A tutorial on deductive reason when branching your family tree using Hiram Fee as the example.
Assuming you have been following this blog series on determining if your person of interest belongs in your family tree, we’ll skip the introductions and move on to the next step. If you haven’t been following along, recommend you read Part 1 and Part 2.
Obituary of Hiram Jones Fee.
Source: Jackson County Banner, IN (31 May 1950), p.2.
By this point you have now amassed a large number of documents on your person of interest and possible associates such as their parents, spouses, children, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. Time to move on to Step #5:
STEP #5: APPLY THE EASY PROBABILITIES TO YOUR POSSIBILITIES.
Wait, what? Aren’t they the same?
No. Possibility means something may happen. Probability applies a belief to that possibility, typically based on increasing amounts of credible evidence. For example, it is possible it may rain today. If you don’t see any clouds, the probability that it may rain is low. If you see dark clouds and lightning in the distance, the probability increases. Another example: it is possible that aliens exist. The probability that aliens exist is, well, dependent on what evidence you want to believe.
Essentially, you’re “playing the odds.” If you come across five documents that all have the same information, the odds are great and you have high probability that the information among the documents correlate. In most cases, a record with ever-increasing data provides even higher probabilities. For example, if you find a will with a name, what’s the probability that it is the will of your person of interest? What if we add a location? What if we start adding a spouse’s name? Then start adding children? And what if the will was dated near the suspected death date?
Be wary of user-submitted data such as anything from Family Data Collection, other family trees, and even Find A Grave. As they are resources and not sources, they do not increase probability; they simply provide additional possibilities.
To really apply probabilities, it helps to have some knowledge of local history, whether it be city, county, state, country, or other locale, and to have some family history, whether it be true or false. For example, in an earlier blog trying to locate the father of Lucinda Baker, taking that extra leap of faith that Samuel Chase Early was her father was in the fact that he ran for sheriff of Knox County… family history was that Lucinda’s husband John Linville was sheriff (which turned out to be false.)
In genealogy, you may see language like “probably,” or “may have,” or “it is believed,” or other verbiage that makes an argument with the data provided. That is because in some cases, you have to make an educated guess. However, there does become a point where you can’t keep throwing “what if’s” at the problem. Occam’s Razor in problem solving states that “simpler solutions are more likely to be correct than complex solutions.” Or as the US Navy noted in 1960, “keep it simple, stupid.”
Remember the 1880 federal census where Hiram is enumerated as the 5-year-old son of Henderson Fee (age 41) and Sarah (age 30). Henderson’s age matches our known birth date of 1839; Sarah’s age of 30 is five years lower than our expected age of 35. So what do you believe? Sarah “probably” 1) lied about her age, or 2) didn’t know her age, or 3) really wasn’t born in 1845.
The 1880 census shows she cannot read and she cannot write, whereas Henderson can. Sarah’s death certificate, with information provided by Henderson, has her birth year as 1845. Her age on prior 1850, 1860, and 1870 censuses all suggest she was born in 1845. It is probable that Sarah didn’t know her age; maybe the census guy came around when Henderson was away? It is also probable that Sarah lied about her age; a socially acceptable trait, particularly with women who want to remain young. But what if it isn’t Sarah Osborne, which is to say, Ms. Osborne passed away and Henderson remarried another Sarah? What if aliens abducted her and replaced her? Ok, now we’re getting silly, but you see where too many “what if’s” can be detrimental to solving the problem.
Also, sometimes no data is data. What do I mean by that? No other census could be found for a Henderson and Sarah Fee; therefore, the probability is high that the 1800 census is of our target couple. Be prepared to lower your probabilities if/when another record surfaces… this is where most people start getting into forum arguments because they’ve held onto their beliefs with what records they’ve located.
In addition to Step #4 with looking at other family trees, obituaries and media articles are my go-to for genealogical problem solving. If you read the obituary of John who has a wife Mary and sons Jim, Jack, and Jose, then read the obituary of Mary who had a late husband John and sons Jim, John, Jack, and Jose, then read an obituary of Jim who was the son of John and Mary and survived by brothers Jack and Jose, then… well, you get the picture. Did you notice one obituary included a son John, whereas the others didn’t? I have solved more brick walls in obituaries and media articles than any other source.
Obituaries provide birth dates, death dates, residence, parents, spouses, siblings, extended family, occupation, and other information, that when paired with other records, increases the probabilities that the record(s) match your person of interest. Again, no data is data. No sibling listed in the obituary? They probably died before their sibling did. Or they were a step-sibling. Or they moved away and nobody knows their status. Or someone just plain forgot in their remorse. Or purposely omitted them due to the fight they had during the last Thanksgiving dinner. Or they were abducted by aliens.
Using the sample of records and obituaries collected from Step #4, we start branching the family tree of Hiram Fee.
Click here for the sample records collected.
Click here to see how the sample records start to branch out the family tree.
Note that so far, we’ve only used death certificates, obituaries, and one marriage record.
The very observant cynic will notice that this is just an incomplete tree about a “Hiram Jones Fee.” But is it the son of Henderson and Sarah? To finish this family tree, we’ll need to get religious and hurdle a few problems.
Coming up in Part 4 of this blog series, taking the leap of faith…
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