A Collection of Thoughts
Aug. 22nd, 2006 10:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ellyssianWell, I've still just got a toe in the water, entering in all the data from my dad's collection and from Duffy's document, but I'm already trying to probe the Great Mystery for me - and that's to follow the Warren surname back a lot further than the late 1700s where I'm currently stuck.
My first salvo in that direction - well, third or fourth, really - is to fire off an e-mail to the maintainer of a page I found that documents some Warren folks from about 1485 to the early 1700s, which stops just shy of where I need to be. This branch of Warrens, related or not, actually holds a ton of interest for me - you see, these guys owned much of the town I grew up in. I'm talking a selectman from 1636-1640 (Watertown was founded in 1630,) another was granted 290 acres by the town (the town is only 2 miles by 4 miles - about 512 acres!) Anyway, with this I'm just looking to see if the list of descendants can be followed out another one or two hundred years, and if so, discover if any connection can be made.
The Peter Obid thing is really eating at me. He was 9 when President Washington ordered the first census - and full families weren't listed until 1850, by which time he was 16 years away from his death - I highly doubt his father was around so they both show up on the list.
So great aunt of my dad recalls her uncle recollecting that Peter O's father was Obediah. That's tenuous right there.
My own memories from what my dad told me - wife of Mercy Blood and all records lost in a fire in upstate NY - are just that; I haven't found documentation providing either point of information. Of course, I also haven't read through umpteen letters in the Warren folder, or any others - still doing raw data entry, just copying the basics to build the tree.
I can find a reference to a soldier named Obed Warren, married to Mary Blood. The birthdates given there coincide with the information on Mercy Blood and her spouse Obed - and that info does provide a parentage in the form of Jacob and Elizabeth (Cooper) Warren. I count the contact with Dixie Blood and the gathering of Blood family info my first foray into all this, back in the mid-1990s, while my dad was stumped and moved on to other related lines.
The second round was discovering the Watertown Warren info, and the third was finding more information on the descendants of Obed and Mercy - the dates and parentage agree with the earlier Blood family data, but actually include a generation or two beyond that - but no Peter Obid. There is, however, another Obed, but he is listed as an only child.
Now, with names being somewhat liquid, it could be that Obediah = Obed, and with records in disarray (not to mention flames,) it could be that Obed Jr. (b.1760) is the older brother of Peter Obid (b 1782) or even - given a 22 years gets Obed Jr. well into breeding age, that Peter O. is actually Obed Jrs son by an unknown first wife. My otherwise brilliant momentary theory that Delight (Frary,) listed as Obed Jrs wife, gave birth to Peter O. was shot down when I realized she was 6 years younger than Peter O., which is, even for that day, a bit young to have kids.
All that still leaves me with a whole lot of nowhere. Pure speculation.
Once I get a handle on the raw information I already have available to me, I think a visit to DC or NYC or Waltham or Philly might be in order - I really need to go over the first 3 census schedules, particularly for MA and NY, if not looking in VT and CT, just in case.
Another mystery on top of all that, is that the same source that I have the Obed-Mary info has the lists of heads of households for all the Warrens in the country - with several southern states records lost to the fires set by the British in the War of 1812. There is no Obediah - or even the Obed in the MA branch of the army - in the census, except for one down in NC. To the best of my knowledge, my grandfather was the first in the family line to head down south - all the rest live and die in MI, PA, and NY (mostly.) I'll need to take a look at the 1790 records myself, just to verify; and then if I can't find Obediah in NY in the 1800 or 1810 census, I'm going to be highly suspicious. It may just be that Peter O.'s dad is anyone but an Obediah.
Gah. Where's a time machine when you need one? Probably all stuck in a traffic jam at some really cool moment.
At least I still have my 23 generation descent which takes me back into Merrie Auld England (posted this past Sunday, for those who don't read LJ on weekends.) And that doesn't even touch the White --> Bowen family line, which lists a Bryn Myr, King of the Britons as the first descendant. Okay, it doesn't quite, I'm being a bit silly. His name was actually Beli Mawr, King of Britain, 100 BC.
