BENJAMIN CABLES - Birth place

Melissa, I'm genuinely sorry that you feel ganged up on. To my knowledge, I'm the only curator who has spoken to you privately about the Cable profiles, so if there are other issues going on, it's probably because you're working in several different areas and therefore your actions are being noticed by multiple curators.

As I've explained a few times, there are two problems you're running into:

1) Geni's definition of immediate family and your definition are different. Geni's "Family Group" definition extends to fourth cousins and closer; it doesn't refer to every ancestor in your tree. Here's the official Geni position: https://help.geni.com/hc/en-us/articles/229704427-Who-is-included-i...

2) Even if someone is within that Family Group range, they are not guaranteed to be private. Specifically, any profile born more than 150 years ago is expected to be public on Geni, except for in a few extraordinary circumstances that don't apply to the pre-1872 profiles you've privatized (I've checked them all for you). So these profiles truly do need to be made public. Here's more info about Geni's privacy range: https://help.geni.com/hc/en-us/articles/229704447-What-profiles-are...

The reason this is coming up as an issue for you is that you are not the only manager on most of these profiles, and there are other Geni users who are more closely related who have been trying to keep the profiles public. You're effectively overriding the wishes of your co-managers and of closer family members every time you flip these very, very old profiles to private. So that's why we have to step in -- not because we're trying to attack you in any way, but because it's a collaborative tree and we're trying to keep it accessible to everyone.

Would you like me to file a help ticket on your behalf so that Geni can consider your argument? As I mentioned in my last PM, I am happy to do that for you -- but you need to explain to me what the specific privacy concerns are, and it has to be more substantive that them being your blood relations.

"Nope you are not the only curator, about the same time I had about 3 other Curators speak to me, fancy that"

As I've explained in PMs and other discussion posts, absolutely nothing coordinated happened here. You made a public discussion posts about the profiles you had privatized. Those posts were noticed by multiple curators, since we all follow public discussions. Curators working in totally different parts of the tree saw that you had privatized profiles in their work areas, so they flipped the privacy.

"I'm sorry that you all just took away control of my work leaving it open for outsiders"

No one has taken away control of your work. You are still manager on these profiles and you can still edit them; I'm not seeing any that have been fully locked.

Also, please be careful with "you all." I haven't touched a single one of these profiles this week -- haven't flipped privacy settings, haven't MPed anything, haven't done anything. You responded to an old discussion thread I had started, and you sent me a PM -- I didn't go looking to get involved here, I assure you. So please, please be careful with the accusations you're making about curators ganging up on you.

"instead of keeping it with close family groups who know they are related via DNA matches"

Geni is a collaborative website. The only close family groups recognized on Geni are ones that meet Geni's definition. You are absolutely 100% more than welcome to keep all profiles in your tree born after 1872 private, and none of us will change those privacy settings.

"even though my mother & Grandmother come within the 150 year mark."

Yes, your mother and grandmother were born in the 20th C., so they absolutely get to remain private. But the 150-year rule means that any profiles born more than 150 years ago are meant to be public. So any profiles born before 17 January 1872 must be public except for in extremely rare circumstances, none of which apply here. The curators who flipped your privacy settings are absolutely following Geni's rules. I'm sorry that this rule is confusing for you, but it's been explained many times.

"I greatly saddened you all did this, but I saw it coming after my bouts with Neil on Archibald Dunlops profile, I just knew your eyes would be gleaming ot open up the privacy of all my famliy members."

Again, be careful with the "you all." I have no idea about the history of you and Neil or you and Archibald Dunlop. I do know that Neil is a very good Scottish genealogist, but I know nothing of your specific interactions with him. While I was of course aware of some of your past work that I've seen, I wasn't "keeping an eye on you" -- I'm not even following your account, and again, you messaged me.

"I am not a paying customer with the privilage to make a ticket for what happened"

I've offered to file a ticket on your behalf multiple times. Even though you haven't accepted that offer, I'll go ahead and do it now.

"I did try to send a glitch community email to the General Manager, becaues I surely think that you wouldn't go outside your own geni rules in making my whole lineage a master profile but, it happened and I am sure no one cares."

The e-mail you want is misconduct@geni.com. You can report any violations you think may have occurred. If I were you, I'd recommend including links to each of these various discussion posts so that they have a full history of your concerns.

"Benjamin Cables, I am the owner of his original birth certificate, my fourth Great Grandfather"

If you have an original birth certificate for Benjamin Cable(s), that is FANTASTIC news. The Morris town clerk doesn't have one, nor does the Connecticut State Library have a record, and there isn't one available through the databases I checked in 2020 when I first started this thread. You should upload that birth certificate to the Geni profile -- it's a public record, so no privacy concerns -- because you must be the only person with access, and it would be great to share with other researchers.

