A Headstone For Ruby

     I want to reach out to my Albea / Waters family to help me fulfill a promise that mom and I made to Grandmama.

     When I first got started researching my family tree, I set out to find their graves. It took a long time to find my Great-Grandmoter, Ruby Waters Huyler's, grave, as my Grandmother, Betty, was very upset by her mother's death and had blocked her burial location from her mind. When we did find Ruby's grave, we were surprised to find it unmarked - as was my Grandmother, who remembered picking out a stone for placement. She was very distraught to hear the news.

     My mom, also named Ruby, promised to one day place a headstone on her namesakes' grave. It's been ten years since then, and it's time to do something to fullfill that promise.

     Ruby Waters Huyler is buried at Greenwood Cemetery, just a little South West of Atlanta. For $600, we can purchase and install a granite marker for her grave. Please pitch in what you can, be it $10 or $50, and help us fullfill our promise to Grandmama.

     Click here to donate.  If you can't do it now, that's fine.  I have set the goal at three months and hope everyone can pitch in a bit.

The Cabbagetown Photo - Then and Now

     Today I visited the location where an old family photo was taken.  The photo (see below) is of a young man standing by a car in front of a house.  My Grandmama said that this was her Uncle Milton Waters in Cabbagetown (a mill town in Atlanta, Georgia).

     In trying to find the location of the photo, I found myself with almost too many options.  Uncle Milton and his parents lived all over the neighborhood and never appear in the same home from one year to the next in city directories.  Luckily though, the addresses were confined to three streets, all in Cabbagetown.

     When I decided to go in search of the home, I did some advance research.  First, I made an assumption that if it really was Uncle Milton in the photo, he was around 15 years old.  That would place the photo around 1930.  I made a list of all of the addresses the family was listed at between 1926 and 1935 - then I looked them up on Google Maps.

     A lot of the old addresses are no more, or have been heavily redeveloped.  For example, I can pretty much disregard the address where the modern condos and high rises now sit.  Other homes are still there, but have obviously had some remodeling done.  Still, I held out hope that the house in the picture still existed.

     Next, I looked at the homes in detail on Google Maps.  There were a few key features in the photo that I used to try and identify it: the shape of the roof, the fact that it was a duplex (hard to see, but the door on the left is open), that it was built off the ground, and that it wasn't much longer than the length of the car.  I also noted that it was very close to the house on the right.

     One of the addresses, 196 Savannah Street, seemed like a possibility: it was obviously a former duplex (two chimneys and space for a second door), it was built off the ground and had the same type of roof design.  The problem was two fold: the house next door and the address.  The other house wasn't close enough, nor of the correct design.  Considering the ages of the homes, however, it was certainly possible that the other house had been renovated.  The street number was also off; this house was 193 Savannah Street.  But considering that it had been changed from a multi to a single home, it was possible that street numbers had changed.

     This could be the house - but I need proof!

    I decided to review the Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps for Cabbagetown in 1912.  I had previously downloaded these to get an understanding of some of the homes in question and had created an overlay in Google Earth.

     I looked at the two houses in question.  The top house was clearly a duplex with basically the same design as today.  The bottom house though, the one that should have been closer, had obviously undergone serious renovation.  It had previously been a triplex, with the left/top most home pushed back.  Today, that space is a driveway, and that's what clinched it for me.  In the original photo, you can see that the porch is pushed back and that there is more siding along the right side.  Compare the original photo and the Sanborn map and you can see it.

     So today my sister and I went to visit the house and take some photos.  It really neat to walk through the neighborhood where my ancestors lived and visually connect the past and present.

Edit: I didn't mention this, but I left the photo behind on the house's doorstep, with a note saying that it was a photo of my Great-Great Uncle in front of their house.  The home owner actually blogged about finding the photo, and then found this blog post.  Read about it here: Oakdale Onward.

Identified!

Also, was this photo taken in a cemetery?

I've had this photo for years.  I know, based on a similar photo, that the girl in the middle is Ethel Waters, my Great-Great Aunt.  But I didn't know who the other two girls were... until now.      I was just looking through photos when it occurred to me, the girl on the left is Aunt Alma, Ethel's sister.  I don't know why I hadn't seen it before, but now it's so obvious.      So if this is a photo of sisters, it stands to reason that the third girl would be the third sister, my Great Grandmother, Ruby Waters.      I had to pull up some photos of Ruby to compare them, because I just didn't see it off the bat.  But after reviewing the photo below, I've decided that the girl on the right is indeed my Great-Grandmother! Yay!

     Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the girl on the right is my Great-Grandmother. A cousin says that it's a friend or maybe a cousin, and she's likely older than my Great-Grandmother would have been. I still think a lot of the features for the girl and my grandmother are similar, so I'm betting on a cousin. But, I did identify my GG-Aunt Alma, so there's still a plus side!

The DNA of a First Cousin, 2x Removed

     I logged into my AncestryDNA account today to a happy surprise: a suggested 2nd cousin DNA match!  And I recognized the username (blacked out below) as my Waters cousin. My first cousin, 2x removed to be exact.

Here's what our match page looks like:

     AncestryDNA has predicted that we are 2nd cousins. Considering that we are 2x removed, this is probably a logical prediction.  I would love to be able to look at our match in more detail, but there really isn't anything else to do with this match at this point.

     I hadn't know that my Waters cousin had taken a DNA test and I'm very happy that she did. I had tested her brother's Y-DNA over at Family Tree DNA to find the origins of our male Waters family line. I had been thinking lately of upgrading his results to the Family Finder test. Hopefully now I won't have to!

     I say hopefully, because ftDNA has number of features that Ancestry.com's DNA does not. Unfortunately the AncestryDNA test does not offer a number of features that allow me to evaluate our match. I can't download my raw data, I can't see how many centiMorgans of DNA my cousin and I share, I can't view our DNA on a chromosome chart and I can't see which DNA matches in my list match the one's in my cousins' list.  I can do all of these things at ftDNA.  Hopefully, Ancestry.com will update their DNA features soon and I won't have to purchase an additional test.

More 1940 Census Records on Ancestry.com - Including Georgia!

     I just got an email from Ancestry.com that 15 more states had been added to their 1940 Census collection. Included in these states is one I'm really excited about: Georgia. (Also added: Alabama, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oregon, Washington or Wisconsin)

     For the most part, I have already found most of my Georgia ancestors in the 1940 Census - but those are my Dad's relatives. They were farmers who sat in the same place for a few hundred years and made things easy. My mom's ancestors on the other hand... talk about mobile.  It's not like they were moving all over the country; they just moved down this street and up this other one and maybe across town or to the neighboring state for just a few months. And they did this constantly.

     I had multiple addresses cir 1940 in which to look for my Great-Great Grandparents, Leverett and Louise Waters. They were nowhere to be found. I did find their daughter (my great-grandmother), one of the their daughters-in-law (sans husband) and Leverett's sister-in-law (sans husband).

     With today's addition of Georgia into Ancestry's 1940 Census collection, I was able to find Leverett and Louise. I learned that Leverett apparently never had any official schooling (which I had guessed based on his shakily printed signature) and Louise had only four years. At the time Leverett was working as a barber and Louise stayed at home. Their youngest boy, Jack, was still at home.

     Now let's just South Carolina indexed and I'll be happy!

He Was Married Four Times to Two Women

     I'm doing a little bit of last minute 1940 Census prep research.  I have never been able to find my maternal grandmother's parents, Vary "Mack" Huyler and Ruby Waters, in the 1930 census.  They would be married less than a year later in Atlanta, Georgia, but I just can't find them.

     Thanks to city directories, I know exactly where Ruby will be found in 1940: living in Atlanta with her second husband.  But what about Mack? I know he left Ruby shortly after their daughter was born to "find work." He didn't return for 14 years. So where was he in 1940?

     I know from his social security application that he was in Augusta, Georgia in 1937. That's where I planned to look. But today I decided to do one last run through city directories to see if I could find a listing for him in a 1940 book. I didn't find him in 1940, but I did find him in 1939 - in Greensboro, North Carolina. With a wife. Surprise!

     Well, something of a surprise.  I know who Ruth was. She was Ruth Sexton, Mack's second wife... or third... or would that be fourth? I guess it depends on how you count. Based on the information I have, it now looks like she's both Mack's 2nd and 4th wife, with my Great-Grandmother Ruby Waters being his 1st and 3rd.  Mack was married four times, to two women.  Here's the timeline I can piece together:

• Feb 1931 - Mack Huyler m. Ruby Waters, Atlanta (marriage certificate)
• abt 1937 - Ruby Waters m. Cecil Whitfield (city directory)
• by 1939 - Mack Huyler m. Ruth Sexton (city directory)
• Dec 1947 - Mack Huyler m. Ruby Waters (bible record)
• abt 1960 - Mack Huyler m. Ruth Sexton (obituary)

     I have evidence of a lot of marriages, but I don't have any official records. Even the first marriage between Ruby and Mack, I have a certificate but I haven't found an actual license (I assume the online database is incomplete and that microfilm in not available at the archive).  And what about divorces? Hopefully the couples were legally divorced...

