Crucianize

Tag: family history

  • Leaving Françoise

    It’s been a while since I’ve shared some genealogy discoveries here, and I’ve actually been sitting on a piece of interesting information that I meant to share two years ago, but life grabbed me and forced my attention elsewhere. So now I will share what I found.

    I made a shocking discovery: Simon Joseph Turbé, also known as Joseph Simon Turbé, my 5th great-grandfather and the man who brought the Turbé last name to St. Barths, was married when he moved to the island. Not only was he married, but he had children.

    I actually came across this information on January 6, 2024, after paying a subscription to Geneanet for 8€. I wanted to see what extra stuff would become available to me after subscribing, and one of those things was an option to search for family members via trees. I saw a hint pop up for Simon Joseph Turbé and was a little intrigued. I fully believed it would be a tree from one of my St. Barths cousins, who are pretty active on there, but it was someone from France, and their connection to me was through a child I had never even heard of before. The child’s mother was also one I had never heard of. I thought for sure there must have been some mistake because how could a whole wife and child slip my research, even after tracking down the baptism and parents of Simon Joseph Turbé?

    I set off to look up the records that were indicated on the profile. Thankfully, Geneanet’s paid subscription has an option that helps you look for the record. There were about five links they showed that pointed to different parts of the Loire-Atlantique archives, and I think it was the third or fourth link that I finally found the record I was looking for.

    AD 44, page 8 – Archives départementales Loire-Atlantique

    There in the records was Joseph Turbé of minor age, son of Simon Turbé and Françoise Maurice. In the record, it states that Joseph was born in Couëron, and the marriage took place in Paimbœuf, which is not that far from Couëron. From my own research on Simon Joseph Turbé, I know that his father, Simon, was born in Île d’Yeu and later on moved to Couëron after the death of his first wife and daughter. This matches up, so I can’t deny that my great-grandfather did, in fact, marry this woman.

    Who was this mystery wife? Her name was Jeanne Perrine Simon. Jeanne was born in Paimbœuf on September 25, 1770, to François Simon and Jeanne Moreau.

    Simon Joseph and Jeanne Perrine were married on December 3, 1792. Their daughter Jeanne Françoise Joséphine Turbé was born on April 5, 1792. I’m thinking they got married because they had a child. A year later, they had another daughter, Victoire Turbé, born on August 25, 1793. Unfortunately, Victoire died on August 12, 1794, not even a year old. I guess that sometime between 1794 and 1799, Simon Joseph Turbé decided to leave his family for the Caribbean. Did his wife know he had left her, or did she assume he was going on a trip and never returned?

    Jeanne Françoise Joséphine’s young life was chaotic. She lost her little sister, her father left, she lost her paternal grandfather in 1797, and on July 15, 1799, she lost her mother. Jeanne Perrine Simon died just 3 months after Simon Joseph Turbé married Anne Rose Jeanne Greaux in Saint-Barthélemy, while he was enjoying married life in the Caribbean; the family he left behind was disintegrating.

    There was little Jeanne Françoise Joséphine, 7 years old and an orphan, even though her father wasn’t actually dead. We can find her later living with her father’s mother, Françoise Maurice, in Couëron. Between 1802 and 1806, her father had five new children in Saint-Barthélemy, half-siblings Jeanne Françoise Joséphine would never meet, much less know.

    On February 7, 1814, before her 22nd birthday, Jeanne Françoise Joséphine married Julien François Chartier in Couëron.

    France, Loire-Atlantique, Etat-Civil, 1792-1960

    In the record, it says that Jeanne Françoise Joséphine is fille majeure de feu Joseph Turbé et de défunte Jeanne Perrine Simon, which tells us that they thought he had died many years ago when he travelled to the Caribbean. Her grandmother was her legal guardian, mentioned as present and consenting to her marriage to Julien François Chartier.

