My Mother’s Maternal Shared Matches

In my previous Blog, I set out to look at my mother’s Nicholson Shared Matches, but ended up looking at both Lentz and Nicholson from her maternal match list. That Blog was successful, so I want to continue down her maternal match list.

Here are the next three on my mother’s maternal match list:

Hannah

Hannah has no tree and is more difficult to place.

Justin is Hannah’s first cousin or half uncle:

As Justin is on the bottom of the Chart, my first guess would be 1st cousin. Judy is her grandmother or Aunt:

I’m guessing grandmother.

Paige is her half sister or Aunt:

I’ll say Aunt. That narrows it down:

This should be the likely connection.

Michele

Michele shows a Nicholson in her tree, but I have never heard of this person:

I do show this tree in my records:

Perhaps I had started investigating this line before. This seems worth pursuing.

In 1871, Frances was a servant in Sheffield:

She was born in Darnall. according to the 1871 Census:

Here is the family in 1861:

I think I see the family now:

However, the dates don’t quite match up between the Henrys in my tree and Michelle’s Henry.

Ancestry thinks her parents are Benjamin and Rebecca.

The family was in Worcester, Massachusetts in 1900:

They probably married about the year 1880.

Henry Nicholson

Father Henry is also in Worcester in 1900. Good news:

Unfortunately, his death record does not shine a lot of light on the situation:

My assumption is that he lived alone as there was no informant listed. Henry was in Sheffield with his young wife in 1851:

The transcriber says that Ann was born in Walkley, Yorkshire:

I am guessing that Henry and Ann married in 1850 or 1851.

The death record for Ann is more helpful:

Here I would like to thank Henry for putting down his wife’s parents’ information. There were two Henry Nicholsons in the 1841 Sheffield Census, so the information on the above death certificate could be important.

Here is Ann in Nether Hallam, Sheffield in 1841:

The family was living at Walkley Bank. I wonder if the town of Walkley was wrong. Nether Hallam sounds familiar from my Nicholson research, so I may be on to something here. Here is the wedding:

This is from the Sheffield Indexers site, but I had to use Firefox to get it to work. Here is some more information:

Now I have another problem as I have not been tracking a Joseph Nicholson. However, I do have this Joseph on my Nicholson Web Page:

He would have been quite old in 1830 – about 63. Here is a baptism of a Henry:

Assuming the baptism was not at an independent church, this could be the Henry I am looking for. That means that this could be the right Census record:

But who is John Nicholson, head of household? This is likely Sarah and Joseph:

Next, who was this Joseph? The marriage record gives no father. My web page manetions a Joseph born in 1767. If this is the Joseph, he would have been 46 at marriage. This would be unusual for a bachelor. Here is a record from Sheffield:

This Joseph would 34 when he married. Also the baptism took place at Wortley. This is North of Sheffield and this Joseph is a labourer rather than a cutler. I’m ready to stop researching this line. I feel like the connection is quite old.

Robert

Robert’s connection to my mother is much closer than Michele’s.

We already have one child of Joan on the chart:

Karen is Robert’s likely Aunt:

To confirm, Joshua is Robert’s 1st cousin:

Next 5 of My Mom’s Maternal Matches

I added Justin earlier in the Blog.

Jason is the son of Carolyn:

I’ll add him to my chart next to Heidi:

For some reason I had not entered Barbara. Here she is on lower left below:

The Nicholson family tree is rapidly expanding.

Sue

Doris is Sue’s mother:

In my previous Blog, I had Doris in the 1st cousin range to Barry from the English Branch of Nicholsons:

Elise

Elise shows as 1st cousin to Joshua and Robert and niece to Karen, so I put her as shown above.

Summary and Conclusions

  • Most matches that I looked at on my mother’s maternal side at this level were easy to place or figure out on my Nicholson DNA/Genealogy Chart
  • One match was difficult to place. I did a lot of genealogy, but was still unable to find Michelle’s Nicholson connection.
  • The Nicholson DNA/Genealogy Chart is expanding
  • It would be worth my while to further look at my mother’s maternal matches.

 

Updating Philadelphia Baker and Surrick ThruLines

In the past, I have looked at some of my Baker ThruLines on my mother’s side. This is my summary on a Baker DNA/Genealogy Chart that I made:

This Chart goes back to some of my 4th cousins on average. However, ThruLines go back to 6th cousins. That means that this chart is undersized.

Here are my ThruLines going back one more generation to an earlier Conrad Baker:

I already have a tree for Ruth’s maternal side:

Ancestry suggests Conrad Baker and Mary Surrick as the parents of Sophia Baker.  I would have to assume that they are correct. All indications are that the tree is correct, though there are few original sources.

Here is a source from the Daughters of the American Revolution:

Here is the extra generation added to my Baker Tree:

Based on this Ancestry Tree, Conrad had many children:

My ancestor was the first wife Mary Surrick who apparently died before 1796. That means that most of the children must have been through Susanne Fraley. Also, according to these trees, this Conrad was bron in New York.

This tree shows that Sophie Baker Andress had quite a few childre also:

This increases the chance of having a DNA match.