     And hopefully Mack can still be found at 710 Railroad St for the 1940 census.  If so, he'll be in ED 41-58 in either block 313 or 314. Fingers crossed!

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?

The 116th Field Artillery

     So yesterday I found the death certificate for my GGG Uncle, Millard Waters. He was buried in the Mountain Home National Cemetery, a veteran's cemetery. I placed the burial on FindAGrave.com with a photo request and less than 24 hours later I received the photo!

     I love how military headstones give so much information about the veteran's service. From here, I was able to find out more information about the 31st Division, which was part of the National Guard. They were in France from Sep 1918 to Dec 1918.

     I was also able to find this photo from the Library of Congress showing the 116th Field Artillery at Camp Wheeler, Georgia in April 1918. Millard is likely one of the tiny figures in the photo.

     I'm still curious about Millard's participation in World War I. I'm going to try and request his service record and see what I can get.

Found: Millard Waters

     When I checked my email this morning I had one from Ancestry.com, telling me I had hints in my tree.  I was going to automatically delete it, since the hints I receive are usually records I've already found but haven't attached to my tree. But I thought: wait, let me look at it real quick. The hints were for my GGG-Uncle, Millard Waters, for records in Tennessee.  My Waters family is from Georgia, but Tennessee is within the realm of possibility.  Let's see what we've got... click, click...

     OMG! It's Millard Waters' death certificate! From 1944. He fell off the face of genealogy records after the 1920 census. I thought he must have died before 1930! Well I was wrong. I now know that he died at the Veterans Hospital in Mountain Home, Tennessee.

     Why am I so excited about a 3x Great Uncle's death certificate? Because I don't know his and his siblings parents names. I have many records for my Great-Great Grandfather Leverett Waters that give his parents names. The problem is that they all give different names! I have two different first and middle names for his father and three different maiden names for his mother.

     I've been doing collateral research on Leverett's siblings to try and find the correct names. Unfortunately Leverett & Millard sister, Queen, didn't have any records that confirmed their parents' names. In fact, when Queen's obituary didn't mention Millard or his family, I incorrectly thought that he had died before she did.

     And this new find? Does Millard's death certificate provide an answer? Yes, it does! And it's pretty good information too, as it comes from his hospital records which he provided himself. The information listed matches the information that Leverett listed on his Social Security Application. Based on the records I now have, my Great-Great-Great Grandparents were J Bayles Waters and Mary Elizabeth Pilgrim.

The Waters Family in Atlanta

     Here's the Google Earth family history tour that I created based on Lisa Louise Cooke's class at the Georgia Family History Expo. This tour talks about my Great-Great Grandparents, Leverett and Louise Waters and their lives in Atlanta in the 1920s and 1930s.

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Waters - Smith - Carson Connection

Edited 12 Jun 2011

     One of the earliest brick walls on my mom's side of the tree is the Waters family. I can't uncover details on J Waters and Mary, parents to Leverett, Millard and Queen Waters. To try and uncover the ancestry of this couple, I'm researching all of the children, not just my direct ancestor.

     Today, a search on Genealogy Bank turned up a result for "Mrs. Millard Waters." I know that Millard appeared in 1920 with a wife whose name looks to be Suzie. In 1930, their known children, Ben and Ida, as well as a new girl, Marie, show up with a mother, Bessie Edwards. Is Millard's wife Suzie or Bessie? Did she marry a Mr Edwards after Millard's death?


     I can't find any mention of Millard after 1920 and I didn't have information on his wife - until today. I found an obituary for Allen M Carson, who had a sister called Mrs. Millard Waters of Atlanta. This provided me with Suzie's parents: William and Ella Carson. And guess what? They were already in my tree, complete with two daughters named Susan and Betsey!

      I'll need to do a little more research to sort out Susan and Betsey, but this information didn't actually add anyone to the tree, it just connected people. In fact, it created something of a circle. This family connection gets pretty confusing, so instead of explaining everything, I drew a family tree:

New WWII Navy Records on Ancestry.com

     My Grandmama Betty (Huyler) Albea was an only child, but she had a three uncles who were more like brothers or cousins to her. All of these uncles served in the US Navy during WWII. I've always been dismayed at the lack of Navy records available online compared to Army records - but that's changing. In celebration of memorial day, Ancestry.com has released a number of US Navy Records.