    Let’s back track a bit. Simon Joseph Turbé was 23 years old when his daughter Jeanne Françoise Joséphine was born. He was 24 when he married her mother, a whole eight months later. Why did they wait so long to get married? It’s 1792 in Paimboeuf, France. Paimboeuf is an outport of Nantes. The Loire River is too shallow for large ships to reach Nantes, so they had to dock in Paimboeuf. It had a tavern culture, lots of inns and drinking dens for the many sailors, merchants, and soldiers who came from all over. 1792 was also Year 1 of the French Republic; the country was at war with most of Europe, and the government was also starting to draft young men into the navy and army. Which might explain how Simon Joseph Turbé ended up on a ship to St. Barts. In 1792, marriage was still very much a social and economic arrangement. Simon Joseph was probably pressured into marrying Jeanne Perrine Simon, who was 21 at the time of Jeanne Françoise Joséphine’s birth. An unwed mother in those times was very shameful, and her family probably demanded that he fix this situation. So we have Simon Joseph possibly going into this marriage reluctantly, while also being in a town with a port, a very tempting situation for someone who might have been forced to marry a woman he’s not even sure the child is his.

    Despite her poor luck in early life, Jeanne Françoise Joséphine had 10 children with her husband, and she died on June 23, 1849, at 57 years of age. Her children were born in Couëron from 1814 to 1822, when the family moved to Nantes. The last five children were born in Nantes, and the descendants of Jeanne Françoise Joséphine include Chartier, Bedin, Balcou, Gillot, Bretonnière, Merlet, and Jean.

    I often marveled at how my 5th great-grandfather left France for the unknown, landed in Saint-Barthélemy and established the Turbé name on the island and to know his history, his life before the Caribbean it just provides a more fuller picture of who this man was, even if I personally find it a little off putting, it’s hard for me to not feel for that little girl who was abandoned by her father.

    But did he completely forget his daughter? Am I just romanticising the past? He named a daughter, born in St. Barts, Françoise Joséphine Turbé in 1806. She was his last daughter and last child, ironic how his first and last are named so similarly.

  • Half Cousins galore!

    Half Cousins galore!

    This month has actually been pretty active for DNA cousins, I had one of my cousins pop up, they are actually my half 1st cousin but in my family we don’t really use “half”. I also had the child of one of my cousins pop up, again they are half relation but we don’t use those terms.

    Itr is actually interesting to see the shared relatives between both of my cousins. I was expecting to see just relatives of my grandfather but sprinkled in there were relatives from my grandmother’s side and my father’s paternal and maternal side!

    This is interesting to me because my grandparents were from different countries. My paternal grandfather was from Saint-Barthélemy in the French caribbean, my paternal grandmother was from St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands and my maternal grandparents were from Dominica.

    I’m trying not to get ahead of myself while speculating on the relationships of all these dna relatives and what it means that they show up in my shared relatives in common with my cousins. It is entirely possible that I am related to this person on their paternal side and my cousin is related to them via their maternal side. I have no idea how I’m actually going to prove these lines though, Dominica genealogy is the most frustrating one I have ever had to deal with, if I could find my way to a family history center and view the records on, FamilySearch I would be so happy but I have no way to gain access to one. I hope that the records for Saint George parish will be made available one day and I’m able to search whenever I want.

    Here is my Half first cousin, their parent is my mother’s half sibling. We share 7% of our DNA, 485 cM across 22 segments. My cousin and our aunt who is my full aunt share 1031 cM across 34 segments while I share 1808 cM across 60 segments. My cousin actually share a little more DNA with my brother than I do and I don’t like it lol, my brother actually shares 594 cM across 20 segments, it doesn’t really change the fact that this is our cousin but in my mind it’s like they are more his cousin than mine and it makes me a little sad. It’s an illogical thought but my mind travels down these paths frequently.

    Now, here is my half 1st cousin once removed, we share 4% of our DNA, 301 cM across 11 segments, their shared DNA with my aunt is intereting, 223 cM across 10 segments, I share more DNA with them than they share with my aunt, I wonder if it means that my mother shares more DNA in common with this half sibling or maybe their other parent is somehow related to me through my father. This cousin’s parent is my half 1st cousin which means their grandparent is my mother’s half sibling.

    So here is a little chart showing piece of my family tree, I have way more aunts and uncles than is shown here, I just wanted to show where my cousins are located in the family tree.

    I wish some of my cousins on my father’s side would test so I can see how much DNa we share and what relatives they might be related to that doesn’t show up for me or my brother. They don’t seem to be interested in it but one can only hope.