Going Back Before Baker to Surrick

I notice that my mother has some Surrick ThruLines:

Why not take a look at some of these matches?

ldclouser has a good tree. Here is her Druck Line going back to Surrick:

Surrick seems to be an unusual surname:

According to Ancestry, there were 6 Surrick families living in Pennsylvania in 1840 and they were found nowhere else in the US. However, the good news it it appears that could narrow down the genealogy.

My own tree does not go back to Philip Surrick, so this may be a good time to amend my tree:

Checking LD’s Tree

One good thing about a rare surname is that the connection is more likely to be real to that surname between two families. Here is Mahlon’s family in 1930.

Here is Bart, to the West of Philadelphia in Lancaster County:

At this point, I should be following Kathryn’s Line. The death certificate and marriage record for Mason Druck has his wife as Katherine or Catherine Smeltzer. Here is a child’s birth certificate:

Here is Catharine in Chanceford, PA in 1900:

Catharine’s father was a cigar manager and her mother was a cigar maker. In the Census, her mother appears to be Lucy, but this obituary has her mother as:

In 1860 Philadelphia, 19th Ward, I find this record:

Here is Catherine who was supposed to be born in 1864 according to findagrave was born probably in 1859.

This Tree at Ancestry for John Smeltzer shows that he had two wives:

The first died in 1893.

This is my tree so far:

According to ThruLines, I am alsmost there. I see a George Surrick in 1850:

He is living in the Richmond Districk of Philadelphia. His father appears to be Philip Surrick. The ThruLines wanted to show Georges father as George and his grandfather as Philip. However, I see what happened. There was more than one George Surrick in Philadelphia. The above was a different, George W Surrick:

He was a ropemaker like his father and he married Anna.

Here is the George that I am interested in:

He is living in Chanceford with the husband of his late daughter Catharine. I don’t agree with the birth date here. I think it should be around 1835.

Here is some more information on George:

This tells us that George was in the Civil War.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I was able to expand my Baker DNA/Genealogy Tree by looking at ThruLines
  • The earliest ancestors on that tree are Conrad Baker born 1764 and his wife Mary Surrick
  • I had thought that I would be able to create a Surrick DNA/Genealogy Tree based on ThruLines, but I was unable to figure out a good connection between Surrick descendants and basically, my mom.
  • I may try again at some point. This would involve extending my known tree out to the parents of Mary Surrick.

 

Reviewing a Lentz ThruLine

My DNA evidence for my Lentz ancestry has seemed scant. Here is one ThruLine worth looking at:

This depiction shows that I match the descendants of two children of Anna Eliza Glenn. Anna is shown as the daughter of Eliza Lentz, the daughter of our proposed Common Ancestor John A Lentz.

My Mother’s Lentz ThruLines

Before I check the Ancestry, I’ll look at some other ThruLines. It would make sense to look at my mother’s first:

She has better ThruLines from Eliza plus she shows a William Andrew Lentz Line.

Glenn Genealogy

Three Glenn matches support the genealogy of this Thruline through Eliza Lentz. I doubt that the DNA test taken was really for the daughter of Lydia King about as that person died in 2011. This was before Ancestry was doing DNA tests:

Usually, I start from the present and work back. In this case, I’ll start with my tree and work down to the present. This is because the DNA matches look good and the genealogy looks likely. Right now, I don’t have a spouse for Eliza Lentz:

This hint at Ancestry appears to be correct:

The marriage took place 16 February 1840 in Kensington, PA. Here is Eliza in Kensington in 1850 with her boat builder husband:

Here is Eliza’s burial information:

She died three years after my ancestor Jacob Lentz. Here is his marker – also at the Palmer Burying Ground:

This record shows where Eliza was living at the time of her death:

I believe that her brother lived on Frankford Ave.

Anna Eliza Glenn

ThruLines indicates that Anna Eliza Glenn was in the ancestry of my mother’s three DNA matches. Anna Eliza shows as plain Eliza in the 1850 Census above. Here is Ann E Glenn in 1870:

It appears that the census taker missed a lot of information. Also Frances hasn’t married at age 30 at this time.

Here is Elizabeth Glenn Williams’ Death Certificate:

This gets us one step further down the tree.

Starting Back with the King Family Tree

Really, the right way is to start in the present and work back. Here is the tree I am looking at:

I just have to verify that Dolores goes beack to Eliza Lentz. First I am looking at Lydia M (Lottie) King. Here she is in the 1900 Census in Philadelphia:

She is a waitress and her father is a carpenter. That gets my tree looking like this:

The name Liza King is from the Census – though that was not her maiden name of course. Here is a death record from Clara Gavin that names her parents as Sidney King and Anna E Glenn:

Here is some information from the findagrave website:

The next step is connecting Ann Eliza Glenn to her mother who we expect is Eliza Lentz. I believe that I already made the connection with the marriage record I mentioned at the top of the Blog. This record gives no parents for the bride or groom, but I assume that they have the right Eliza Lentz. The location of where she lived compared to her Lentz family as well as to her age at time at marriage seem to say we have the right Eliza Lentz.

Ella, Clara and Lydia

The ThruLines mention Ella, Clara and Lydia:

Lydia was the line I looked at above.

I mentioned Clara in a death certificate above (Clara Virginia Gavin).

Ella is seen on the 1880 Census for Philadelphia:

Ella’s father is on the previous page of the Census.

