Making headway in the Rhodes branch of the Cox family this week. YAY! Time was spent building out the family of Anna Rhodes Meehan. The migration of this family was somewhat interesting and seems to be driven by Anna’s husband, Walter. Walter had been married twice before Anna, and she was a bit older than most first time brides at 34. Walter was originally from Iowa and had lived for a time in Gallatin County, Montana. I’m not exactly sure how he became connected with Anna who had lived her entire life in Perry County, Indiana. I do not see anything obvious in my tree where Walter would have crossed paths with a Rhodes or Cox family member in either Iowa or Montana. There could have been a friend of a friend who put them in contact with each other. Or Anna could have been a mail order bride. According to newspaper announcements of their marriage, he was highly respected by his pastor. This would support the first theory. It is an interesting question to pose, but not one I have the time to explore fully. After returning to Iowa for a few years, the Meehans moved to South Dakota until the late 1930s when they relocated to Merced County, California.
A mail-order bride was a woman whose introduction to her husband came through the mail, and one who made plans to marry him before meeting in person. -National Postal Museum
Just two Rhodes children to finish researching. I should be able to complete this task by month end.
Beginning of Week: 26,878 people End of Week: 26,954 people Change = +76 people – GOAL MET! Goal for coming week: Add 50 new people
On the DNA front, no new matches that I could easily insert into my tree were produced. There were tons of new matches with little to no helpful information. What strikes me funny is there were a couple people who tagged themselves “willing to help”. These individuals did not have a linked tree associated with their results. You know what would be helpful? BUILD. YOUR. TREE.
I did some place name clean up. It will take forever and a day to clean up my place name list in Family Tree Maker. Some time ago I tried to do a clean up. It was a rather discouraging task and I hardly made a dent. I focused this week on places in Perry County, Indiana since that is where the family I am working on is located. I think it is important to have a system established for place names and try to adhere to it for clarity. It can be quite confusing if the place is listed as “Perry, Indiana”. Is this Perry County or a Perry Township? How many counties in Indiana have a Perry Township? It could be as many as ninety-two!
Perry County, Indiana 1876 Indiana Historical Society
I’m continuing with my build out of the descendants of Gabriel and Nancy Cox through their granddaughter Martha Cassidy Rhodes. The thing that captured my attention this week is that a couple of the women in this line, sisters in fact, married late in their thirties and tried to have children. Unfortunately, the babies only lived a couple days. The cause of death for one of the infants was Bandl’s Ring. Not familiar with this term, I looked it up.
Bandl’s ring occurs when the uterus retracts during contractions, but the cervix doesn’t dilate quickly enough. The ring forms around the baby’s neck or shoulders, obstructing labor. –Google AI
How tragic! Family history research is definitely filled with learning opportunities on many different topics, including geography and medicine.
I still have three of Rhodes children to finish up before moving on. Hopefully, I can do that by the end of January.
Beginning of Week: 26,821 people End of Week: 26,878 people Change = +57 people – GOAL MET! Goal for coming week: Add 50 new people
I do this every year. Resolve to blog regularly and then it falls to the wayside. Let’s see how long I stick with it this year. I’ll start with a summary of what I accomplished last year and move on from there.
I’m continuing to work on the ancestry of my paternal grandfather, Samuel Thomas DeMoss, Sr. I moved on from the DeMoss line to the Cox line in 2024. With the release of the Full Text Search functionality on FamilySearch last year, I have found some interesting details about the family of my 4th great grandparents William J. DeMoss and Elizabeth Lowe DeMoss. Divorce records and land deed records cleared up several details that were still out there for me. Their son Isaac (my 3rd great grandfather) has a ton of land deed transactions on the books in both Knox and Daviess Counties. Every month or so I will do a quick follow up search to see if anything new and exciting pops up.
I put the DeMoss line on pause with my 4th great grandparents. The documentation currently available for Fleming County, Kentucky, in the early 1800s doesn’t amount to much for William and Polly DeMoss. It doesn’t appear that he was too involved in local politics or was at odds with the law, but it’s not clear exactly who he descends from or where he was prior to Fleming County. At this time, the only thing that might solve this riddle is if we had Y DNA results from my male cousin or his male descendants.