  • Finding Sarah Holm

    Finding Sarah Holm

    If there is one ancestor who has evaded all my research skills it is my 2x great grandmother Sarah Holm, the amount of evidence !i have that Sarah did exist is very minimal, five pieces of primary records, I have tried to look forward but couldn’t find her in any record after 1920, I have tried going backwards but hit a brick wall in 1908.

    She is truly one of the most elusive people I have had to research and I can’t help but ponder, just  who are you Sarah? Were you hiding from someone or just didn’t know your correct age?

    Let’s go over everything I currently have, starting with the 1908 baptism record of my great uncle Harold Olanzo Smith. Harold was born on November 14, 1908 to Michael Smith of Tortola, British Virgin Islands and Sarah Holm of St. Thomas, Danish West Indies. Michael was 38 while Sarah was 33 at the time of Harold’s birth.

    Harold Smith’s baptism line 286

    1911 Census

    In 1911, Sarah lived in Mandenberg which was located in New Quarter on St. Thomas, she was 35 years old and worked as a Coal Worker and had two children, Harold 2 years old and another child identified as a boy with no age given.

    Sarah and children located on the bottom

    In 1914, Sarah gave birth to my great grandfather Alfredo Alexander Boyles also known as Alfredo Pedrito Boynes. Alfredo was born on May 26, 1914 to Joseph Alexander Boyles and Sarah Holm, Joseph was 45 years old and Sarah was 35, here is where the age discrepancies begin, in 1911 Sarah was 35, there is no way she was still 35 a whole 3 years later.

    Alfredo Boyles’ baptism line 46

    Sarah gave birth to my last great aunt in 1916. On November 12, 19166, Sarah and Joseph had another child, the baptism record lists the child as being male and named Arthur but on the left hand side there is a remark about the child actually being female. Joseph was 42 years old and Sarah was till 35 years old. Even more interesting Agatha later on gave her birth date as January 14, 1917 which was the date she was baptized.

    Agatha Boyles’ baptism line 2

    The last piece of primary source I could find, the 1920 Census, fun fact the 1920 Census was actually taken in 1917 up to 1918 so the dates are almost always wrong, sometimes I come across people with the right birth year but it’s mostly off by two years. In 1920, Sarah was living in Altona, which was located on the Southern East section of the island. She was 40 years old and living with three children, Mary J Griffith 11 years old, Agatha Boyles 1 years old, and Alfredo Boyles 3 years old. I’m not sure where Harold was at this time.

    Sarah and children located on the bottom

    An interesting piece of information I came across recently gave me some more clue to who Sarah might have been, this piece of information was an interview Mary Jane did when she was 99 years old. On October 9, 2004, In an interview with the St. Thomas Source, Mary Jane spoke about her life, how she met her husband and what she remembered of the day the islands were sold to the United States. She spoke about how her father was a carpenter, her mother grew vegetables to sell, Mary Jane states that she was the oldest of four children and was born on May 10, 1905 in Park Yard. I have not been able to find any baptism records to confirm this date nor do I have any clue as to where Park Yard might have been on St. Thomas.

    I’m afraid the only way I will get any answers is through DNA but Mary Jane had no children, I’m uncertain if Agatha had children, none of my known cousins on my grandmother’s side of the family has tested and none show any signs of being interested. I have one grandchild of Harold’s but there are very few connections, it did lead me to the grandchild of my grandmother’s half sister which also lead me to the NPE I discovered and posted about before Detective Lynnette and the Case of the Mysterious DNA Relative, this mystery cousin has a few relatives in common but I have not been able to make any connections between her tree and the other matches, if I could find a match betwen thm then I can find the connection to me as well.

    I guess I will be back to looking through my DNA relatives, those of my brother and those of my father as well.

  • Agnes Ancita Bastian

    Recently I was able to fit a missing piece into my puzzle thanks to a stranger on FamilySearch.

    For so many years I’ve been searching for proof that my great aunt Agnes Bastian was the daughter of Casper and the full sister of Ann Loratia Bastian but that pesky baptism record eluded me for so many years, no matter what combination of names or dates I put in I just could not find that baptism record. That is until I went onto FamilySearch after a little break and saw that someone attached a document to my great aunt, I was intrigued, usually, I am the one finding records and connecting them to other people’s relatives. I wasn’t convinced even if the names sounded similar, I had never heard the middle name Ancita before so I took a closer look at the record, and there it was.