The William Lentz Connection

Here are my mother’s small DNA matches to descendants of William Lentz:

I will look at Debbie’s connection as she is a fourth cousin. The other matches are fourth cousins once removed. Here is Debbie’s tree:

The tree is small, but goes back to Lentz. I don’t have much information on Harriet Lentz on my Ancestry Tree:

It turns out that I made a tree for Debbie years ago:

This was made before Ancestry had ThruLines. At the time, they were using a concept called ‘Circles’. All I need to do is to add to my Ancestry Tree. Here are Emma and Harriet from my Ancestry Tree information:

Mary and William Davenport

The two William ThruLine Lines above are for William and Mary Davenport. Here they are in the 1900 Census for Philadelphia:

Harriet’s husband Claudius was a saw maker. These children were born in New York according to the Census.

Comparing Lentz ThruLines to Nicholson ThruLines

My mom is part Lentz and part Nicholson on her maternal side. Here is a comparible Nicholson Thruline with a match in the 4th cousin range:

I never doubted my mom’s NIcholson heritage, yet there is only one match going to her comparible 3rd great-grandfather on that Line. It shows that my feeling of not enough Lentz DNA matches was irrational.

Summary and Conclusions

  • All my mother’s ThruLines under John A Lentz born 1792 appear to check out
  • This is satisfying as I thought that there were very few Lentz DNA matches
  • Altogether my mother has 7 DNA matches descending from the John A Lentz Line
  • It appears that the ThruLines are effective at the 3rd great-grandfather level which compares to a match of a 4th cousin.
  • It would be interesting to see how many 3rd great-grandparents even have ThruLines

New DNA Match Derek at Ancestry with Possible Ellis Ancestry

I checked recently for unviewed DNA matches at Ancestry with a common ancestor and came up with Derek. He matches me at 15 cM:

Derek has a tree with 49 people, but shows no Ellis ancestry:

However, Derek’s tree shows that his parents were from Sheffield which is where my Ellis ancestors lived. Here is the connection that Ancestry shows:

Derek shows as a 4th cousin once removed to me.

My Shared Matches with Derek

If we have an Ellis shared ancestor, then we should have shared DNA matches with others who descend from the Ellis family. When I check that, there are about 4 people that I know descend from the Ellis family:

Checking Derek’s Genealogy

Derek’s tree does not show a link to the Ellis family. However, I would be interested in checking out Ancestry’s ThruLines:

Derek is the only one showing descending from James Ellis on my ThruLines.

I’ll check out Derek’s genealogy by creating my own tree for him:

This gets me out to about the level that Derek had. Here is William H Pullen in the 1871 Census for Sheffield:

They are living in Nether Hallam and William’s father is listed as a saw grinder. Unfortunately, Ancestry has the surname transcribed as “Gullen’. William’s mother is listed as Emma. She is born about 1839 in Sheffield.

It would be nice to have a marriage record for father William Pullen. Here is a record but it is to a Tattershall:

One Ancestry tree I have shows Emma’s mother as a Tattershall:

That is confusing. Here is another tree:

This tree has the wedding date for Emma and William. I might assume that Emma was previously married. However, this Emma appears to have been a spinster:

Here is where I believe that St Philips Church was based on a current map:

The 1881 Census

The 1881 Census appears to be the key for Emma being an Ellis:

Here we have William Pullings which I take to be the same as Pullen. He is married to Emma. Living with them is father-in-law James Ellis and brother-in-law Harry Ellis.  That should connect Emma to her father James Ellis and Emma to her brother Harry Ellis. That means that this is likely Emma in the 1851 Census:

Here is the 1861 Census showing Emma still single:

The census was taken on 7 April 1861. So, if Emma Ellis is the same as Emma Tattershall, then she could have married later in the year at the end of July.

Conflicting Evidence?

It appears that there is some conflicting evidence. One possibility is that there were two William Pullens. Although, it does not seem that Pullen is a common name, that is possible:

Here are two different people by the name of William Pullen. One is in Sheffield and one is in Ecclesfield. Ecclesfield is 4 miles to the North of Sheffield:

However, for this to work out, I suppose that the two Williams would have had to have married two Emmas. Also possible, but less likely. [Note: Based on conclusions below, the correct William was from Sheffield son of William based on the marriage record between William and Emma Tattershall.]

Are Emma Ellis and Emma Tattershall the Same Person?

Here is a record for the wedding of James Ellis and Caroline Tattershall. Here is an entry from a Sheffield area Newspaper published on 21 May 1842:

This gives a wedding record for James and Caroline. Also we see that James’ wife was a Tattershall. It appears that Emma could have taken on her mother’s maiden name. Here is a timeline for Caroline Tattershall:

If I have things right, this is showing that Emma was born about three years before James Ellis and Caroline Tattershall were married. This brings up the possibility that James Ellis may not have been the father of Emma. That brings up the question of why there would be a DNA match then.

Here is an interesting record:

This baptismal record gives Emma’s full name as Emma Ellis Tattershall. Could this suggest that James Ellis was the father of Emma? I think that this is about all that the records will reveal to me at this time. The rest must be based on speculation. I would guess that connection that Ancestry has would be correct, but it would be nice to see connections through some of the other siblings of Emma. The fact that Emma’s middle name was Ellis in addition to the DNA match suggest that James Ellis was likely her father.

