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Click here to watch a video
presentation of this article.
Most women have absolutely no idea that they are eligible to
join the DAR. Basically, the purpose of this project is to
create a big neon sign that tells our distant cousins that they
are eligible. The project involves creating an
Ancestry.com public tree that documents the
children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, gg-grandchildren
etc. of your patriots as far down as possible to descendants who
died as recently as 1960 - present. A
critical aspect of this project is marking each direct
descendant with the appropriate designation by typing it in
parentheses after the surname:
(Child
of DAR Patriot)
(Grandchild of DAR Patriot)
(Great-Grandchild
of DAR Patriot)
(GG-Grandchild of DAR Patriot)
(GGG-Grandchild of DAR Patriot)
etc.
Below
are examples
of two Ancestry public trees for Revolutionary War patriots
documented in this manner.
Rebecca Waldron Yates
Benjamin Rice
In
order to participate in this project, you must:
* have an Ancestry.com account
*
create an Ancestry.com PUBLIC tree
* know how to attach documents to your tree
* allow messages through Ancestry's messaging system
There
are several reasons to participate.
*
It is lots
of fun.
*
You will hone your research skills.
* You will discover distant
cousins and help them join DAR.
*
This project will help us reach our goal of 250,000 members.
*
You will leave a legacy for future generations.
Step One:
Start Your Tree with Your Direct Line to Your Patriot
Begin
your Ancestry public tree with yourself, your parents, your
grandparents, your great-grandparents etc. all the way back to
your Revolutionary War patriot. Ancestry.com has two
tutorials for creating a family tree:
Starting Your Tree, Lesson 1
Building Your Tree, Lesson 2
For
yourself, just list your first name and maiden name (no dates
and places), and mark yourself as "Living." If your
parents are still living, do the same for them. For all
deceased Individuals, list birth, marriage, and death dates and
places (if known) and attach documentation from Ancestry and
FamilySearch.
Once
you complete your direct lineage to your Revolutionary War
patriot, mark each individual in the direct line by typing the
appropriate designation in parentheses after the surname.
For example, (DAR Patriot), (Child of DAR Patriot), (Grandchild
of DAR Patriot) etc.
Check Your Ancestry Settings and Update Your Profile
It is
very important that your Ancestry tree for this project is a PUBLIC tree.
Check your Tree Settings to confirm that your tree is
public. (NOTE: If you already have a private tree
that you want to keep private, start a different, new public
tree for this project.) Consider updating your
profile so a distant cousin will feel comfortable contacting
you. If you don't feel comfortable adding a picture of
yourself, add a picture of a flower or a kitten or something
nonthreatening to encourage communication.
Step Two: Find the Patriot's Children
Once
you have your direct line to your patriot on your tree, the next
step is to start with your patriot and add all of his/her
PROVABLE children. First, check the
DAR Ancestor Database,
and add all the established children listed on your patriot's
profile.
IMPORTANT NOTE: You will be using the DAR Ancestor and
DAR Descendants Databases a great deal for the early generations
in the lineage. Remember that if a child or grandchild of the
patriot is already approved on a previous DAR application, you
do not have to worry about documenting the parent-child
relationship. This is true even if the application is very
old assuming there is nothing indicating an EL (Error in
Lineage) in the DAR patriot's profile. However, if the
most recent application for a child or grandchild of the patriot
is very old and does not list dates and/or places, try to
document either a circa birth date and birth place (birth state
only is fine) OR a death date and death/burial place for each
person in each generation.
After adding all the established children listed in the patriot's
profile to your
tree, look for additional children of the patriot (i.e.,
children that are not listed in the DAR Ancestor Database).
To find all the children in each generation, search
Ancestry's Public Member Trees by typing 1)
a last name in the Last Name box, 2) a first name for the
Father, and 3) a first name AND maiden name for the Mother.
Leave everything else blank. If there are possible
spelling issues, use the asterisk for a wild-card search.
