I have to say I got a little lost, but you sound excited so that's great. I only know first cousins, and not particularly well.

I am going to join ancestry.com this year.

pk - if you're a member of AARP you can get a discount on Ancestry's fees. I think it's 30%.

I wish I'd stumble across a relative like yours Susan. I can use all the help I can get finding my ancestors.

This post was edited by maire_cate on Tue, Jan 6, 15 at 22:15

I discovered my great great great grandparents were uncle and niece. And her two children went to live with her mother when she remarried after her first husband's death.

Mostly it's been a series of happy dances late at night sitting here all by myself. I did hire a researcher in Wisconsin to do a check at the cemetery and courthouse for me. She broke my brick wall. I've met some distant "cousins" through ancestry so I do have someone to email with my discoveries and we can celebrate together. Keeping all of them straight has been a challenge! I added them to the appropriate spot in the tree so I could type their name in and find them right away.

"Figuring out how youâÂÂre related" link makes it easy.

Here is a link that might be useful: Figuring out how youâre related

What a fun link! So Nigella Lawson is my third cousin once removed. I knew we were distantly related, but I didn't know what to call it. Thanks!

I wonder if your g-g-g-grandmother's second husband didn't want the children around. Sad, if that's what happened.

That was my guess, too, alisande. I have quite a lot of information about her and I don't have good feelings. Since I wasn't there and never knew her, I shouldn't be making judgments. I also suspect she and her uncle might have been doing some hanky panky and she ended up pregnant. He lived with her family almost since she was born. Ewwwwww!! Wisconsin didn't keep records then so I don't know if they really got married. His probate refers to her as "wife".

I was surprised how many birthdays were so soon after the marriage. Or how soon the marriage was after the birth! My grandmother on the other side had a son that I can't get the birth certificate for until 2020. They have to be dead a LONG time. Everyone is dead. What difference could it make? And it might not even tell me anything. I suspect she didn't name the father because there was never any family gossip about him that I was aware of. Even though I didn't pay attention to those things when I was a kid, some facts that I've found doing genealogy reminded me of comments I heard my dad say. I do study every local man for features that look like him!

I'd be cautious about studying those local men if I were you. Some might misinterpret your stare. LOL

Kitchen, do you need that birth certificate to find out the date, or to find out who is named as the father? On Ancestry, you can often find a public records entry that gives the birth date.

I will look at the local men sideways! That might be worse?

I am curious who my uncle's father is. I have everything else. I'm supposing that when his mother, Sarah, married my grandfather, Albert, the son just took the Ward name. That would have been 1901 in Iowa. I doubt there was any adoption. All of this happened nearly under my nose and I didn't know any of it until about 5 years ago when I started doing genealogy! Well, the birth and all that happened here. I wasn't born until '46 and the son, Wesley, died 1975, Wesley's wife, Vera, in 1967, his two daughters in 2000 & 1987. His only grandchild died 1998. I missed everyone by a few years. That's what happens when you don't keep track of family.

I have a list of names and addresses of nieces and nephews from an inheritance from the last aunt. I've written letters. I get NO replies. None. Through ancestry I've met an x-wife of one of those nephews. She and I work on the family tree together. He has never called, written, emailed or made any contact whatsoever.

Since I'm digging stuff up anyway, I'd love to dig up the bodies and do a DNA test on all of them. Wesley, his "step father" and his grandson. I'm not positive his step father is not his real father but there is nothing that I've found to make me thing that is the case. He was not living in this area at the time. And in a picture of all the siblings together, you KNOW which one is Wesley. One of these faces doesn't go with the others.....

I have been working on my husband's father side of the family for over 2 years now. I have made some breakthroughs but also had some set backs. I was sure his GGGGGrandfather's line came from the infamous Henry Boston on the Eastern Shore of MD/VA. I even went so far as tracking down a living male proven descendant of Henry's (who, btw, still lives on the Eastern Shore) and he agreed to do Ydna testing,along with my husband. Results - not even closely related! And hubs isn't related to any of the other male Boston lines that have been tested, albeit only a few have been tested.

But, I did find two 4th cousins of his that are also GGGGrandsons of James Boston 1767. One lives in NC and the other in GA. All three, hubs and the other 2, are on the same generation but from different sons of James. Interestingly enough, the other two are in a similiar situation as you Alisande.
Camilla, the daughter of John (son of James) married her first cousin, John Wesley (son of Ira). One of the 4th cousins is from the line of Camilla and John Wesley and the other is from the brother of Camilla, John C. After I made contact with the fellow who is from John C.'s line, I was able to introduce him to his 4th cousin, who he didn't know about. How cool is that!

So now hubs and I are planning a trip to Savannah to meet the cousin who lives in that area, where Ira, John, James and hubs line, George all lived. Turns out Ira and John owned thousands of acres along the Savannah River. (Our ancestor, George owned a little compared to them.

Later on, we want to go to NC to meet the other cousin. Age wise the oldest is 77 in NC, so we need to make it a priority. He has sent me photos of relatives but we need to get better ones. Plus, he was the one who had hand written pages from James, father of Ira,. John and George that he donated to North Carolina Archives. How I would love to actually see those!

So, mboston, you are having happy dances, too. Lucky you!