When it all falls apart...

I have not written any blogs lately because there was not much new to write about.  I wanted to use this Blog for updates and adding more information that you would see on my Rootsweb site.

I have spent the whole summer re-sourcing my direct lines.  Just like starting over from scratch and going back through each person.  I have found so many new records and even old records that I some how miss along the way.

Last week I was spending time on my GGG grandparents Mariner A. Price and his wife Mary S. Friars of New Brunswick.  As usual I typed Mariners name into the standard search places, Familysearch, Ancestry, Google and Find A Grave. There are three Mariner Prices in my tree and I have added two of them to Find A Grave myself.  It struck me as odd that a third Mariner Price popped up on Find A Grave.

Mariner W. Price

Mariner W. Price born Feb. 1837 Butternut Ridge, Kings Co, New Brunswick d. 15 Sep 1870 Helena, Arkansas.  Buried in Forest Hill Cemetery, Glen Ellyn, Dupage Co, Illinois.

You know when you research a family long enough that you know everyone and where they lived.  I am like that with the descendants of Edmund Price and Jane Webb of Kings Co, New Brunswick.  They are one of my primary research groups.  There has only ever been one Mariner Price, mine!

About 19 Years ago I contacted by letter and phone one of the authors of the Descendants of Edmund and Jane Webb Price book.  He help me research out my line and he was very confident that Mariner b. 1837 and my Mariner b. 1847 were the same. This was also the information I received from many other researchers at the time.  It was thought that the census or other records maybe incorrect on my Mariners birth date.  I also have a letter from the 1920's where distant family members discuss our relation to Edmund Price and that they had been in contact with family in Kings Co to make the connection.

Sitting there for a few minutes trying to make sense of this find, it hit me, Dr. William Henry Price once lived in Dupage Co, Illinois. .  I pulled up his notes and sure enough.  The man who I had always thought was a GGG  Uncle lived in Dupage Co in 1870 per the census record.

Now I was starting to feel a little ill and if I was the type of person to who got emotional I would have cried.  Twenty-one years of research on the wrong family!

I send a note off on Facebook to a friend in British Columbia, it was midnight my time but would only be 9 pm there.  He kindly send me pages from the Price family book, so I could check my information.

At 10 am the next morning I called to find that the caretaker of the Cemetery in Glen Ellyn passed away last month at age 90 (Murphy's Law of Genealogy).  So I called the local funeral home and a very kind man offered to contact the family to see if any of the records from 1870 still exist.  All I needed was who owned the plot or if anyone else was buried with Mariner W.  They said it might be a while so I am still waiting.

Racking my brain for available records in New Brunswick from that time period I realized that there still was a chance I belonged to the Edmund Price Group.  It is a very large family and my Mariner A. could still be a descendant.

Going through ever record source I could think of online and then remembered that the County Deed books for New Brunswick are on Familysearch.  They are not indexed but fairly easy to use.
with in minutes I located a land sale from Mariner A. Price to Nathan Stiles, for the land of the diseased Elijah Price.

Now I was back to feeling ill, my husband said he could hear me talking to myself and lots of colorful words would trail down the stairs on occasion!

What I failed to mention earlier is that I always believe I have two Price ancestries.  Edmund Price and that of William Price (see previous blog).  Because of this I know exactly who Elijah Price was, he was the brother of my ancestor William Price, Jr.  With a little more searching I found all of Nathan Stiles land transactions in Kings Co, New Brunswick.  Oh, did I mention that Nathan Stiles was the 2nd husband of Sarah Ann Abrams/Abraham?  Sarah Ann was the first wife of Elijah Price...

The document shows Nathan Stiles Land Deed in Kings Co, NB

The reason this makes Mariner A Price is part of the Descendants of William Price and Sarah (Sally) Mason is the other names listed in the sales.
1.  John Friars, husband of Elizabeth Jane Price, Known daughter
2. Mariner Price
3. Joseph Price, Known son listed as Heir on documents and from death record
4. John E. Coates, husband of Sarah Ann Price, Known daughter
5. Hannah Price, Known daughter per death record.

I have done extensive research on the family of Elijah Price and Sarah Ann Abrams Price.  I sometimes get very attached to families and research them either because no one else has or they were somehow separated in life and I try to bring them back together again.   Elijah died very young and it seems the young widow Sarah remarried Nathan Stiles by 1859, all of her children were with other families or working as servants in 1861.  I have not been able to located my Mariner in 1861 so far.  Only one child was raised by a family member, Hannah Price was raised by her Aunt Hannah Price Bell and is with her in 1861 Kent Co, New Brunswick.  I knew ther might be missing more children but never would have guest it was my ancestor that was missing.

In 1870 Mariner A, his wife Mary Friars and children are in Tuscola Co, Michigan, next door to John Friars and his wife Elizabeth Price who has brother Joseph Price living with them.  I always thought the family was together because John Friars and Mary Friars were siblings.  Now I know it was also because Mariner, Elizabeth and Joseph were siblings as well.  It is so mixed up. lol!

In the end I have put this forward for review.  Feel free to re-research my findings and make your on conclusion.  I have given the new information to the Descendants of Edmund and Jane and passed it to researchers of William Price and Sarah Mason.  I will be e-mail people with Mariner on Rootsweb and a select few on Ancestry.  It will take years to update the information and with the way Ancestry.com works it may never be totally fixed but I can try.

Please feel free to contact me about this on going project.  I will continue to research the ancestry of Edmund Price and Jane Webb, with over 20,000 descendants in my database I will adopt the family as mine and keep up the search.

Wish me luck,
Michele