~ ~ ~
In other news, and by way of explanation of the mood, I had a close encounter with a beautiful red tailed hawk this morning - she flew alongside me, making eye contact all the way along the fields, until the tree line approached, and then she cut behind me and soared nearly straight up into the air. Part of me flew up into the sky with her, the other part showed up here at work and wrote a poem about it. =)
My first salvo in that direction - well, third or fourth, really - is to fire off an e-mail to the maintainer of a page I found that documents some Warren folks from about 1485 to the early 1700s, which stops just shy of where I need to be. This branch of Warrens, related or not, actually holds a ton of interest for me - you see, these guys owned much of the town I grew up in. I'm talking a selectman from 1636-1640 (Watertown was founded in 1630,) another was granted 290 acres by the town (the town is only 2 miles by 4 miles - about 512 acres!) Anyway, with this I'm just looking to see if the list of descendants can be followed out another one or two hundred years, and if so, discover if any connection can be made.
The Peter Obid thing is really eating at me. He was 9 when President Washington ordered the first census - and full families weren't listed until 1850, by which time he was 16 years away from his death - I highly doubt his father was around so they both show up on the list.
So great aunt of my dad recalls her uncle recollecting that Peter O's father was Obediah. That's tenuous right there.
My own memories from what my dad told me - wife of Mercy Blood and all records lost in a fire in upstate NY - are just that; I haven't found documentation providing either point of information. Of course, I also haven't read through umpteen letters in the Warren folder, or any others - still doing raw data entry, just copying the basics to build the tree.
I can find a reference to a soldier named Obed Warren, married to Mary Blood. The birthdates given there coincide with the information on Mercy Blood and her spouse Obed - and that info does provide a parentage in the form of Jacob and Elizabeth (Cooper) Warren. I count the contact with Dixie Blood and the gathering of Blood family info my first foray into all this, back in the mid-1990s, while my dad was stumped and moved on to other related lines.
The second round was discovering the Watertown Warren info, and the third was finding more information on the descendants of Obed and Mercy - the dates and parentage agree with the earlier Blood family data, but actually include a generation or two beyond that - but no Peter Obid. There is, however, another Obed, but he is listed as an only child.
Now, with names being somewhat liquid, it could be that Obediah = Obed, and with records in disarray (not to mention flames,) it could be that Obed Jr. (b.1760) is the older brother of Peter Obid (b 1782) or even - given a 22 years gets Obed Jr. well into breeding age, that Peter O. is actually Obed Jrs son by an unknown first wife. My otherwise brilliant momentary theory that Delight (Frary,) listed as Obed Jrs wife, gave birth to Peter O. was shot down when I realized she was 6 years younger than Peter O., which is, even for that day, a bit young to have kids.
All that still leaves me with a whole lot of nowhere. Pure speculation.
Once I get a handle on the raw information I already have available to me, I think a visit to DC or NYC or Waltham or Philly might be in order - I really need to go over the first 3 census schedules, particularly for MA and NY, if not looking in VT and CT, just in case.
Another mystery on top of all that, is that the same source that I have the Obed-Mary info has the lists of heads of households for all the Warrens in the country - with several southern states records lost to the fires set by the British in the War of 1812. There is no Obediah - or even the Obed in the MA branch of the army - in the census, except for one down in NC. To the best of my knowledge, my grandfather was the first in the family line to head down south - all the rest live and die in MI, PA, and NY (mostly.) I'll need to take a look at the 1790 records myself, just to verify; and then if I can't find Obediah in NY in the 1800 or 1810 census, I'm going to be highly suspicious. It may just be that Peter O.'s dad is anyone but an Obediah.
Gah. Where's a time machine when you need one? Probably all stuck in a traffic jam at some really cool moment.
At least I still have my 23 generation descent which takes me back into Merrie Auld England (posted this past Sunday, for those who don't read LJ on weekends.) And that doesn't even touch the White --> Bowen family line, which lists a Bryn Myr, King of the Britons as the first descendant. Okay, it doesn't quite, I'm being a bit silly. His name was actually Beli Mawr, King of Britain, 100 BC.
~ ~ ~
In other news, and by way of explanation of the mood, I had a close encounter with a beautiful red tailed hawk this morning - she flew alongside me, making eye contact all the way along the fields, until the tree line approached, and then she cut behind me and soared nearly straight up into the air. Part of me flew up into the sky with her, the other part showed up here at work and wrote a poem about it. =)