     The most exciting of these records are the "U.S. World War II Navy Muster Rolls, 1938-1949." These are something like the Civil War enlistment records available on footnote.com. These give information on the sailor's name, his service number, when and where he enlisted, and his movements. I've found two out of three uncles for certain and likely the third as well.

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LC & Jack Waters

     • Jack Franklin Waters - the youngest of the Waters family brothers, the information I had on Jack's time in the Navy came from his tombstone: USNR - S2. I also knew from my Grandmama that Jack had been injured during his time in the Navy, which had a lasting impact and eventually lead to his death at age 36.

     I found three records for Jack in the Navy Muster Rolls. From those records, I learned that Jack enlisted in the US Navy Reserves on 3 Dec 1942 in Atlanta, Georgia, was rated S2 and was received on the USS Mizar on 31 Oct 1944. I also learned just a little more about Jack's injury: he was transferred to the US Naval Hospital in Oakland, California on 20 Jan 1945.

     • LC Waters - the middle Waters brother never had a full name until he joined the Navy. Apparently "L. C." was not an acceptable name, so he picked Lewis Cranford. I had a bit more information on LC's navy service, thanks to photos he'd sent his parents. He sent a photo of his ship, labeled USS Barney. This helped me with my search for LC: as soon as I saw Barney, I knew I had the right sailor.

     I found a lot of records for LC, aka Lewis. He enlisted on 25 Aug 1942 in either Macon or Atlanta, Georgia and rated AS. He joined the USS Barney on 23 Nov 1942 from Norfolk, Virginia. He remained on the Barney for his entire career. His last record indicates that on 12 May 1945 he was transferred to a receiving station in New York City. At the time his rate was BM 2/c, though he had also previously held the rate of COX and was recorded as a "straggler" at one point.

     • Milton Waters - The oldest of the three brothers, Milton was originally in the Marines. Right now, I'm still not sure if I have the correct Navy records for him.

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     I view this information as a starting point. The biggest piece of information I found in these records are my GG-Uncle's service numbers. With these, I should be able to request more information from the National Archives eVetRecs service. I can also research the ships they served on to see what action they might have seen during the war.  I'm really excited to do more research on the Waters brothers.

Queen Waters - is she the Key?

     I've written before about my Waters family brick wall. I know my Great-Great Grandfather was Leverett Waters, that he had a brother named Millard, a mother named Mary, and a father possibly named John or James. Recently, I uncovered a sister, Queen Elizabeth Waters.

     I found Queen by searching the FamilySearch database for Georgia Death records (which has more search options than the death certificates at the GA Virtual Vault). I filled in only the father's last name and mother's first name, and Queen's record was the second one. Unfortunately, her father is given as "J B Waters," which doesn't help me much. I have been able to find other records since then linking her to her brother, Leverett.

     I thought that this might be a rather unique name that would help me bust down the wall. Queen was born in 1885 in Georgia, probably in (present day) Cobb/Cherokee/Fulton area. In the 1900 census there is only one match, in Marietta, Cobb, GA:

     I think that this is probably the family I'm looking for, but I don't have any proof of it. Where are Leverett and Millard? I haven't been able to find them in 1900. And who is John T? Is that Queen's brother or a cousin? 

     I'll have to do more research on "Grandmother" Elizabeth Waters to see if I can find a John or James as her son.

Tombstone Tuesday - Looking Into the Past

     I've wanted to try this technique for a while: photographing an old photo in its contemporary location. There's a group on Flickr devoted to this technique, called Looking Into the Past.

     Today I drove out to the Bethel Cemetery in Smyrna, Cobb, Georgia with copies of old photos and re-photographed them. I remember when we were first looking for the graves of my Great-Great Grandparents, Leverett & Louise Waters, that my grandmother said that they were buried "way out in the country." Well, Smyrna might have been "country" in the 1950s, but it's well developed today! Thanks to that, there's some interesting contrast in these photos.

     This first photo is just about perfect. It's of my Great-Grandmother, Ruby Waters Huyler, and her father, Leverett Waters. They are standing by the grave of Louise Waters, Leverett's wife.

