Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Continuing drama with Ancestry

This has become the back-story.
How many things that are listed as fact, are in fact just errors on Ancestry DOT com

I was working on another branch back from my mother's family tree, where the Conns moved to Texas back when it was being settled.

Tomorrow I'll post more details about John Thomas Conn on his birthday.

Both his parents came from VA and only moved as far as Ralls County, MO, where they have headstones in the cemetery. So there's a good likelihood that facts about them are substantiated. I'll write more about their lives later.

But let's check where his mother's parents came from.  Mildred Ann Conley Conn was born in VA.  Her father John Conley was born in 1730 (or so) in Ireland, according to Ancestry.  Her mother, Elizabeth Sanford Conley was born in 1731 in Fairfield, Fairfield County, CT...and she also died in Fairfield County, CT - in Redding in 1760.

Their lives are believable, except, how did she go to VA to give birth when she was born and died in CT?  Mildred Ann and the next to next born child are the only ones Ancestry lists has having been born in VA.  And they are the only 2 who carry the Conley last name, the other 7 having the name of Platt, being born both before and after the 2 Virginia children.  Here's the list which shows not much information about several of them.

Eunice Platt (Born: )
place unknown                     ( Died: 1829)
John Platt (Born: ) Redding, Fairfield, CT          (Died 1782)
Samuel Platt (Born: )  place unknown            (died 1782 Ridgefield, Fairfield CT)
Jonas Platt (Born: 1755) Redding, Fairfield CT  (died 1740 Dutchess County, NY)
Obadiah Platt (Born: 1758) Ridgefield, Fairfield CT   (died unknown)
Isaac Platt (Born: 1760)
Ridgefield, Fairfield CT   (died 1824 Redding, Fairfield CT)
Mildred Ann Conley (Born: 1770) Falls Church, Fairfax, VA  (died 1845 Salem, Ralls, MO)
William Platt (Born: 1775) Redding, Fairfield, CT   (died unknown)

John Conley (Born: 1785)   VA   (died  1852, place unknown.

 Don't you just know someone looked at Fairfax and Fairfield and got the 2 places confused?
I could do that.  But VA and CT are a whole long distance away, especially for colonial US.

But this brings into question the Conley connection, because the mother of Mildred couldn't have lived her whole life in CT, gone to VA in 1770 to have Mildred Ann Conley, then back in 1775 to CT for William Platt's birth, then in 1785 back to VA to give birth to John Conley.

At least the 2 children born in VA were named Conley.
So I think I can count that John Conley might at least be the brother of my ancestor Mildred Ann Conley.

Their parents are quite another matter!

And just as I was finishing up John Thomas Conn's post for tomorrow, what do I notice but another Ancestry connection (they call them hints) that places my great great Hannah Leak Conn Booth in Indiana as the daughter of yet another branch of the Conn family...which is really strange.  But the Indiana connection is the weak link in my history, so perhaps this will expain how she got there.  All will eventually be clear, or I'll just give up.










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