"Most of these profiles, I am the only direct RELATIVE."

With respect, no, this isn't the case. We can check for claimed Family Group members on profiles, and for some of the ones you privatized, you are not in the Family Group (you're too distant) while other closer relatives do have claimed Geni profiles. This is true for Benjamin Cable (you're not in the Family Group, while another Geni user is), Hannah (Treadwell) Cable (same as Benjamin), Livionia Hayward (same), Henry Treadwell Cable (you're listed, but so are two others, one of whom is closer than you), and some others.

Keep in mind that these profiles are so far back, like your sixth-great-grandfather who you privatized, that there are likely branches of the family you may not be working with or even personally know.

In any case, I'm going to go ahead and file your help ticket now. I'm sorry this has been stressful for you, but I genuinely do not see any signs of misconduct from any curators. You're just running up against the 150-year rule, and some have enforced it, which is exactly what Geni asks us to do. But do message the misconduct e-mail address so they can take another look for you.

PTID:6000000181816850962:6000000043153991501 I'm the General Manager of Geni. I want to reply to what you've written specifically, but honestly there's nothing more that I can say that Ashley has not already said. To reiterate:

1. Profiles of people born more than 150 years ago should be public. If you have information about a person born before 1872 and you don't want that information to be public, don't put it on Geni.

2. Other users (including curators) have a right to ask for evidence to support the information you're adding to this shared, collaborative family tree. Curators have our full confidence to determine which evidence is correct and for public profiles, they have the authority to correct the tree according to that determination.

3. What Geni calls your Family Group is the range at which you consider other users to be closely-related enough to (mutually) share private profiles with you. It has nothing to do with whether or not someone born in 1789 can be a private profile on Geni [it cannot].

I hope this helps. If it's your plan to make profiles private so that you don't have to justify the genealogy to anyone else, we do not recommend doing that on Geni.

PTID:6000000181828711839:6000000043153991501 -- As stated previously, please PM me when you need something switched to public, or post in the "curators, please assist" thread. There's no need to tag multiple curators or keep posting in multiple threads. Thanks in advance for helping us do things efficiently.

I will send a note to the manager of those profiles.

Please, Melissa, stop making accusations. You have not been targeted. The general manager of Geni already looked into this and determined absolutely nothing wrong was done.

You drew attention to your own actions by sending PMs and making a lot of public discussion posts (like these). You can't then be surprised when people respond to you as a result.

I feel like I have been extremely fair towards you and listened to your concerns. I've tried to work with you. Please don't work against me in exchange.

As you can see a full ten messages back in this thread (as of me typing this; you might post again in the interim), I already did message Neil. Just because you don't see everything publicly, that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

Curators have been engaging you because you made public threads. If you make public discussion posts, you should assume that people are going to respond to them.

"...wondered why you didn't see the sources or didn't want to read them as there were links to them all in the bio..."

I'm glad we're now back to the actual subject of this thread, Benjamin Cable and Judson Cable.

Your message to me was about Judson Cable. For more than a year, there were indeed sources on the profile -- all added by me. So yes, I of course saw everything I had added. :) Over a year later, you then added a bunch of info to the "About" and a bunch of screenshot uploads, all of which is of course appreciated -- but none of it provides a birth record.

What you found and have labelled "Judson Cable Birth & Death Record" is actually neither of those things. It's a death index from the town of Washington, Connecticut. There is indeed a column on the index that says that he was born in Morris, Connecticut. But that is based on information provided by the informant about the decedent -- it's not a birth record, or even guaranteed to be accurate. It simply means that whoever told the town clerk in Washington that Judson had died also believed that Judson had been born in Morris.

And again, it's absolutely possible that he was! But, your objection is to me saying on the profile that no birth record exists for Judson Cable in the town of Morris. This is a basic fact that's confirmed by every database I've checked, the Connecticut State Library, and the Morris town clerk. So I am still confused as to what the objection is to stating that fact.

Knowing which records exist and don't exist is essential in genealogy. There are no birth records for Judson in Morris. That also means there's no primary source for his parents, or for him being a brother of Benjamin. Your fellow researchers need to know that. As a result, I'm not going to remove that statement.