I’m about a year into my research on the Cox line. I am cleaning up what I already had and filling in the branches downward. My 2nd great grandfather Frank Cox lived quite the life and I continue to find more documents on him every time I search. He’s now up to four (4) wives! I’m still looking for definitive proof that John S Cox (my 3rd great grandfather) is the son of Gabriel and Nancy Cox. There is a lot of circumstantial evidence that needs to be sorted through before I can feel confident in this parental assignment.
I am currently building out the descendants of Martha Ann Cox who married Luke Cassidy. I have six confirmed DNA matches through Martha. Luke and Martha had six known children and resided in Perry County, Indiana. Some of their descendants still live in the general area in south central Indiana, while others have migrated to the Pacific Northwest. This week I am specifically working on the family of Martha Henrietta Cassidy Rhodes and discovering my “5th cousins”. She and Sylvester had six children that I am aware of. I’m currently working on daughter #2. I expect the Rhodes family will take me a month to complete, depending on how much basic information I can find.
There were two individuals that stood out to me this week. These are usually younger individuals that catch my attention. The first was a 30 year old male in the late 1940s who died of a stabbing to his femoral artery. According to the man who ultimately was convicted of manslaughter, the victim had tried to rob him and he was merely acting in self-defense. The other was a 23 year old woman who was driving to work at a hospital in Evansville. Apparently the roads were slick and she was trying to pass another vehicle on or near a bridge. She lost control and died instantly from her injuries.
Unrelated to my Cox research, I had one new DNA match that I was able to place in my tree down my Roderick branch.
Progress: Tree contains 26,821 people Goal: Add 50 new people this week
Currently I am working to build out the Cox line of my family tree. I hate to leave a branch completely unresearched. I try to find a minimal amount of information on everyone that I might share DNA with just in case it becomes useful to someone someday. Even if that person is not me.
Today I was fleshing out a fifth cousin, Nell. Granted, she will not make it into the family history I am assembling, but my genealogy OCD is alive and well and I felt obligated to learn what I could about my cousin. Nell was listed in both her parents’ obituaries in 1989 and 1991 with a married name. When I was sorting through her hints on Ancestry, it gave me a marriage record, but the name did not match what I had for 1989. A divorce record was located prior to 1989 so the next logical step was to search the newspapers for a second marriage announcement. Her surname in 1989 did not appear to be overly common so I went with that.
A marriage announcement for Nell in the four year window in California did not populate using the new surname, however, there were a few articles with a byline for the night city editor with the Los Angeles Times. What were the chances? Could this guy be Nell’s husband? I clicked on one. It started out “I did not want to go: I didn’t believe in doctors.” The writer proceeds to describe how he’s been getting in shape in the past few years and this doctor’s visit. Unfortunately, the EKG was abnormal and the doctors thought he was in the middle of a heart attack! He then mentions his wife’s name, Nell. BINGO! I found the second husband…and several genealogical details about Nell.
I almost skipped over the article by Nell’s husband…but I didn’t. Something made me read it. It’s important to turn over all those stones, even if they are the size of pea gravel. You never know what is hidden underneath.
I’ve set aside my DeMoss research and am moving on to my Cox ancestors. I don’t know why but my Cox ancestors are some of my favorites. Maybe it is because of the snippets about great-grandma Blanche I’ve been told by my aunt over the years…how she stepped in on behalf of my uncle during my grandmother’s difficult second marriage. Maybe because Blanche’s grandfather died in the Civil War. Maybe because of the well-documented stories that already exist about the Cox family members who came before. If nothing else, this is not a boring bunch of skeletons in my closet!