Here is my best guess for the connection between Derek and myself:

Summary and Conclusions

  • Derek and I match by DNA. Ancestry traces that DNA match to possible common ancestors of Charles Ellis and Ann Roebuck
  • Derek and I have shared DNA matches with other Ellis descendants
  • Derek’s genealogy was confusing as his ancestor married an Emma Tattershall not Emma Ellis
  • The record shows that Emma was baptized Emma Ellis Tattershall about three years before her mother Caroline Tattershall and James Ellis married
  • My guess is that James and Caroline had Emma before they were married and married later and had more children. This guess is based on DNA matches and Emma’s middle name of Ellis.
  • I created a tree showing how the two lines got to be about a generation apart over the years.

 

My Sister Heidi’s Nicholson Match at MyHeritage

I noticed recently that my sister Heidi has a match with Kenneth at MyHeritage. They have a Theory of Relativity that looks like this:

This Theory put Heidi and Kenneth at 4th cousins once removed and the connection goes back to 1765. There are no shared matches between Kenneth and Heidi that I readily recognize. Also Kenneth’s tree is managed by someone else and is private.

Kenneth’s match also is not strong:

Connecting Heidi to Kenneth by Genealogy

I would usually try to connect going from the present to the past rather than the other way round. I see that the manager of Kenneth’s tree is from the UK which is probably a good thing as the Nicholson family was from Sheffield, UK.

I see that this is the Armstrong family in 1901 in Carlisle:

This tends to confirm the Theory at the bottom (more recent) level:

Of course, the Census does not give Mary A’s maiden name. All Ancestry Trees plus a probate record identify Mary Ann as a Lawrence. I’ll just accept the two hints, but the family is still in the Region of Cumberland:

At this point, the road I want to go down is the Hannah Nicholson road, but Ancestry gives me no hints. The 1881 Census has Hannah born in Renwick:

Renwick is quite a hike from Sheffield.

Here is a marriage record from Ancestry:

Here are Hannah and her parents in 1841:

The ‘y’ in the last column indicates that everyone was born in the same county – which would be Cumbria. The connection to Sheffield is not looking good.

Pulling the Plug

At this point, the connection does not seem feasible. The John Nicholson in my tree was married to Martha Jow:

Summary and Conclusions

  • I had hopes that a Theory of Relativity at MyHeritage would lead to an actual connection between my sister Heidi and Kenneth
  • I checked out Kenneth’s tree and his Nicholson ancestors were in Cumbria to the North of England while mine (and Heidi’s) were in Sheffield England
  • MyHeritage did have the confidence as low, and the DNA match was small

Nicholson 4th Cousin Nancy at Ancestry

When I was looking at my sister’s DNA matches at Ancestry, I came across Nancy. She also matches me and we show common ancestors:

Ancestry want me to evaluate the tree. I suppose I can start with mary Ellen Nicholson. Here are the basics that Nancy has on Mary Ellen:

The thing I find interesting about Nancy is that she descends from Henry Nicholson who shows as the brother of my 2nd great-grandfather’s brother William. William was from a large family. Here are his siblings:

I also have my own DNA Matching Genealogy Tree:

This is part of the tree. I see I already have Michelle on the Henry Nicholson Branch. I suppose that is a good sign. I wrote a Blog including Michelle here.

My genealogy-only Tree doesn’t have Walter:

Doing the Genealogy to Try to Connect to Nancy

The best way to make the connection is not from the top down but from the present to the past. I’ll start a tree for Nancy:

Based on Arie’s Naturalization papers, Arie and Mary Ellen married in Sheffield, England and Mary Ellen was also born in Sheffield:

Based on this, I take this to be the Nicholson family in 1911:

All family members were born in Sheffield according to this Census.

More on Joseph Nicholson

I can get back to the 1901 Census before Mary Ellen was born:

Here is some more information from the 1901 Census:

Here is what I have for Joseph and Mary Ellen’s children:

Mary Ellen should be Boothroyd. I think that one of the record transcriptions was off. I have Joseph at least later associated with Brightside Bierlow:

In 1891, there are two Josephs associated with Ecclesall Bierlow.

Mary Ellen Boothroyd

Here is Mary Ellen in 1881:

Mary Ellen’s father was a Carter as was her later husband Joseph Nicholson. She also lived in Brightside Bierlow, so perhaps Joseph went to live near where she was from.

Back to Joseph Nicholson

FamilySearch has these two Josephs born in Sheffield:

Neither of these two have the father Walter as suggested by Ancestry. The one with the fathe Henry is promising as Joseph’s first son was named Henry. However, I’m ruling him out as he appears in the 1901 Census:

Here is a Joseph in the 1881 Census:

He appears to be the son of George and Mary Ann Nicholson and the grandson of Mitalda(?) Nicholson. I was looking in the Ecclesall Bierlow area, so that meets that criteria.

The 1891 Census Gives a Clue

Here Joseph is a Carter:

That is too much of a coincidence for me to overlook in an area that was known for the metal industry. Time to deviate from the Ancestry Common Ancestry Tree to see where this leads us:

Ancestry wants me to put in William Nicholson for the father of Joseph Nicholson. Unfortunately, I am unfamiliar with this line. Perhaps the connection is on another line.