As far as profile pictures go...I wasn't going to get into this, since I know you're upset and I don't want to add to that. But since you've brought it up, I can tell you there are two problems with the ones you're showing on Benjamin and Judson's profiles:

1) Benjamin's profile picture is a still from the 1975 Stanley Kubrick film "Barry Lyndon." That means the image is copyrighted, and it shouldn't be on Geni for that reason. I totally understand the desire to use some kind of image to represent a person, but you should be using images that are public domain or royalty-free. I'm not personally going to report it, but you should strongly consider deleting it.

2) Judson's profile picture is likely not of him -- but before you react strongly to that, hear me out. If you look at the photo card, it says it was taken by the Jackson Studio in Norwalk, Connecticut. That studio's history is pretty well-documented -- the studio's work is well known in Fairfield County genealogy -- and it was started by Edward Miller Jackson (with assistance from his father, LeGrand) after 1880. Judson died in 1873, plus the man in the photo looks way too young to be him during the photographic era. Edward Miller Jackson was born in 1862, so the idea of him taking a photo of an extremely youthful octogenarian while still a child himself doesn't really work. Even in 1880, he wasn't yet a photographer -- he was a clerk in his father's jewellery store. The timeline simply doesn't work in any respect.

Since the note about it being a photo of "Judson Cable, Milt's Grandpa Cable" was presumably written during or after the lifespan of Milt, and not during the lifetime of whoever this particular Judson was, it seems likely that whoever wrote that name and note simply had it wrong. (It happens! We've all goofed up with photos.)

So a good question to ask yourself is: Was there a Judson Cable in another generation? Did this Judson have a son, grandson, or nephew by that name? That would all be much more likely. Or do we know who Milt is, so we can figure it out from there?

You can post links to any profiles born over 150 years ago in the zombies discussion at https://www.geni.com/discussions/217559 and curators will look at them.

As the general manager of Geni previously confirmed for you, most of the profiles where you're objecting to curator practices being followed have no one in their "Family Group." That term has a very specific definition on Geni that's been previously linked for you a few times. For profiles in the 1700s or even much of the 1800s, there is literally no Family Group for us to contact -- the only descendants are too distant, per Geni's definitions.

While I'm not willing to get into a debate over copyright law, I just want to reassure you that curators cannot delete any other user's uploaded media, which includes pictures. What we can do is remove the profile tags on media -- and we are actively asked to do so by Geni in cases where the media falls under Geni's "inappropriate image" criteria, which can include copyright violations, inappropriate content, and misidentification. If you had images that fell under any of those headings, even if it was unintentional on your part (which I am certain it would've been), curators would have removed the tags, and Geni would support curators in doing that.

You will still, however, be able to find those images in your personal photo folders. So whatever images you wanted to apply to those profiles could still be used in your own personal tree, outside of Geni. And if you'd like help identifying Geni-acceptable images for any particular profiles, send me a PM and I'm happy to assist.

Having said all of that...this thread was supposed to be about the genealogy of Benjamin Cable and Judson Cable, and I'd love it if we could stick to that subject.

Again, we literally can't delete -- we can only untag. Check your photo folders and you'll be able to find the image.

https://www.geni.com/photo/recent_albums

Out of respect for forum etiquette, I'm not going to engage further here unless it's about Benjamin Cable or Judson Cable. If you're interested in helping to find proof for their birth places or parentage, or if you want to help find the correct Judson Cable for the photo attached to this one, I'm happy to engage.

I have looked at every link and image you've posted.

From my previous post:

What you found and have labelled "Judson Cable Birth & Death Record" is actually neither of those things. It's a death index from the town of Washington, Connecticut. There is indeed a column on the index that says that he was born in Morris, Connecticut. But that is based on information provided by the informant about the decedent -- it's not a birth record, or even guaranteed to be accurate. It simply means that whoever told the town clerk in Washington that Judson had died also believed that Judson had been born in Morris.

And again, it's absolutely possible that he was! But, your objection is to me saying on the profile that no birth record exists for Judson Cable in the town of Morris. This is a basic fact that's confirmed by every database I've checked, the Connecticut State Library, and the Morris town clerk.

So again, we do not have a birth record. We do not have a baptismal record. We do not have any primary sources for his birth or parentage. That is rare for that period in that locality. We should be trying to find better documentation, because it's really important to make sure connections in the tree are accurate and supported.

I should add (again):

I'm actually fine with leaving Morris as his birthplace on the Geni profile; that's why I haven't removed it. It has at least some support, even though it's from an unreliable narrator. Using birth places from death records is acceptable when there's nothing else to go on.

But if we're also going to tie him to Benjamin as his brother, and then tie both of them to a set of parents, and the few records we do have never make those familial connections, then we need to make sure we're on better footing than we are currently.