If you are able to document a link
between the patriot and additional children through records such
as wills, deeds, church records, guardianships etc., add
the other children to your tree and attach or link the documents to your tree.
IMPORTANT NOTE:
Only
add children and grandchildren of the patriot to your tree that
are EITHER 1) already proven on a previous DAR application, OR
2) have documentation that prove a parent-child relationship.
In
order to keep from getting confused, it is best to use a
systematic approach for adding people to your tree. I
suggest adding everyone in each generation before moving to the
next generation. In other words, add all the patriot's
provable children. After adding all the patriots provable
children, add all the patriot's provable grandchildren.
After adding all the patriot's provable grandchildren, add all
the patriot's provable great-grandchildren. Also, when you are
finished with working on your tree, be sure to write down where
you left off so you know where to start the next time you work
on it.
Step Three: Find the Patriot's Grandchildren
After adding
and documenting all the provable children of your patriot to
your tree, the
next step is to start working on all the provable grandchildren
of your patriot. Start with the patriot's oldest child,
and document his/her proven children. There are two ways
to find all the proven children of a child of the patriot (i.e.,
patriot's proven grandchildren), and you should use both methods.
1)
If the patriot's child is an established child of the patriot, go to the DAR Ancestor Database and
click the little purple D next
to each application for that child in
the patriot's profile.
2) Go
to the
DAR Descendants Database Advanced Search page and
search on the patriot's child name and the name of his/her
spouse. This strategy is important because a patriot's
grandchild may be linked to his/her parents on an application
for a DIFFERENT patriot (i.e., not the patriot you are
researching). Use the wild-card search for spelling
issues.
After identifying all the established grandchildren of the
patriot, look for additional grandchildren that are not listed
in the DAR databases. Search Ancestry's Public Member
Trees using the same strategy as
before
(i.e., last name, father's first
name, mother's first name, and mother's maiden name). To document grandchildren that are not in the DAR databases,
attach or link wills, deeds, vital records, county histories,
church records, guardianships, etc. to your tree.
After adding all the provable children of the patriot's oldest
child, next add all the provable children of the patriot's
second child. After adding all the provable children of the
patriot's second child, add all the provable children of the
patriot's third child and so on. Again, only add children and grandchildren of
the patriot to your tree that are EITHER 1) already proven on a
previous DAR application, OR 2) have documentation that prove a
parent-child relationship.
Step 4: Find the Patriot's Great-Grandchildren, GG-Grandchildren,
GGG-Grandchildren, etc.
To
find all the children of each couple in each generation, search
Ancestry's Public Member Trees with
the last name, father's first name, mother's first name, and
mother's maiden name. Be sure to mark each direct descendant in
each generation as (Child of DAR Patriot), (Grandchild of
DAR Patriot), (Great-Grandchild of DAR Patriot), (GG-Grandchild
of DAR Patriot) etc.
Once
you reach the patriot's great-grandchildren, documenting
parent-child relationships usually becomes much easier as the
great-grandchildren are often in their parents' household in the
1850 census. On the flip side, it starts to take a great
deal more time to complete each generation because the number of
people in your tree increases substantially. You can save
time if you avoid adding descendants to your tree that clearly
never married or never had children. For example, if a
couple married in 1905 and they do not have any children in the
1910, 1920, and 1930 censuses, do not add them to your tree.
When
you add people to your tree who were born after 1900, Ancestry
will mark them as Living.
To add a
death date, click Deceased. Even if the
person is probably deceased but you do not have an exact date of
death, mark them as Deceased.
Attaching Documents
To increase the
likelihood that a person will appear in the results of an Ancestry
Public Member Tree database search, attach at least one Ancestry record to that person. Thus, always try to attach at
least one Ancestry.com record to both
the husband and wife in
each generation in your tree. When attaching census
records and marriage records listing both the husband and wife,
attach the records to
both of them at the same time.