Trying the Top Down Method

This is the less preferrred method, but perhaps I can test out the Ancestry model this way. Here are two records for Henry Nicholson:

As these are both bachelors, they must be two different people. Interestingly, one is the son of Joseph and one is the son of Matthew. Matthew is my 3rd great-grandfather. I have Henry married to Ann Bainbridge:

I’m not sure where I got that so I’ll change her to Elizabeth Bradshaw. That could mean that the work I had done on a previous Blog on Michelle (mentioned above in the Blog) could be wrong.

Henry and Elizabeth in the Census

Here is a Henry and Elizabeth listed as visitors. They also have a son Walter. However, how did Henry and Elizabeth get three sons if they just married in 1850? Nothing seems to add up.

Back to Michelle

I mentioned Michelle near the top of this Blog. It appears now that I have drawn her connection incorrectly and too hastily. Now it is back to the drawing board or in this case, Nicholson Tree. Here is part of Michele’s tree:

Here is 4 year old Francis Emily in 1861:

10 years earlier, this couple had no children:

This is likely the Ann Nixon that I mentioned above.

This is where things get complicated again. I found an Ann Nixon who died in Worcester, MA:

Unfortunately, Henry’s death record is missing his parent’s information:

However, from the marriage record, we know that the Henry Nicholson who married Ann Nixon had as his father Joseph Nicholson. I will go with this for Henry’s birth:

This is the closest I could find in the 1841 Census:

Here, there are many possibilities:

  • I may have the wrong family
  • Joseph may have died, but then who is John
  • Joseph may have been a John Joseph or Joseph John
  • The Census taker may have gotten the name wrong

Assuming that Joseph and Sarah are the right names, here is a wedding transcription:

I assume that this is the same family in 1851 and that the husband is correctly named now:

Henry married a local girl as the Nixon family is on the same page. I also see that Joseph was born in Thorne.

The red marker is where Thorne is.

Will the Real Nicholson Relative Please Stand Up?

I have taken Michele off of my DNA relative chart. I believe she is related, but I haven’t figured out how or where right now. Both these lines end up in the Thorne area. From my early genealogical Nicholson guesswork, I did have a Joseph Nicholson in the mix:

Concerning the Walter in the Ancestry connection shown at the top of the Blog, I coudln’t find that he had a son named Joseph. This is what one Ancestry tree shows for Walter which appears to be accurate:

Summary and Conclusions

  • Sometimes it is difficult to figure out how DNA matches match by genealogy
  • When I took Michele’s genealogy back it ended with someone who died in Thorne
  • When I took Nancy’s genealogy back, the Nicholson side also ended up in Thorne
  • These DNA matches may hark back to an earlier Nicholson connection or they may connect with an associated line to the Nicholsons.
  • At very least, I was able to correct a past mistake. I had William Nicholson’s brother Henry married to an Ann where he was apparently married to Elizabeth Bradshaw.
  • I would like to give credit to the Sheffield Indexer Website where I was able to find important Nicholson baptismal and marriage records

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two New Nicholson DNA Matches

I just noticed that I had a new Nicholson DNA match named Jessica:

Jessica shows to match on my mother’s side. Ancestry has already figured out that Jessica and I have a common ancestor:

Ancestry would like me to evaluate Jessica’s tree. The Docrill threw me off a bit, as I have a Maria Baxter Nicholson in my tree:

I also had that Maria died in 1866. I wonder where I found that. Perhaps I got the wrong person:

In 1861, I have that Maria Baxter Nicholson was living in Liverpool with her grandmother Ann Ellis:

This is why I like Census records so much. They tell quite a story. Here we have three generations of Nicholsons. From a previous Blog, I have that Ann Baxter is Ann Ellis who is the daughter of the elder Ann Roebuck Ellis listed in the Census:

I see this record online:

One reason this marriage to George Dockrill makes sense is that the Dockrill name is carried down in the US in Walter Nicholson’s Line:

This name must have been given in this family to rememer the Nicholson sister Maria who stayed in England. Assuming we have this right, Walter would have been a younger brother of Maria Baxter Nicholson. He named his son George Dockrell or Dockrill Nicholson.

More DNA Matches for Jessica

As it was not easy to find a marriage record between Maria Baxter Nicholson and George Nehemiah Dockrill, let’s look at some more DNA matches. Jessica matches my mother at 128 cM:

That is a substantial match. That means that I need to erase the early death record I had for Maria Nicholson. I’ll also add Jessica to my Nicholson DNA match Tree:

Jessica is in the first column.

Another DNA Match with Michelle

I can look at DNA matches that are shared between Jessica and my Mom. I see an interesting shared DNA match with Michelle and my Mom. They share 59 cM across three segments. Here is Michelle’s tree on her paternal side:

My attention is drawn to Michelle’s ancestor Francis Nicholson. When I search Ancestry for Francis, I find this record in someone’s tree:

My web page on the Nicholsons has a Henry here:

There is also a Matthew Henry on my web page, but this one makes more sense as Henry is the older brother of William who is my 2nd great grandfather. The tree above has this Henry born 1831 and I have him born 1822, so that is a bit of a discrepancy. The tree above has Henry married to Ann Bainbridge. I have Matthew Henry married to Mary Ann Bailey.