I understand why you've arrived at the conclusions you have. I think they're perfectly reasonable ones. I don't think they're sufficiently proven, especially in the context of the specific time and place. That means we have more work to do. Does that make sense?

It's totally fine if you don't want to engage further; I'll respect that and not tag you or use your name. No need to feel obligated to respond to my thread here. But I'm not going to stop pursuing the question.

As previously stated, the State of Connecticut doesn't have a birth record for him. First of all, Connecticut is a home rule state and those records are kept at the town level, not the state. So the state wouldn't have a record and could not provide one. They are recorded, held, and issued locally.

The town -- who would be the keeper of the record -- has confirmed they don't have a record. Absolutely nothing.

The Connecticut State Library has confirmed they don't have him in their index. The Connecticut Department of Public Health doesn't have him in their index. None of the major genealogical database companies have a birth record or index for him.

The few state indices where he appears pointedly give him no birth place -- not Morris, not Connecticut in general, not anywhere else.

He first appears in the local church records in his late 20s. There are no childhood records for him, even though they have records for the people we're saying are his siblings.

I could absolutely be wrong -- which is why we need to flesh it out. Please, prove me wrong. I welcome it.

For the sake of any other researchers who might find this thread and find the info useful, I'm going to go through source-by-source and explain why I don't think we've proven Judson's birth place or parentage. I'm not expecting a response from any specific users; I'm just putting this out there.

Before I start, I'll note that Morris, Litchfield County, Connecticut was the South Farms section of the town of Litchfield, Litchfield County, Connecticut from its European resettling in 1723 until it was granted a town charter in 1859. Morris was never part of Washington, Litchfield County, Connecticut.

From the profile overview:

"Brothers, Judson and Benjamin, both found on the 1820 census with relative William Cogswell..."

No. The 1820 Census shows us that a man named Judson Cable, a man named Benjamin Cable, and a man named William Cogswell were living as neighbors, in separate households, in the town of Washington, Litchfield County, Connecticut. It does not establish a relationship between the men, certainly not a precise one. We can reasonably infer that the two Cables are related, but beyond that, we don't get anything from this about them being brothers (or natives of Morris).

"... CT Church Abstracts both, particularly, were both born in Morris"

No. The Washington church index says two things of relevance to us:

1. A Daniel Cable(s) who died 26 August 1826 at 18 months of age was the son of a Benjamin Cable(s)
2. A Judson Cable(s) and his wife were baptized and admitted to the church on 8 July 1821
3. A Hannah, "w.of B( )," is baptized and admitted to the church on 8 July 1821

It establishes absolutely nothing about a relationship between Benjamin and Judson, nor does it say anything about their birthplace. Remember that these indices are lists of people who attended the same church and had the same surname; they do not guarantee that everyone is part of the same immediate family, though with a rare surname like Cable(s), we can safely surmise there is some connection. We just don't know what it is.

We know from the index that Judson has a wife who is baptized and admitted on 8 July 1821. But the only woman with the surname Cable(s) who is baptized and admitted that day is said to be the wife of a man who's given name starts with a "B." Our profiles say Benjamin is married to a Hannah and that Judson is married to an Abigail.

So now we have more to puzzle out. Indexing error? Could be. But in the absence of other sources, we now know we need to be careful.

"...both, particularly, were both born in Morris, Judson's birth place of Morris & Death Information & the 1850 Census showcases his year of Birth ..."

We don't know that both were born in Morris.

What you refer to as a "Birth & Death record" is, again, neither. It's a death index from Washington, Litchfield County, Connecticut. It tells us that the informant for Judson's death believed he was born in Morris, Litchfield County, Connecticut. It is not a primary source for the birth. Technically, it's not even a source from Judson's lifetime. Can we place some trust in it? Yes...but since there's no record in Morris confirming it, we can't treat it as authoritative, and we need to note to other researchers that there's no Morris birth record. Also, the index tells us nothing about Benjamin at all, certainly not his birth place.

Both the death index and the 1850 Census support an estimated birth year of 1792. The census, which we like because it's from his own lifetime, supports a birthplace of Connecticut. Excellent. Neither supports the specific birth date of 11 March 1792 that we show on the profile, but at least the year has support. This is good.

It also supports Judson's wife being Abigail, not Hannah.

"...the place where their father William died as noted in Church Abstracts..."

No. The church abstracts index supports a William Cables dying in Morris in 1818. It does not support him being the father of either Judson or Benjamin, nor does it support either of them being born in Morris.

"...on Williams Grandson Henry Treadwell Cable's birth certificate."