So, I’m working on the Cox line and the first family unit to clean up for the manuscript is that of my 2nd-great grandfather Frank Cox. I’ve written about Frank before, exposing some details that other researchers in the family hadn’t yet discovered. The one detail that really bugged me that I didn’t have was the date that Frank married Jennie Hollingsworth. I had searched the Knox County marriage records forward and backward with no luck. This time, I decided to try the newspaper. I simply love the fact that the Knox County library has digitized so many of the old papers and I can access them from 2000 miles away! I plugged in my search criteria and voila! They were married on July 4, 1876 in LAWRENCEVILLE! That would explain why I could not find them in the Knox County marriage database. For those of you that don’t know, back in the day, Lawrence Co, IL was Knox County’s very own Gretna Green. Yay! Now I have another source to confirm they did get married and now we have a date.
Of course, I don’t work on just a single person at one time. I’m also unraveling the generation before and after at the same time. This was especially true today with Frank Cox’s family. In building the timeline for this family, it seems they kept moving back and forth between Cape Girardeau County, Missouri and Knox County, Indiana…and so did the McCullough family. I wrote about Arabelle’s parents, Oliver and Rachel, way back in 2014. I basically lost track of them after the 1880 census. Re-examining Arabelle’s marriage license from Cape Girardeau, she was under 18 and it has a notation that her father OP McCullough gave written permission for her to marry. This means Oliver was alive in 1888. Then, as I was scouring the land and court records for Frank down there, I came across a land transaction listing Rachel McCullough and Francis M Cox as grantors in 1891. Since Frank was listed on the transaction instead of Oliver, either Oliver and Rachel had divorced or Oliver was deceased. At this point in time, I’m leaning toward deceased. I haven’t found any additional information on Rachel.
So, to sum up my new findings…
Frank married Jennie Hollingsworth in Lawrenceville, IL on July 4, 1876
Oliver McCullough likely died sometime between 1888 and 1891, in either Missouri or Indiana
Rachel McCullough died sometime after 1891, probably in Missouri
Week 4 of the 52 Ancestors Challenge finds us exploring the topic “Witness to History”. There are so many individuals I could write about under this topic, most having served and fought for the freedoms we currently enjoy. Many of those same individuals I have already written about, but I haven’t yet focused my attention on my third great-grandfather Isaac DeMoss.
Isaac was born in Fleming County, Kentucky on March 13, 1833 to William DeMoss and Elizabeth “Betsey” Lowe.1 He is believed to be the fourth of ten children born to the couple. While still in diapers, his parents, along with several of his father’s siblings’ families, packed up the family and journeyed westward into Indiana, settling in southeastern Daviess County, Indiana.
Isaac remained on the family farm until the early to mid-1850s. He set out to make his own way, heading further westward, settling along the White River which separated Daviess County from Knox County to the west. On December 8, 1855, at the age of twenty-two, he married sixteen year old Louisa Reeve, daughter of Joseph Reeve and Sarah Ireland Reeve. The following June, Isaac acquired a land patent (certificate 39184) for thirty-three acres of land along the White River bottoms.
Isaac and Louisa did not waste time starting a family. Samuel T was born in October 1856 and Marion followed four years later. Life as a farmer was then interrupted when the Civil War broke out. Isaac, Louisa’s brother Samuel, and many of their friends and neighbors enlisted for a three year stint in the Union Army, becoming a private of Company C of the 80th Indiana Infantry. They mustered in on September 8, 1862 at Princeton, Indiana, and marched to Covington, Kentucky, where they joined forces with several units from Ohio. The first year of service was spent mostly in Kentucky. Notable campaigns included fighting Confederate forces at Perryville led by Major General Braxton Bragg. The Regiment had movements in Tennessee before engaging in a number of battles in Georgia in 1864. They circled back through Alabama to Tennessee once more before heading east to North Carolina in 1865. The 80th finished their tour of duty in Salisbury until they mustered out on June 22, 1865, returning home to Indiana. Isaac left the military with the rank of corporal.2
Unfortunately, when Isaac did return to Edwardsport, he did so as a widow. Louisa passed away on April 18, 1864. The cause is currently unknown, however, both Louisa’s mother Sarah and her mother-in-law Betsey also died within months of Louisa. It is not known if their deaths are related or merely coincidental. A year later, young Marion also died of an unknown cause, not having reached his sixth birthday.