Here is Matthew Henry and Mary Ann Bailey in 1861:

Matthew Henry was a boss of some type and his sister-in-law was the housemaid. It looks like he had an adopted daughter Mary. That seems to rule out Matthew Henry as Michelle’s direct ancestor.

More on Henry Nicholson

Here is Henry and family in 1861:

Here we still have the age discrepancy. If Henry was 29 in 1861, then that is where the later birth of 1832 must come from. I believe that this is the same Henry in 1841:

Concerning Henry’s age:

Ages in the 1841 Census

The census takers were instructed to give the exact ages of children but to round the ages of those older than 15 down to a lower multiple of 5. For example, a 59-year-old person would be listed as 55.

That means that Henry would have actually been around 18 in 1841. Henry’s father Matthew had died the year before in 1840. In 1841 Henry was a cutler and in 1861, he was a table knife [hafter?].

Here I have added Michelle and Henry Nicholson into my DNA/Ancestry tree. That means that Michelle is Gladys’ (my mother’s) third cousin once removed. This is where the DNA gives some confidence to the relationship when some of the genealogical records are missing.

Summary and Conclusions

  • I don’t get many new third cousin DNA matches, so Jessica was a good find
  • Jessica descends from Maria Nicholson. I was not aware of this Nicholson Line before I found out about the DNA match with Jessica.
  • Jessica and my mother have a shared match with Michelle. Michelle descends from Henry Nicholson. The DNA connection fills in some of the missing or not yet found yet genealogical records.

Another Nicholson Heard from at 23andMe

Lately I have been reaching out to Nicholson descendants at 23andMe who match me by DNA. The last one that I had identified was Dave and I wrote a Blog about my match with him here.

It turns out that this match is with Cynthia who is Dave’s sister. I didn’t realize that until I just checked. Cynthia’s common matches with me.

This shows that David is my third cousin and Cythia’s brother.

Here is how we match. I’ll need to add Cynthia into David’s box on the lower right. Cynthia didn’t know much beyond her Nicholson grandfather. I have more on the Nicholson family here. Here is Walter’s baptismal record from Kensington Presbyterian Church:

Walter is Cynthia’s Nicholson great-grandfather. Walter and his brother George Dockrill Nicholson were both baptized on April 4, 1886 when they were 10 or 11. Cynthia’s grandfather George Dockrill Nicholson was named for Walter’s brother.

My DNA Match with Cynthia

My DNA match with Cynthia is similar to the one I have with her brother David, but larger:

Here is my match with David:

I match David on the same Chromosomes but for less on each Chromosome.

I had added David to my Chromosome map, now I can add Cynthia. Here is Cynthia on Chromosome 8:

My match with Cynthia is represented by the third purple bar. Her match overlaps some with Linda. In order for these people to match me, each of our unique mixes of chromosome inheritances have to match up. David and Cynthia’s DNA matches with me do not overlap with each other

Other people that match me on this Chromosome are Linda, Carolyn, Beth and Robert.

Robert and Beth are the great-grandchildren of Sarah Nicholson, my great-grandmother Annie’s older sister. Linda and Carolyn descend from Nellie Nicholson and David and Cynthia descend from Walter Nicholson. David and
Cynthia also have a 1st cousin Robert, but he tested at AncestryDNA, so he doesn’t have detailed DNA comparison information unless he uploads his results to Gedmatch, MyHeritage or Famly Tree DNA (FTDNA).

My DNA Match with Cynthia on Chromosome 20

We have two copies of each of our chromosomes. Both Cynthia and I match on our maternal copy of our Chromosome 20. That is because that is our Nicholson side.

Chromosome 20 is one of the shorter chromosomes. Judith descends from my closer Lentz and Nicolson ancestors, so she is in a different color. Cynthia’s DNA match with me on this chromosome overlaps my match with David and Carolyn, meaning we all got the same DNA from William Nicholson or his wife Martha Ellis there.

Here is what my maternal chromosomes look like now:

Cynthia brought my maternally mapped DNA up a percentage to 38%. The purple represents DNA from my great-grandmother Annie Nicholson. I have eight great-grandparents, so that represents roughly 12.5% of all of my DNA or 25% of my maternal side DNA. Taking this one step further:

5.5% divided by 12.5% is 44%. That is the amount of DNA from William Nicholson and Martha Ellis that I have mapped now.

Visual Phasing

I have mapped out by visual phasing where I got my DNA from each of my grandparents on all my chromosome. Here is Chromosome 8:

I am the third person on the chart. All my maternal side (green) DNA came from my maternal grandmother who was a Lentz. However, this is my Nicholson side also as my grandmother’s mother was a Nicholson. That explains why I match Nicholsons well on this Chromosome. My sister Lori has the second most Lentz DNA on the bottom row.

Here is Chromosome 20 for me and my siblings:

Again, I have all green or Lentz. By looking at my siblings’ DNA, you can get a good idea how DNA is inherited differently by each sibling. For example, my sister Sharon would not match Cynthia on this Chromosome as she has a lot of Rathfelder DNA on Chromosome 20. But she may match on another chromosome where I con’t match Cynthia.

23andMe Family Tree

23andMe suggests that I add Cynthia to their tree:

I also added David on the lower left part of the tree.

 

DNA Relative Chris at 23andMe – a Lentz/Nicholson Descendant?