This does help us with Benjamin, so well done! This card, transcribed from the original ledgers, tells us that Benjamin stated in his lifetime that he was born in Morris. (Even though this record is from 1902, it was created by transcribing info from the birth record itself.) The card even helpfully notes that Benjamin, husband of Hannah Cogswell, said he was born in Morris at the time when it was still South Farms. A delightful find -- we can use it to support three different profiles, two of which (Benjamin and Hannah) aren't actually tagged to it.

Unfortunately, it provides no help with Judson. And even for Benjamin, it still isn't an original birth record, but hey, we'll take it.

"...This was the only noted Cable family from Morris, CT through CT Abstract Church Records..."

The index tells us that a number of people with the surname Cable(s) lived in Morris; it doesn't tell us how many precise family units there were. Just something to keep in mind. (And, again, we don't see either Judson or Benjamin on this list, so we can't say it's their family.)

"...and his sister Nancy Cables, also born in Morris, CT per the Cogswells of America Book and Church Abstracts...."

No. Again, this page from an 1800s genealogy tells us, without citation, that 1) a Nancy Cables was born in Morris on 12 June 1795 and 2) her parents were William and Hannah Cables. It tells us absolutely nothing about her having a brother named Judson or Benjamin.

"These abstract church records without a doubt tie the family together as many birth certificates came up missing through a fire loss in Morris, CT."

Big claim, but based on what? Plenty of extant records from Morris would argue against there being a vital records fire in that era, and the Litchfield Historical Society says the Morris Congregational Church has its records since 1748. How do we know there was a vital records fire?

"Further, several members of the Cable family inter-married into the same Cogswell line. First of all we have his son Benjamin Cables who married Hannah Cogswell per their son, Henry Treadwell Cable statistic record. Williams's daughter Nancy married Riley Cogswell as denoted by the Cogswell of America book and their gravestone and marriage record. Nancy Cables and Benjamin Cables were both siblings who married Both Hannah Cogswell and Riley Cogswell who were also siblings, thus marrying into the same Cogswell line; They were the children of Ruel Cogswell who was the son of Edward, who was the son of Samuel, who was the son of Edward who was the son of William who was the son of William who was the son of John Cogswell, the notable patriarch of the family per the Cogswells of America book. Further, Both these siblings had a child with the matching middle name Treadwell ( Lucius Treadwell Cable and Henry Treadwell Cable) whom are 1st cousins, named after their Grandmother Hannah Treadwell."

This makes a nice case that people surnamed Cable(s) married people surnamed Cogswell, but it doesn't pertain to Judson.

"Town Marriage records shows that Judson Cable married Abigail Hubbard alongside his sister Nancy Cable who married Riley Cogswell."

The Barbour index certainly does say that Judson Cable(s) married Abigail Hubbard on 24 April 1815. It also says that Nancy Cable(s) married Riley Cogswell on 19 January 1815. But those are two separate dates (so they're not marrying alongside each other), there's no connection established between Judson and Nancy beyond sharing a surname, and -- crucially -- this Barbour index is from Washington, not Morris. So it's again not helping us with the birth date, birth place, or parentage, but I'm glad we have it to support the marriage.

"Judson was a corporal in the civil war, record in source tab."

This index shows us that a Judson Cable served in New York. On Geni, we're saying this Judson never left Litchfield County. We need to be certain it's the same Judson Cable, especially since the Geni Judson Cable would've been 69 years old at the start of the Civil War. Are we certain it's not a Judson of a younger generation?

The other sources you have are:

• FindAGrave -- the tombstone helps us calculate a birth date, but it doesn't tell us who the parents were or where the birth place was. The date of death on the stone is 30 December 1873 and the age was 81 years and 10 months, so I'm getting 29 February 1792 for that (it was indeed a leap year). Unless there's a concrete source for the date we're showing (11 March 1792), we should change it to 29 February 1792 since the gravestone is now the most precise date for which we actually have evidence.
• William Cable's will -- this page doesn't mention Judson or Benjamin; maybe they're somewhere in the rest of the probate packet, but they aren't here
• Litchfield County maps -- this is just maps, no mention of Judson or Benjamin; again, maybe they're somewhere else in the file, but they aren't here
• The attached photo -- already addressed in this post. It's almost certainly a Judson from another generation -- perhaps the New York corporal matter should be explored more.

Update: Here's the Civil War Judson Cable. Corporal, served with New York troops, enlisted in the City, b. c. 1844. Not this guy. I'm removing it from the profile and untagging the document.

Most of what you've commented on has already been addressed in my previous post, especially the misreading of what the church abstracts actually show, so I won't go over them again. But I want to address just a couple things, because they are important.

