Sticky wicket or family drama? How do you weigh in on less than perfect actions?

Susanne Floyd PRO

2/20/2021 at 8:16 AM

This is a different kind of discussion, but it has been weighing on me so I thought I would bring it up. Cemetery walks as a child with my grandmother caused me to post this thread. She had stories that made relatives come alive in many cases and those are the things I seek out today, but what happens when you find more than you thought for relatives you only knew from a gravestone?

I am posting this thread as I am currently dealing with a nest of one indirect line of relatives's family (fourth great uncle) and have found lost sons, documented military service, disappearances (and probably relocation to another region), but as of a few days ago, in working with the women of the Civil war era uncovered fatherless children, death certificates that list father's name as the spouse of another relative and supported by FAG connections that are open to the public. This has happened on more than one occasion. I have worked on attaching profiles of several DNA proven living relatives who are not attached by formal means with their consent and often at their request. The profiles are outside the age of issue with privacy and public on other platforms. I didn't know anything of great uncle Samuel but his name before all this and that anyone with his last name was most likely my cousin. It is a convoluted tale of a family - part of a larger family that had social standing and how they all coped or didn't cope with it.

I am just curious what issues others have with profiles less than perfect and how you resolve the issues.

I have two cousins (different lines) hanged for murder since 1800 and I grew up hearing stories about them so it was important to document them on here. I've used third party sources in both accounts. Of course, family stressed their innocence or worse gave odd justifications. (At one time, Horry County had more "justifiable" homicides than any other county in the US. I think that "justifiable" is a term made up by a strange swamp culture, but I digress.)

I've one who was killed for desertion multiple times in the Civil War, though his father was a War of 1812 veteran and other brothers served in the Civil War to the end. It was one of those stories when talked about was accompanied by sad head shaking. Then there are all those "Corn Makers." All this kinda keeps me grounded from thinking about the Royals and is so much worth the effort to uncover them, but a huge responsibility, don't you think when you grew up knowing of them? What have been your profile dilemmas and how have you resolved them internally and externally?

Private User

2/20/2021 at 10:04 PM

We have a great many ancestors who committed crimes, in the Brannen family. And usually that makes me no never mind; they are long dead. So I put the stories in.

However.

One of my second cousins made the National news with his crimes, and he is still alive.

I just left that story out. Geni doesn’t need it.

Private User

2/20/2021 at 10:08 PM

I’m reminded, though, that great uncle Herschel wouldn’t let anybody talk about great grandfather Walker,, who had been sentenced to death for murder, though he got pardoned.

I did not obey this order, however. For one thing, I lived in another state. For another, great grandfather Walker wrote an autobiography about the whole thing, and I figure if you write a book about it it’s not a secret.

Susanne Floyd PRO

2/20/2021 at 10:09 PM

Private User, yes, I think any who are alive or recent need to have some time lapse. Things look different over time. Better or worse.

Steven Mitchell Ferry C

2/21/2021 at 7:56 AM

Once you start down the rabbit hole it's tough to turn around. I recently learned that a great grandmother took an axe to her then 19 month old son. He survived till the age of 9, so murder was not charged. But she was tried and determined to me insane. Spent the rest of her life in an asylum near Austin, Texas. Her daughter, my grandmother (who told me so many family stories) never said a word about it, and my mother didn't know until i recently told her.

Found a 9th great grandmother who was tried in Massachusetts as a witch (Mary Bliss Parsons) and acquitted. Many more stories.

And don't even get me started on the Welsh lines on both sides of my lineage. Quite a bunch of cousin killing folk they were.

Private User

2/23/2021 at 7:28 AM

I actually found out about my briefly infamous second cousin when I was looking for sources for his Geni profile. And then suddenly there he was! In national newspapers! And Wikipedia! Last time I’d seen or heard of him we’d been eating barbecue at a family reunion.

By the way — the Black Sheep Genealogy Society, which you can join if you have badly behaved ancestors, used to exist on its own; now it seems to live over at MyHeritage. I qualify for it under the murder qualification, two times that I can think of.

I’ve long considered starting a Descendants of Executioners society, but since it would be mostly to annoy my cousins, I keep forgetting.

Susanne Floyd PRO

2/23/2021 at 2:14 PM

Private User, so wicked! I love it! I would certainly qualify for the Black Seep Genealogy Society for multiple reasons, but as you note, it would just irritate my relatives.

Susanne Floyd PRO

2/23/2021 at 2:15 PM

Seems like I have a European witch, Steven Mitchell Ferry. I cannot for the life of me remember who it was now.

Sticky wicket or family drama? How do you weigh in on less than perfect actions?

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