I wrote to Chris about a year and a half ago because we had a good DNA match at 23andMe. I perhaps confused Chris by mentioning another common relative named Judy as Chris would not have known the last name of Judy. I sent a message recently about being able to see Chris’ DNA results and got a message back that Chris didn’t know Judy but was curious about her ancestry. I’m curious as to where we connect also.

My DNA Connection with Chris

Here are the places that Chris and I share DNA. Based on the amount of DNA we share, 23andMe guesses that we are 2nd cousins once removed. 23andMe also put my match with Chris onto their Family Tree:

 

The Judith who I mentioned is on the left. She descends from William Lentz. By the way that 23andMe has the tree, it seems like Chris should descend from one of William’s siblings. That is assuming that the tree was created correctly. I know that Judith is my 2nd cousin. 23andMe think that Chris and I are 2nd cousins once removed. That means that he was born a generation after me.

Here are Jacob Lentz and Annie Nicholson:

Jacob is wearing a bow tie and Annie is to his right. My grandmother Emma is in front of Annie and my mother is in front of Emma. This is what I have for the other people:

TOP – Uncle Stanley, grandfather Lentz, Grandmother Lentz
MIDDLE – Aunt Agnes, Cousin Hazel, Gladys’ Mom
BOTTOM – Cousin Doris, Rob, Cousin Rob Poole, Muriel, Gladys

Some Lentz Genealogy

Since I have looked at a DNA tree, let’s look at the Lentz familyTree

Judy descends from William. I descend from Emma. That leaves Stanley and Agnes for Chris. I don’t see a record that Agnes’ son Robert was married or had children. That seems to leave Stanley Lentz.

Stanley Lentz Born 1894

These are the children I have for Stanley:

I couldn’t find much information about Hazel Lentz.

This findagrave.com record suggests that Doris may never have married:

Stanley Lentz

He had these children:

That filled in some more of my Lentz genealogy, but shed no light on how I match Chris.

William Lentz

I have that Judith descends from William. Perhaps Chris does also. I’ll look into some of his children.

Margaret Lentz

Margaret married John Viden. I couldn’t find a record that they had children.

Elva Lentz

I have this husband and children for Elval:

Bernice Lentz

In my last Blog, I had that Judy was the daughter of Florence. Now I see I should hae had her as the daughter of Bernice. I see this photo at Ancestry:

Judy shared the above photo with this caption:

My guess is that Judy is Bernice’s only child.

This family lived in Pitman, NJ:

Emma Lentz

Emma was born a little over a year before my mother:

I’m sure there were other descendants, but no clear connection to Chris, my DNA Relative at 23andMe. If Chris gets back to me with more family information, I’m sure I will be able to make a connection.

 

My Nicholson Ancestors in Liverpool

I was recently looking up information on my mother’s grandmother Annie Nicholson and found a baptismal record for her and her sister Agnes from Liverpool. In that record, her father was listed as a saw maker. This was too much of a coincidence not to be true.

Nicholson Genealogy

Here is what I have at my Nicholson Web Page:

Ann is child 3 and Agnes is child for. This information is now probably wrong as I have them both being born in Sheffield. I had just assumed that they were born there as the Nicholson family history went back quite a ways in Sheffield. My assumption was that they emmigrated from Sheffield to Philiadelphia.

From Sheffield to Liverpool

The time that the Nicholson family was in Liverpool was not caught on the Census as the family was in Sheffield in 1861:

 

Parkwood Springs was part of Brightside:

It looks like Brightside is actually to the West of where I circled. At this time, William and Martha had a daughter who was 9 months old.

Not too long after the 1861 Census which was taken on April 7, the family moved to Liverpool. Sarah Ann was baptized there on January 19, 1862. I can’t make out William Nicholson’s profession other than he was a saw maker:

[Based on my research below, this says Fontenoy Street where the family lived in Liverpool before they moved to Bootle. ] This record is taken from the Bishop’s Transcript. That means that it was copied from another record. Sarah Ann’s sister Emma was baptized on the same day:

Here is a drawing of the downtown Liverpool St Peter’s Church from 1800:

 

My assumption is that Sarah Ann was born in Sheffield and Emma was born in Liverpool.

Ann Eliza and Agnes D

Ann Eliza was my great grandmother. Here is her baptismal record from St. Peter from 1865:

Ann Eliza was born in March and baptized in August. Also of interest is that the family lived in “Bootle”. Or Booth. But it looks like Bootle to me. Maybe the Beatles lived there. Bootle. Beatle. Here is Bootle to the North of Liverpool:

Bootle appears to be a little less than a mile from downtown Liverpool. My guess is that Ann Eliza and Agnes were born in Bootle.

Here is the baptismal record for Agnes:

This took place also at St. Peter’s Church in Liverpool on March 9, 1869.

From Bootle to Philadelphia

There was a tight time-frame for the family getting from Sheffield to Bootle. Now there was another tight time-frame for the Nicholson family moving to Philiadelphia. Here is the ship record for Martha and her children when they arrived in New York City:

William was likely already in Philadelphia at this time. Also it is interesting that Ann went by Eliza at this time. This record tells a story. Martha here traveling without her husband and her four girls from Liverpool to Queensland to New York City. From there they must have gone to Ellis Island and then made their way to Philadelphia where William must have prepared a place for them. My guess is that William missed the US Census that was held on June 1, 1870. However, according to the 1900 Census, William immigrated in 1868:

Let’s see what the 1910 Census says:

This shows he immigrated in 1870, and that he is naturalized. His wife also has an immigration date which doesn’t make sense as she is shown as being born in Pennsylvania.