At the age of thirty-three, Isaac married sixteen year old Laura Johnson. Within a year she gave him another son, William, however he died a week later. Isaac continued to amass his land holdings and in 1872, he and Laura welcomed another son John Franklin DeMoss. Personal accounts provided by various family members referred to John as Richard or “Dickie Popcorn”.3
Unlike some of his brothers-in-law (Louisa’s brothers), Isaac focused on farming and did not appear to branch into other trades or skills. He did, however, amass a sizeable amount of land in and around Vigo Township, mostly along the river. Much of this farmland was transferred to Samuel and Richard in the 1890s, as reported in the Vincennes papers.
Isaac took ill in the summer of 1900, contracting Rheumatic Fever. He suffered from this affliction for nearly three months, succumbing on October 19, 1900 at the age of sixty-seven.
Biography of Samuel T. DeMoss, History of Old Vincennes and Knox County, IN, George E. Greene, 1911, p. 271. ↩︎
This week’s prompt for the 52 Ancestors Challenge is “favorite photo”. Nearly fifteen years ago, before my grandmother’s Alzheimer’s got too bad, she handed my uncle Bill a large box of pictures. She said it was all the pictures she had collected over the years. He scanned them into the computer and gifted her an electronic picture frame for Christmas with all the photos stored in it. He said there were between 500 and 600 photos in that box. In 2015, my grandmother passed away. As Bill sorted through drawers and closets, he found more pictures. Over the course of the following three years, he scanned an additional 700 to 800 pictures. He then organized all 1300 pictures and gifted them to me and my sisters. When this challenge came up, I decided to pick a photo from his collection.
My maternal grandmother, Dorothy Cardinal Keller, was born in 1925, and she had two sisters and four brothers. She was fifth in the birth order. Each year during the summer, there would be the Thompson Family Reunion held at the local park in the town were I was born and raised. Thompson was my great-grandmother’s maiden name. I don’t remember too much about the reunions except there were always lots of people I didn’t really know and lots of food–fried chicken, potato salad and deviled eggs. I do recall that Grandma’s siblings who lived out of town would make an effort to come to the reunions.
I have selected two photos for this challenge. One from 1953 and one from 1989. Both pictures feature all seven Cardinal siblings.
This picture was taken in 1953 in Vincennes, Indiana. It might have been taken at my grandparents house, although I am not sure. From left to right, Morris Cardinal, Marlin “Buck” Cardinal, Virginia Cardinal Dye, Dorothy Cardinal Keller, Norma Cardinal Sheley, Wayne Cardinal, and Don Cardinal.
This picture was taken in the summer of 1989 in Vincennes, Indiana, during a family reunion. This particular year, it was not held at the park but at a family member’s house. It may have been Norma’s but I’m not 100% certain of that. Front row, Dorothy, Virginia and Norma. Back row, Don, Buck, Morris and Wayne. This was one of the last pictures of the siblings as Don, the oldest, passed away in 1993.
Our 52 Ancestors prompt this week is “Origins”. Origins are simply beginnings.
I’m currently focusing on my dad’s side of the family. As I continue to dig deeper, it has occurred to me that Dad’s ancestors haven’t really concentrated in any one area for any length of time. To get a feel for his origins, I decided to plot birth locations for his ancestors going back to the Revolutionary War.
The yellow pins are the locations where ancestors from my grandfather’s line (my dad’s dad, the DeMosses) were born. The pink pins are where my ancestors from my grandmother’s line (my dad’s mom, the Fieldens) were born. These are only my direct ancestors–no aunts, uncles, or distant cousins. Each pin represents a location, not necessarily a person. Some pins may represent more than one person. I did not connect the pins because I wasn’t necessarily trying to track how they migrated, although it was clearly east to west.
It’s quite the scattering of locations. My grandmother’s ancestors tended to be more to the south, with a higher concentration of locations in the Carolinas and into Tennessee. There really isn’t a distinct concentration of locations in any one area. They seemed to always be moving. Considering the terrain of North Carolina and eastern Tennessee, it would seem logical that they continued to look for better opportunities.
