Found: Grady Waters

     Ok, so yesterday I posted about not outright trusting death certificates. And yet only a few hours later I was blown away when I found a new death certificate on Family Search.

     The backstory: I have my Great-Great Grandmother Louise Smith Water's Bible. Though many of the records were obviously recorded well after the fact, it's been invaluable in piecing together my Smith family. I've tried to identify everyone listed, but came up short on a few of the infants listed.  One of the names was Grady Waters, who I thought must be Louise's son or nephew. I had both a birth and death date, but could never find a death certificate.

     With the recent luck I've had with my Waters family research lately, I thought I'd try and search for Grady again. I searched Ancestry.com, but came up empty. I searched FamilySearch.org and, like magic, found Grady's death certificate as the first record on the first search. He died in Gastonia, North Carolina.

     Much of what I wrote yesterday, about problems with death certificates, can be seen here. The surname uses an alternative spelling and the parents names are a bit off as well. Also, there doesn't seem to be any such place as Grady's birthplace: "Fort Dale, Georgia." Perhaps it was really Alabama or another place entirely? If this was the death certificate of a grown man and I was using it to find his parents, I'd have to be flexible.

    Also, if you watched my video from a few days ago, you might remember that it showed Leverett and Louise in Georgia, Florida, Alabama, and South Carolina. I was not aware that the family had ever lived in North Carolina. But I'm not surprised. Grady is buried at "Loray Cemetery" - a mill cemetery. The Waters family could often be found in Mill Towns.

     I'm going to keep up my research on the Waters family. Who knows what I'll find next?

Death Certificates: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

     A death certificate is a valuable record for genealogists. For the most part, they can be easy and inexpensive to obtain and provide a ton of information. A death certificate for your brick wall ancestor is the answer to your genealogy prayers - right? Not so fast! Just like any other record, you need to obtain it, evaluate it, and decide how trustworthy the information is.

     Imagine this scenario: your loved one has just passed away and you're grieving, but also having to handle the legal issues created by death. The funeral director approaches you and asks for the names of the parents. You know this information, but your mind goes blank. Seeing that you're upset, the funeral director tells you that it's not important and that they have enough information from other relatives/documents. The next thing you know, you're holding a certified death certificate in which your loved one's mother is listed as "Not stated."

     Here are a few examples of the good, the bad, and the ugly when it comes to death certificates.

• The Good: 
• The death certificate exists and you obtain it.
• It was filled out by a spouse or sibling who has known the deceased for a long time and has first hand knowledge of the dates and relationships.
• The death certificate provides dates, locations and relationships for your ancestors. 
• Typed or written in print.
• The Bad: 
• You can't find a death certificate anywhere.
• If you did, it was filled out by a second spouse, child, distant relative or even a friend or institution who didn't know the information.
• The death certificate provides no information at all: the dreaded "Not Stated."
• Messy handwritten cursive.
• The Ugly: 
• You know a certificate exists, but due to local laws, you can't access it.
• It was filled out by a second spouse, child, distant relative or even a friend. They thought they knew the information. 
• The death certificate provides dates, locations and relationships for your ancestors - and it is all the informant's best guess.
• Illegible scribbles. 

     As you can see, sometimes the good, bad and ugly might be hard to differentiate. It can be difficult to tell if the information is right or wrong. Keep in mind that the information was rarely provided in advance by the deceased. It was provided by someone else who may or may not have the correct information. And of course, that's assuming you were able to obtain and read the certificate in the first place.

     If you don't already have other documents that provide similar information, work on getting them. Your best bet is to use this certificate as a starting point and compare it to other records with similar information: 

• Census records that confirm relationships and dates
• Obituaries that can confirm relationship and maybe ages
• Death certificates of siblings that list the same parents
• Marriage certificates that confirm relationships
• Visit the cemetery listed to find relatives in the same/nearby plots

Take everything recorded on the certificate with a grain of salt. Without another document to confirm the information, a death certificate is a starting point, not the be-all and end-all.

William Barfield's Burial

     I have spent numerous hours searching for a death certificate for William Barfield, my Great-Great Grandfather. I don't know who his father was and hoped that this document would provide the information. He died in Emanuel County, Georgia in 1924, five years after death certificates became mandatory.  I'd searched for his death certificate in multiple indexes and browsed microfilm records for certificates around that date, but could not find his record.  I started to think that he had died out of state, but a "Card of Thanks" in the local newspaper from his wife indicated that he died a illness at home. Finally, a family reunion provided me with an answer.

     I was talking to Shirley, a granddaughter of William Barfield. She told me this story: William Barfield died at home. His family built a coffin for him, a simple wooden box. They took him down to the Hawhammock Church Cemetery on a horse drawn wagon and had his funeral. They didn't hire a mortician or funeral home, but did things the old fashioned way.  It appears that the family either didn't know about the recently instituted laws requiring death certificates, or else they didn't care.