Some More Parish Records from St Peter’s in Liverpool

My research friend in England reminded me that the Lancashire Online Parish Registers covers LIverpool. So I took a look there. Here is a confusing entry:

This looks like William and Martha were living in Liverpool in 1860 when Maria Baxter Nicholson was baptized. Here is a photo from 1901 of Fontenoy Street:

Here is an 1860 map showing Fontenoy Street:

Here is a modern map including the Beatles Statue:

However, the 1861 Census shows that my ancestors were living in Sheffield. William and Martha were married in 1856, so that would have given them time to have a daughter born in 1858. I can’t think that there were too many saw makers named William Nicholson who were married to a Martha who baptized their children in the same Church (St Peter, Liverpool).

Here is Maria in the 1861 Census in Liverpool The Baxters and others were living at 25 Fontenoy Street:

I might as well get more confused. Here Maria is a boarder or lodger at the house of William Baxter who is also a saw maker. Living in the house was Ann Ellis widow aged 66. So did William move back to Sheffield and say, “William take care of my daughter who I named after you”? And who is Ann Ellis? Martha’s mother was Nancy Roebuck born in 1795, so this could be the same person. That means that Ann Baxter must be Ann Ellis born about 1822:

This could also explain the Sheffield/Liverpool connection.

I see I left an important detail from the Baxter 1861 Census. That is where everyone was born:

Everyone in that Census was born in Sheffield except for Ann Ellis who was born in Thorne.  I have that my ancestor Nancy Ellis was born in Thorne, so this makes sense. That is what I like about the Census. It shows a lot of family relationships and gives a lot of information in a little space.

William Baxter and Ann Ellis

I feel I have enough information to go on to make a case that William Baxter’s wife Ann was actually Ann Ellis. Here is the family in 1851 in Nether Hallam to the West of Sheffield:

William was listed as a saw smith.

More On Ann Roebuck Ellis

Here is Ann in 1871 back in Sheffield:

Ann is listed as a lodger with Elizabeth Roebuck. As Elizabeth is listed as widowed, she could be a sister-in-law. Elizabeth is listed as born in Sheffield and Ann in Thorne.

What I Have Learned So Far

Perhaps a chronology would help

  • April 1858 Maria Baxter born to William Nicholson and Martha Ellis in Sheffield
  • June 1860 Sarah Ann born to William Nicholson and Martha Ellis in Sheffield
  • August 1860 Maria Baxter Nicholson Baptized, Liverpool
  • 1861 Census William, Martha and Sarah Ann living in Sheffield
  • 1861 Maria Baxter Nicholson living with Uncle William Baxter, Aunt Ann Ellis Baxter and grandmother Ann (Nancy) Roebuck Ellis
  • So it is not clear whether William and Martha Nicholson were present at the baptism of their daughter Maria Baxter. I had assumed that they were.
  • Dec 1861 – Emma Nicholson born, probably in Liverpool.
  • Jan 19, 1862 – Emma Nicholson baptized at St Peter’s in Liverpool.
  • Jan 19, 1862 – Sarah Ann Nicholson baptized at St Peter’s  in Liverpool. Emma’s and Sarah’s address is given as Fontenoy Street, Liverpool.
  • March 1865 – Birth of Ann Eliza Nicholson presumed in Boote, Lancashire.
  • August 1865 – Baptism of Ann Eliza at St Peter’s, Liverpool
  • Feb 1869 – Birth of Agnes D Nicholson in Bootle
  • March 1869 – Baptism of Agnes D at St. Peter’s, Liverpool
  • Nov 1870 – Martha Nicholson travels from Liverpool to New York City with her four daughters: Sarah Ann, Emma, Eliza and Agnes. The girls are between the ages of  and 11.
  • 1871 – Martha’s mother Ann Roebuck Ellis now 76 years old is living with Elizabeth Roebuck in North Sheffield.

That seems to summarize about 13 eventful years for the Nicholson family.

A Few Loose Ends

I haven’t found William Nicholson’s shipping record or naturalization records. This may be Maria’s death record from 1866:

Though the family should have been in Bootle by then.

I found out some things about Ann Ellis. I could fill more blanks in with her or her siblings. Here are her siblings:

Summary and Conclusions

  • While I was filling in my brother’s maternal side ancestry for DNA testing, I came upon a few interesting records that indicated my Nicholson ancestors may have lived in Liverpool before moving from Sheffield to Philadelphia
  • I checked the records and they did live there. In fact, my great grandmother Ann Eliza and four of her sisters were baptized in Liverpool.
  • I also found my third great grandmother living in Liverpool with William and Ann Baxter in 1861. This Ann was probably Ann Ellis, Martha Ellis Nicholson’s older sister. For some reason Willliam and Martha Nicholson’s youngest daughter was living in the Baxter house also in 1861 while William and Martha were in Sheffield with their infant second daughter.
  • I left with some follow up work to fill in some of the blanks.
  • I didn’ know last week that I had something in common with the Beatles. Now I know that I do.