1) I am not trying to disprove your theory; in fact, I'm trying to prove it. What you have provided gives us a lot of circumstantial evidence that these people are connected. That is good. That is the right track. But we need more supporting evidence to prove it, and we need to address the problems within the argument that are detracting from it.

2) What you have posted as "land records" is a screenshot of 19th C. maps showing the main borders of several towns and villages in Litchfield County. The screenshot does not show which specific plot(s) of land belonged to Judson Cable. Instead of screenshots, can you please link to the exact page on Ancestry? Also, keep in mind that, again, it won't prove his birth place or parentage -- it'll just tell us where he lived, which we already know. But at least we could add it as a source.

3) I have no question that all of these Cables are somehow related. I've said that from the start. Autosomal DNA will of course tell us that. But it's not going to tell us the specific connections and relationships in the 1700s. That's where we need a paper trail.

4) William living in South Farms is good and well, but it still doesn't prove him as Judson or Benjamin's father. It proves him as a resident of South Farms.

5) Finally -- and this is most important -- Geni is a collaborative genealogy website. Asking for and discussing documentation is not, under any circumstances, "bullying." It's genealogy. If you don't want to ever have a profile you've worked on or a profile that's related to you be questioned in any way, you should not use collaborative genealogy websites. Whether you can see it or not, I have spent an extraordinary amount of my own time trying to help you prove your argument. In fact, I'm the person who added the original citations to this profile, at a time when you had added none.

If you don't want to assist with solving these issues, again, it's more than fine -- you aren't required to engage in this discussion, and you can unfollow it at any time. I certainly don't want the discussion to distress you in any way. But the work will continue, because it's a collaborative tree, and we need to make sure that connections are accurate.

Update regarding the probate file of William Henry Cable, which has been used as a source for establishing relationships between various people in these lines:

I finally had a chance to track down the full probate file. The only Cable other than Henry who is listed by name anywhere is Wheeler Cable PTID:6000000181883833901:6000000113492908292 (p. 868).

We're showing this probate file as a source for Hannah Cable, Judson Cable, PTID:6000000181883833886:6000000113492908305, PTID:6000000154477820827:6000000113492907847, PTID:6000000181883833889:6000000113492908281, PTID:6000000181883833892:6000000113492908270, PTID:6000000181883833894:6000000113492908237, PTID:6000000181883833896:6000000113492908259, and Mary Ann Cable.

I'm perfectly content to leave it attached to the widow's profile since the inventory gives us valuable information about what her life was like at the time.

But can someone provide the exact page numbers the other names appear on? If I'm just overlooking them, great -- but for anyone not actually mentioned, we should remove their tags.

Sorry, that should read: "The only Cable other than William who is listed by name anywhere is Wheeler Cables (p. 868)."

"I think what you are saying is that you want to take the probate file off the source for the other children?"

Yes, that's what I'm proposing, because the document doesn't mention any of those people other than Wheeler. Here's the document where you have it tagged to people who aren't mentioned. Since it's not actually a source for those other people -- it doesn't support anything about relationships -- it shouldn't be tagged to their profiles as a source. Does that make sense?

"I had to explain all that and that took a great deal of time so people can understand the family dynamics and where to find the information."

I think you definitely spent a lot of time explaining your proposed family unit and the ways you reached that conclusion. I appreciate that hard work. That's why, even though for Judson in particular we have no primary source evidence confirming your proposal, I saved the full text of it and linked it from within his "About." It's worth keeping and knowing about, and hopefully one day we'll be able to prove the relationship between Judson and his parents through some firmer evidence. I am wholeheartedly rooting for you to be correct.

"If you want me to add page numbers to a source, I would be happy to do so."

Honestly, I was just looking to see if you knew which page(s) all those tagged profiles were mentioned on within the probate file. It looks like you're agreeing that only William and Wheeler are mentioned in the file, so it's moot now.

"The family however, is kept together in church abstracts because it shows who the elder was, who the wife was and most of the children. The two sons didn't make it in with the father because they were much older and their families by then appearing in the other linked abstract."

I think I already explained how the Connecticut State Library's church abstracts work, but to stress again:

When you see a surname in a CSL abstract followed by a list of individuals, it means it's a list of everyone in that church or town who had that surname and appeared in the records during a given date range. It doesn't indicate that everyone on that list is in the same immediate family unit, or even in the same family at all. The only relationships that are explicitly laid out in CSL abstracts are the ones that say things like "Mary, w. of John" or "Charles, s. of William and Rebecca."