My grandfather’s people seem to have come from two different areas and converged on the southwestern portion of Indiana. One grouping appears to have originated from the New Jersey/Eastern Pennsylvania area, while the other was from the North Carolina/Virginia area before migrating north and westward. When the DeMoss ancestors arrived in Indiana, they must have found what they were looking for. The large cluster of yellow pins represent several generations who put down some serious roots, at least for a while.
The data represents five almost complete generations and a partial of the sixth generation, starting with my grandparents. Birthdates of those included ranged from the 1770s to about 1920.
If nothing else, the data plot gives me insight into the areas of the country I should delve deeper into when the opportunity arises.
The first prompt for 52 Ancestors in 2024 is “Family Lore”. This prompt reminded me of a story my dad mentioned about his younger brother Jim.
As the story goes, Jim had red hair. I don’t believe it was flaming red like Carrot Top or Little Orphan Annie, but probably closer to a strawberry blonde. It was definitely a contrast to the black hair that my dad, his sister and my grandmother were blessed with. Dad said he teased his brother and told him he was switched at the hospital. Somehow I doubt there was a baby swap, but it makes for a good story. I personally do not have first hand knowledge of the color of Uncle Jim’s hair. I wasn’t even two years old when he died at age twenty-one in an automobile accident. The few pictures we still have of him are black and white. I did attempt to colorize this photo using Fotor. Maybe there is a little red in there. It’s difficult to say for sure.
The fact that Uncle Jim had reddish colored hair isn’t really that far fetched. My niece is a strawberry blonde. Jim’s father (my grandfather) was described as having blonde hair on his draft card for World War II. Maybe it had a little red mixed in that wasn’t noted. My Ancestry DNA results have significant levels of Scottish (21%) and Irish (10%) origins, all apparently from my paternal line. We’ve even got some obvious Irish and Scottish surnames peppered in there–McCullough, McLees, McAllister–as well as the family Ireland (I’m assuming they came from Ireland!). My grandmother may also have had a tad bit of Irish or Scottish blood in her veins from the Caseys and Heaths in her line.
“The expression is from mixed Italian-Irish families in the late 19th century. The red-haired stepchildren would be seen as evil. Also, red hair would underscore that the child is not related to the stepparent, as seen by the physical difference.”
–tvtropes.org
So was my uncle Jim a red-headed stepchild? I seriously doubt it based on this photograph of him with my dad. The few memories my dad shared of his younger brother were good ones. I can only imagine what kind of crazy trouble they would have gotten up to together if Jim had lived a few decades longer.
A likely candidate for a sibling to William DeMoss is Polly DeMoss Harmon. Marriage records from Fleming County, Kentucky have Polly marrying Thomas Harmon in 1814. The family resided in Fleming County until the early 1830s at which time they migrated to Daviess County, Indiana. This is the same time period that William DeMoss’s family also relocated out of Kentucky. Polly is believed to have died sometime between 1839 when her daughter Fannie was born and 1843 when Thomas married Rachel Baker Gibson. A line by line search of the 1840 US Census did not find an entry for Thomas Harmon which would have provided some insight for a more exact date of death for Polly.
Old Union Church and Cemetery, Reeve Township, Daviess County, Indiana. Several members of this family are buried here.
Polly and Thomas had at least seven children during their time together. It’s possible that there were a few more as there is a large gap between William (b. 1819) and Matilda (b. 1829). According to the 1830 Census, there could be two daughters born in the 1820s that have not been accounted for. The children that have been documented are:
Elizabeth (1814-) m. Alexander Moren/Moran/Morin
Hannah (1816-1902) m. Jacob Hedrick
William (1819-1884) m. Indiana Alford
Matilda (1829-1860) m. Lewis Isham
Rebecca (1831-1859) m. William Edwards
David (1836-1870) m. Lavina Hedrick
Fannie (1839-1920) m. William Edwards
Thomas remarried in 1843 to Rachel Baker Gibson and added three more children to the family, Lavina, Robert and Lucinda. In 1860, Thomas is living with William’s family in St. Clair County, Missouri. The younger children are not living with them and Rachel cannot be located.
Digging Up My Roots 