     So there's no death certificate; I can stop looking. Unfortunately, I'm no closer to finding William's father. 

Found: Bennie England Craft Jr.

When my Great-Uncle passed away in 2005, there was something surprising in his obituary: mention of a brother that I'd never heard of. According to the obituary, my great-uncle had been, "preceded in death by brothers, B.E. Craft Jr., Marvin Craft and Thomas Craft." But who was B.E. Jr.? I'd never seen another mention of him - and this is a well researched family line.

I'd had no further success researching this new great-uncle - until last night. I was wondering around Ancestry.com's family trees and landed on the page of my great-aunt Mary Frances Craft. On her page was a story, titled "B. E.'s Burial." It read:

"When B.E. died only his sister Mary Frances Craft was able to go because the rest of the family was too sick the the flu to attend. She said the funnal home did a good job cleaning him up and put him in a pine box. - Story told by Mary Frances Craft to Jessica Mica"

Success! Finally, a piece of information proving the existence of my great-uncle. But it sounds like a sad story, and didn't really provide an data or dates. But, it did give me some idea of when B.E. might have died. His sister, Mary Frances, attended her funeral. Frances was born in 1922, and was old enough to attend the funeral on her own and to remember the event. So, he probably died in the late 20's or later.

I decided to check out GA death certificates. The online Georgia Virtual Vault is a great resource for those with GA ancestors. They recently added un-indexed 1928-1930 death certificates that I had not finished looking through. So, I headed over to check it out - no success. But wait! Craft is often indexed as Croft..... success!!! There it was, the obituary of B. E. Craft Jr.

The poor thing was only 8 months old and died of pneumonia.

He lived -31 Years

I'm transcribing death certificates for FamilySearchIndexing right now. The put out a new project of 1930s Georgia death certs. They haven't had a GA project in a long time, so I hopped at the chance to help with this one.

So, I'm transcribing. Some are easy to read, some are hard to read. Some are in cursive, some in print and others typed. I come across one for Francis Gallo. This one's interesting! He's from Italy and died at "The Little Sister of the Poor," and was born in May 1961. Wait... these are all 1930 deaths! Checking death date.... yup, 1930! This man lived negative 31 years! It's a miracle! Or, I guess it's a typo... but a miracle sounds like more fun.

Another GA Death Certificate - with COD

I recently requested four death certificates from the GA Vital Records Department and received copies back in which the cause of death had been removed. It was suggested that this was a privacy issue, and that GA, like many states kept back the COD for deaths within the last 50 years. But, I had received back other certificates, from deaths within that time span, that did include the COD. And, the GA Vital Records Website does not state any such restrictions.

Now, I have received back a fourth recently requested death certificate - and this one did include the cause of death. The funny thing? I received two copies: one with the COD and one without. I only paid for one copy. Also, this ancestor died in 1953, the same year that one of the other ancestors died, and who's death certificate did not include COD.

I have to conclude that the GA Vital Records office doesn't know it's own policies! I've sent them an email, enquiring as to their policy on listing causes of death.

Here is the latest one I received, about my Great-Grandmother, Ruby Lee Waters Huyler. She died of "chronic and acute alcoholism." (click for a larger image)

Death Certificates Have Arrived

I sent off for three GA death certificates on April 9th and they have arrived! Yay! These death certs represent a direct line in my genealogy research: Father, Daughter and Grand-Daughter. They don't provide any new information, so much as act as proof of previously discovered information. This is also the line that I plan to apply for the DAR with.

One thing I did hope to discover: cause of death. But I was thwarted! The CODs have been blanked out. What gives? I've never had this happen before. I checked out the GA Vital Records website and it doesn't say anything out not releasing COD information. I think I'm going to contact them to find out the policy on this. I really was curious to learn why my Great-Grandmother died at age 37.

Here are the death certs (click for larger):

Stephen T. Boatright, my Great-Great-Great Grandfather

Susan Frances Boatright Barfield, my Great-Great Grandmother

Sallie LeDora Barfield Britt, my Great Grandmother

SC Death Records on Ancestry.com

Ancestry.com updated their South Carolina Death records to include scans of death certificates. It previously was made up of scans of the index only (which I now can't find). I'm really happy about this, because it was costing me $10 for each death certificate that I had to send off for. I've been able to view some of the collateral family members' death certificates that I would not have spent money on, as well as some certificates that I had not sent off for yet.

Here's one find: my great-grandfather, Charles Vernon Albea.

Received the death certificate for Leila Frances (neé: unknown) Evans Brown. Turns out, her maiden name is Craft! So far I'm not having too much luck tracing her parents, Ruebin Craft and Leila McCurly. Fingers crossed.