So in our case, simply seeing a Barbour index that says a Judson Cable and a Nancy Cable were married in the First Congregational Church in New Preston does not tell us that they were siblings. It tells us that they were two people in the same town with the same surname, who may have been siblings or who may have been cousins or who (less likely) just happened to have the same surname.

I'm not sure if you live in Connecticut, but if you do, a lot of the local genealogical societies and historical societies run workshops on how to use and interpret the church abstracts, the Barbour Collection, the Hale Collection, etc. It's worth doing if you have the opportunity.

"The family however, is kept together in church abstracts because it shows who the elder was, who the wife was and most of the children."

Again, no, there's no church abstract in any of these towns that says that Judson was a son of William.

"The two sons didn't make it in with the father because they were much older and their families by then appearing in the other linked abstract"

This is a wonderful theory, but it has no support. The church records in these towns go way back, before Judson was even born. We can theorize all we want about why Judson and Benjamin have no Connecticut birth records, but we can't say why they don't have them unless we can prove that our theories are correct. There's just no evidence to support the idea that Judson and Benjamin's ages meant they got left out, especially when other people their age made it into the records with no problems. Same with the fire theory, which I removed that from the "About" -- there's absolutely no evidence of it.

"IF you go on Ancestry you will see this family in the same way in hundreds of trees, so I think the understanding of who the parents and children are, are the same."

I first started this discussion in 2020 because I had done exactly that. There are indeed hundreds of Ancestry trees saying that Judson and Benjamin are brothers and are the children of William Cable and Hannah Treadwell. It's clearly the widely held belief -- no argument there.

But in all of my combing through trees, I never found a single one that presented a citation for that that wasn't another uncited Ancestry tree. Not a one. Same with FamilySearch, where he's connected to William and Hannah but with no sources for anything prior to 1815.

I also went back through a bunch of different journals from the 1800s and 1900s, including lineage society and historical society journals. What you find when you do that is people submitting queries asking "Does anyone know who Judson Cable's parents were?" Even within just a couple decades of his life, presumably within living memory, he had descendants struggling to answer the question. It's a longstanding one. And Benjamin's not any better.

But! I am an eternal optimist with genealogy, and I firmly believe that the era of collaborative genealogy means maybe we do now have an answer out there somewhere. Since you are in contact with so many Cable researchers, I would urge you to ask them to please share whatever records they've found proving the connection. Maybe someone out there has something that will help us out.

"I see no reason why the fathers record can't be linked as a source to all the children in general but for my purpose it was to show DNA relationship's. Hope that makes better sense."

Again, because we still can't prove he's the father, even through DNA.

You are using autosomal DNA, and your autosomal DNA is connecting you to other people with Cables in their ancestry. Excellent -- that's a great start. The problem is that it's not precise enough to tell you which Cable from the 1700s is the father of your Cables. It's just telling you there's some kind of some connection.

Let's try it this way: William had at least one brother (Abner). He may have had others. Is it not possible that Judson and/or Benjamin are actually Abner's children? Is it not possible that William and Abner had a cousin whose son(s) moved north? (Young bachelors moving from Fairfield County to Litchfield County was an everyday occurrence in that era. The land crunch was forcing them north.) Could that maybe be why Judson and Benjamin don't appear in any Litchfield County records until they were old enough to move there on their own?

You're interpreting your grandmother's autosomal DNA connection to other people with Cables in their lines as saying, definitively, that these were William's sons. I'm saying, I think you might very well be right, but you may also be wrong, so we can't rely on DNA alone.

Also, keep in mind that DNA evidence is only used in Geni's historic tree when there are documents backing it up. I know you feel you've provided such documents, but you really haven't, especially when your argument relies on hypotheticals like unrecorded fires, birth records that don't exist, etc.

And, remember that Judson isn't your direct ancestor -- he's your grandmother's third great uncle. Keep that in mind when considering autosomal DNA capabilities.

"I really don't feel comfortable with you making changes or removing any of the family work that has been done, especially to my bio."

I thought long and hard before I edited the profile. In the end, my decision was based on one thing: I don't have the time to keep going around and around with this, especially when the objective, agreed-upon facts are easy to present.

The profile now includes everything we know about Judson and agree is correct. We can agree that the Census records say he was born in Connecticut. We can agree that he married Abigail Hubbard on a particular date. We can agree that he was living in certain locations at certain times. We can agree that he's buried in New Preston. We can agree on the death date and place. And so on. (I even added in info you didn't have about his occupation as a marble dealer.)

It also includes your entire written theory about his family unit, with all of your links and supporting arguments, linked to as a document. It even gives a link to your profile so people can contact you about it.

