as I go along.  One last thing is that the ships that were used to come to America where the Java, Nevada and Idaho, I find it funny that it was these ships at different times since most of the family went to, lives in or likes these three things.  If there is anything I am missing or have wrong I hope to find out so I can correct it and have the best information possible online or on my tree.  

New Challenge

As the new semester begins here in good ol' Rexburg I find myself in my advanced family research class.  This is a class that I have decided to take to further my search for my ancestors.  With this opportunity to further my knowledge of select ancestors I am finding myself drawn to my Great-Great Grandfather Walter Sylvanus Parsons.  Walter is from England and traveled from there across the ocean on the ship Nevada to New York.  From New York he proceeded to Salt Lake City, Utah.  Here is where it gets interesting.  On the travel to Utah he had a wife, Lucy Ling, and three children, while in Utah he had four other children.  Sometime around 1890 the children found themselves in an orphanage and the parents gone, this is the mystery, Where did the parents go?  Why the orphanage?  And what role does Walters mom have in all of this?  Hopefully I can find answers to these questions as my research and skills progress, wish me luck.  

The Reverand Addison Murdoch Lewis

What a night it has been!! This is the most luck I have had searching for my ancestors that I have had in a long long long time. I was home from Church and wanting to tinker around on my family lines so I decided to go to my old friend Google and see what would happen. Well the results at first were frustrating but after a while I had the feeling to look at another line and to go to new.familyseach.com and look there, that is where it all happened. I was able to fine the Reverand Addison Murdoch Lewis and some letters that he wrote to a doctor while in Missouri about his wife's sickness. It was very rewarding to find this tid-bit of information. It is quite a feeling to see your ancestors own writing in any form. It was a very good night researching. Apart from this I was able to go way back on that line and wind up in the 1300's, Welsh names are interesting and also very hard to research, let alone verify. So after a couple of days or attempts at searching I am now able to say I got something done, a very good feeling.