52 Ancestors #1 - A Fresh Start

1870 Census for Renah Daniels

Happy New Year!

I’m happy to say that Amy Johnson Crow has decided to continue the 52 Ancestor Challenge. Last year, I only created 16 posts for this challenge. This year I hope to have 26 posts dedicated to the challenge. If you don’t know about it, Amy Johnson Crow’s blog, “No Story Too Small”, offered a challenge to genealogists to write a post once a week about one particular ancestor. Well, the challenge continues in 2015 with a twist or as Amy wrote, “a prompt.” The first week’s prompt is dedicated to “A Fresh Start.” For instance, which ancestor was given “A Fresh Start” or which ancestor you need to research over again. You know a “re-boot.”  This post is dedicated to those brick walls that I’m determined to break-through this year.

For instance, what happened to those Pate brothers, John, Robert and Wyatt. They were my maternal grandmother’s older brothers who were adults by the time my grandmother was born in 1901 but no living family member can explain what became of them. Did they marry and have children? Or did they suffer a horrible demise? Where did they lived after they left Wayne and Greene Counties, North Carolina?

Another mystery is whatever became of Grandma Mary Vick; actually she was my maternal Great-Great-Grandmother who left home when her daughter was a toddler and never returned.  What woman leaves her small child and never returns home?

How can I forget those family members who I find only on one census, for example, my maternal grandfather’s Great-Great-Great-Grandmother, Renah Daniels. My DNA cousin who goes by the username of “DabofSugar”contacted me on Ancestry.com and told me to look for Renah on the 1870 census and behold...there she is. Renah and her family was found on a page just before her daughter’s family, Olivia/Silvia Roundtree Newsome. Renah’s age is listed as 35 but if you look at the actual page its 55 and her name is spelled Rena. Sadly, I can’t find Rena/Renah or her children after this census. They all disappeared. I’m hoping that later on this year, I can provide an update on a few of my break walls.

I want to thank Amy again for this challenge because if it wasn’t for her; I would still be wondering “what am I going to do with all this information that I’ve collected on the ancestors.” 

Source: Year: 1870 Census: Black Creek, Wilson, North Carolina; Roll: M593_1166; Page: 451B.