      I couldn't seem to get this photo just right, though you still get the idea. This is in the same location, but from the other side. This is Leverett and Louise's grandaughter, and Ruby's niece, Sandra Waters.

Monday Memories - Baby Jack

     My Grandmama had this photo of her Uncle Jack Waters:







     My Grandmama had this story of this photo of her Uncle Jack Waters:

Jack did not want to have cooperate for this photo. Jack would not smile for the camera. Jack did like money. They gave Jack money to play with. Jack smiled for the camera.

Surname Saturday - Waters

The Waters family is one of my "1881 Brick Walls." By this I mean that this is one of many of the families in my tree that I have trouble researching because my ancestor was born in 1881 and had left home by the 1900 census. In the case of this family, I can't even find my ancestor, Leverett Waters, in 1900 - though I have found his mother and step-father.

I've done a great deal of research on Leverett, which I won't go into again since I wrote about it here. I've also done research on his mother (here and here), but cannot find his father, whom I have multiple names for.

So, I decided to see about getting help researching this family. I posted my problem family on Ancestry.com's expert connect and was able to hire a professional genealogist to help me. She's going to evaluate my research and then build off of it. To start with, I've purchased two hours of research and can add more if things look promising. She'll be doing the research today and I should hear back from her in about a week.

Hopefully soon, this family won't be a brick wall - or at least this generation won't be!

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Waters Men in the Navy

With a name like 'Waters,' when it's time to join the military, you'd go with the obvious: the Navy. And that's what my Great-Uncles did. Milton, Lewis (LC), and Jack Waters all enlisted in the Navy and, I believe, served throughout World War II.

I don't have much to go on aside from family stories, photographs, and grave markers. Unlike army records, which seem to abound on sites such as Footnote and Ancestry, Navy records are relatively scarce. Ancestry has been working to expand its collection of Navy Cruise Books, but so far I haven't found my Great-Uncles. Also, information seems a little hard to request without information on the sailor's service details. Because of this, and because these men aren't on my direct line, I haven't been able to find much information on them.

Here's what I do know:

Milton Waters (1916, GA -1966, FL) served in both the Marines and the Navy (this based on photos). I believe that he enlisted before the war. His grave lists his rank as AOM3 in the Navy for WWII (I don't know what that means and I'm having trouble finding information on Navy Ranks and Rates).

Lewis Cranford (LC) Waters (1920 - 1978, GA) served in the Navy. I can't find his tombstone and don't have any information on his rate. I do have photos of him from his ship. It seems that he served on the USS Barney, which at one time was docked in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. There, the crew took a bunch of photos. An arm patch in one photo, indicates that he was a Petty Officer 3rd Class.

Jack Franklin Waters (1924 - 1961, GA) also served in the Navy for WWII. According to his gravestone, he was a S2 in the Navy Reserves for South Carolina. Aside from his grave, I only have one photo to give hint to his service.

I'd like to find more information on my Great-Uncles and their, but I don't have information such as service numbers and dates of service, which appear to be required to obtain information from the National Archives. I'm hoping that as online databases expand their records, they will put more emphasis on military branches besides the army.

If anyone has advice on researching Navy veterans, I'd love to hear it.

More Music in the Family

In a previous post, I wrote about the musical instruments on my ancestors, which are in the possession of my cousins. In the post, I mentioned that the family was related by marriage to two early country music recording artists.

One of those musicians was Christopher Allen Bouchillon. Chris was born in Oconee County, SC on 21 Aug 1893 and is credited with originating the "talking blues" style. He recorded a number of songs with his brothers as "The Bouchillon Trio" and as a solo artist. Chris married my Great-Great Aunt Ethel Waters, sometime after 1920. It was the second marriage for both of them.

I had no idea until I started researching Chris, but it turned out that Ethel's entire family was musical. Her father's and siblings sang and played musical instruments. The cousins who have their instruments say that the family played at barn dances. It's probably how Ethel and Chris met: mingling in local Atlanta musical circles.

In 1928, "Mr. and Mrs. Bouchillon" recorded a series of comedic talking songs.¹ You can hear a 30 second clip here. Ethel was about 25 years old when this album was recorded. It's very strange to hear a recording this old and knowing that you are listening to the voices of your ancestors!

It is interesting to note, however, that music was not Chris' main profession. In the 1930 census he's listed as a sewing machine salesman.

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Sources:

1. Tony Russell and Bob Pinson, Country Music Records: A Discography, 1921-1942 (Oxford University Press, 2004), 119-120.