Adding Links to Documents
There
are many important documents and resources that are not found on
Ancestry.com. For example, Ohio death certificates from
1908-1953 are on FamilySearch and Missouri death certificates
1910-1969 are on Missouri Digital Heritage.
County and
town histories contain biographies that can establish a
parent-child relationship. When you find helpful resources
that are not Ancestry.com,
add a link to them to your tree.
Tips for Finding Documents
1)
When reviewing someone's Ancestry public tree that has lots of
attached records,
check the Gallery. If the owner of the tree
has scanned and uploaded records, usually they will only appear in
the Gallery.
2)
When attaching records to an individual in your tree, choose
View Record (not View Image). Review the
Suggested
Records as some of these records may also pertain
to the person. Census records generally have the most
Suggested Records.
3) To
find missing children, enter parents' names only in a
general search on FamilySearch as many birth, marriage, and death
records listing parents have been indexed. Leave the
Deceased Ancestor's Name fields blank.
Uploading a Scanned Document
You
may want to
upload a document such as an obituary or death
certificate. You can also make that document appear on the
person's main page as the profile photo so that it catches the
attention of visitors to the page. It is best to upload
.jpg files rather .pdf files.
Adding Comments and Notes
You
will want to
add Comments and Notes to your tree. Comments
are open to the public to view. Notes are only viewable by
the owner of the tree. Consider adding this comment for your DAR
Patriot in your tree, "He has been accepted by the Daughters of the American Revolution
(DAR) as a Revolutionary War patriot. His descendants are
eligible to join the DAR or SAR."
Finding Obituaries
Obituaries are extremely important in this project, especially
for the recent generations. Be sure to check Find-A-Grave
memorials for people in your tree as obituaries are often posted
there. Many obituaries from about 2005 to the present are
available online for free. If the death was 2005 -
present, search Google with the person's name and death year.
Add a city name to the search if needed. In addition, there are links
to many free newspapers and obituaries
on
this page.
If
you find an obituary, add a link to the obituary to your tree
(see Adding Links to Documents above). Also copy and paste the
text of the obituary into a Note so you have the text of the
obituary if the link is no longer active in the future.
(See Adding Comments and Notes above.) If you decide to
paste the text of the obituary in a Comment (open to public
view) rather than a Note (private), be aware that there
is
a
character limit for Comments. You will probably need
to edit the obituary.
1st Cousins vs. 2nd Cousins vs. 2nd Cousins Once Removed
For every direct descendant of your patriot in your Ancestry
tree, the person's profile will
indicate
how they are related to you. It is easy to
understand the difference between 1st cousins, 2nd cousins, 2nd
cousins once removed etc. without charts or other aids.
For example, if your closest shared relatives with another
individual are your Grandparents and they are also the
Grandparents of the other individual, you are 1st cousins.
However, if your Grandparents are the Great-Grandparents of the
other individual, you are 1st cousins once removed. If
your closest shared relatives are your Great-Grandparents and
they are also the Great-Grandparents of the other individual,
you are 2nd cousins. However, if your Great-Grandparents
are the Great-Great-Grandparents of the other individual, you
are 2nd cousins once removed.
*
First cousins share Grandparents
*
Second cousins share Great-Grandparents
*
Third cousins share GG-Grandparents
*
Fourth cousins share GGG-Grandparents * Fifth cousins share GGGG-Grandparents
* Sixth cousins share GGGGG-Grandparents
When two
individuals are not on the same level (e.g., GG-Grandparents for
one person are GGGG-Grandparents for another person), the person
closest to the common ancestors (e.g., GG-Grandparents)
determines the cousin number (e.g., 3rd cousins). The
number of generations that the two are separated determines the
number of removes (e.g., 2 times removed). Thus, if the closest
shared ancestors are the GG-Grandparents of someone in your tree
but they are your GGGG-Grandparents, then you are 3rd cousins 2
times removed.
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