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