The profile now explains that there are some questions still remaining about various issues, and it lays out arguments for and against certain things. It clarifies things that were misrepresented, I fully assume unintentionally, in the previous version.

The profile now does not include things that have been proven objectively wrong, like the idea of his Civil War service, or the idea that the previous photograph is of him, or that there are primary source documents saying where he was born and to whom.

I also made the deliberate choice to not lock the "About," because I want you to be able to keep adding to it as you find cited, provable info. When one of your collaborators gets back to you with Judson's birth record, by all means, please add it in. Genuinely looking forward to seeing it.

"please let me know what profiles you are speaking about or refering to because this discussion is linked to so many profiles right now. ANd it looks like we are speaking on Benjamins profile right now. But then you mentioned the mother and father....."

I've been trying hard to do that, and I apologize if that hasn't always worked out.

The nature of Geni discussions is that they usually end up being about family units as opposed to individuals. Which makes sense, because trying to juggle a bunch of different discussion threads about the same people and their relationships to each other would be even more difficult.

The subject with Benjamin's name in the title is annoying since the questions are really about both him and Judson, but I can't change it now; sorry.

I believe the only profile I've edited is Judson's.

The question of the thread isn't whether Wheeler is William's child. It's whether Benjamin and Judson are.

Though, if you want to have a conversation about the document you just linked...that CSL abstract is for Bridgeport, Fairfield County, Connecticut, and it's for a Wheeler Cable who died six years before "your" Wheeler was born. And none of the Williams match your William.

"The highest possibility is that William is the father! He is in the right time and place for that relationship."

This is the one part of your statement where I have no disagreement with you at all. That is why I haven't cut the relationship -- it's not proven, but it's likely enough to be correct.

But the profile has to say that it's not proven and what the issues are...and if you can't live with that, you probably should consider what others have already suggested to you and not use collaborative trees.

Are you talking about Benjamin's birth place? I said three pages ago that his son's birth index card is totally fine to use as a source for him being born in Morris. Just remember to correct where you've listed it on Benjamin's profile as "Morris, New Preston," since that place doesn't exist.

Though I have to note that, no, a derivative birth index card from 1902 is not a primary source for Benjamin's birth in 1789. But it's totally fine for our purposes, especially since Benjamin presumably knew where he was born.

(You're going to post between now and the time I'm done responding about indices, so hang on, I'm typing...)

Sorry, had actual life to attend to. :)

There are two main types of source documents you'll encounter in genealogy: original and derivative.

An original document is exactly what it sounds like -- it's the version of the document that was created at the same time and in the same place where the event occurred.

Here's the original combined marriage license and certificate for Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd. This is the exact document that was created at the time their license was granted. It is original.

Here's the marriage index for that same event. It is obviously not the original document -- it's a derivative transcription of what was on the original, typed up by somebody at the Illinois State Public Record Offices, most likely in the 20th C.

Indices also commonly compile info from various events or people. What you keep calling Judson's "birth and death record" is a death index, because it's a document that the Washington registrar produced to show a list of everyone who died in Washington in 1873. It's not just Judson on the record; Judson is appearing with everyone else. That makes it an index. (And it's still totally valid to use.) Another example is a voter registration index, where it's not someone's original voter registration form, but rather a bunch of people's all together on one sheet.

Both original and derivatives are perfectly acceptable to use in genealogy -- but a derivative should always be noted as a derivative, because it's possible that the typist at the Illinois records office made a mistake, or that Ancestry.com made a mistake when transferring the data over.

In most New England towns, clerks over the years have gone through the original records and either handwritten or retyped the essential information onto what are known as index cards, because those are far easier for clerks to browse through than originals. A classic giveaway for an index card, other than the format, is the hole punched through the bottom, as seen on Henry T. Cable's index card. The fact that it's an index card -- a transcription of an original -- is why you were able to get a certified copy from the state; all original records prior to July 1, 1897 are held at the local level only. (And again, still perfectly acceptable! No problem using either format in genealogy. You haven't done anything wrong by using them.)

Here's the important thing: literally none of this matters to Judson or Benjamin. I simply tend to use the formal language out of habit, because I think it's good practice to distinguish between originals and derivatives. And I frankly just assumed you knew the terms, because I know you've said before that you're a professional genealogist, so I didn't think there'd be any confusion. My apologies that there was.

Ultimately, I don't think there's anywhere else for us to go with this conversation. Collaborative trees can be hard to work with if you're used to working on your own tree where you have total input and control, and I totally get why you don't find this experience enjoyable. If you'd like, I can ask to have the thread locked, and I will just make updates in the future as needed without starting discussion threads. Does that sound like a better plan?