    “Virgin Islands US, Church Records, 1765-2010”, database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:6ZF3-9558 : 29 December 2021), Agnes Ancita Bastian, 1918.

    Agnes Ancita Bastian was born on October 21, 1917, and baptized on January 15, 1918, the daughter of Caspar Bastian and Maud Hinds.

    Before this record popped up all I had to go by was the1930, 1940, and some travel records which unfortunately did not give her birthdate just her age and an estimated birth year which said around 1917.

    So now I have confirmed that Agnes and Ann Loratia Bastian; Ann was born on December 24, 1914, and baptized on February 6, 1915, were both the daughters of Casper Bastian.

    St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, Slave and Free People Records, 1779-1921, Ancestry.com

    There is an older sister, Esmeralda Bastian who was born on October 29, 1911, according to her baptism record but no father is recorded, given that Ann and Agnes followed after I assumed that Casper was also her father but I have no proof.

    I guess I will just have to continue searching and hope that maybe another kind soul will stumble across it and link it for me again.

  • Another piece to the puzzle

    At the end of October, I received from one of my sisters by way of an aunt who got them from my step-grandmother the baptism records for not only my grandfather but also two of his sisters. This was like a gift from the universe because I had pretty much given up on this side of my family tree with little to no information forthcoming. I was at a dead-end and just did not know how to move forward. I put this branch of my tree on the back burner and turned my attention elsewhere.

    I think it was last month or maybe even earlier than that Familysearch released a bunch of indexed records for several Caribbean Islands and Dominica was included, I helped with the indexing but only got records from St. Kitts so I was pleasantly surprised to see Dominica had been included. Unfortunately for me the records included seemed to only be for Saint Patrick parish which I don’t know if either one of my grandparents had family from there. I know they both were born in Roseau which is part of the Saint George parish. I did find a few Xavier in the Saint Patrick parish with a few of the names looking very familiar, one seemed to show up in my brother’s DNA relatives but of course, I have no idea how they are actually related so now I’m attempting to triangulate and group-specific people according to how they are related to my brother and each other. I really need to do my Ancestry test and send it off for that extra connection.

    If you’re interested in looking at the Saint Patrick parish records you can view them here: https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/4318340

    You will need to sign in to actually search the records, if you don’t have an account it’s very easy to sign up for a free account.

    Here are the baptism records I received (I tried to improve them so it would be easier to view the information, they were very blurry and hard to read before, some of them still are):

    In order of age, we have the baptism record of Olive Xavier, child of Joseph Xavier and Jane Xavier née Augustus born in Roseau on the 18th day of December 1914. She was baptized in the Catholic Church on the 7th day of February 1915. The other names are really hard for me to make out but it looks like her sponsors were Ludovic Oscar and Marian S…?

    The next baptism record belongs to Mabel Xavier, child of John Xavier and Marian Xavier -Augustus born in Giraudel Dominica on the 16th day of April 1919. She was baptized in the Catholic Church on the 18th day of May 1919. Her sponsors were James Samuel and Josephine S…? I think it’s the same last name from the first record but I can’t really make it out.

    The last baptism record belongs to my grandfather, Norbert Anthony Xavier, child of John Xavier and Jane Xavier born in Roseau on the 12th day of June 1931. He was baptized in the Catholic Church on the 12th? day of July 1931. His sponsors were Michael T…? and L…? Nicholson?

    I’m left with so many questions after seeing these baptism records, Are Marian and Jane the same person? Are Joseph and John the same person? If so then John has another name to add, my grandfather told me his father was also called Roderick so here we have a John aka Joseph aka Roderick Xavier who was married to a Marian who might or might not be Jane Augustus.

    I’m hoping beyond hope that Familysearch transcribes the church records from the Saint George parish, they do have it but it’s a film and I have no way of getting to a Family History Center so the only way will be an index. Next year maybe? Possibly? Please?

  • Who are you? Joseph Boldt

    I wrote about Joseph Boldt before in this post and this one as well. Since those posts, I have done a lot more fact-checking and some stuff is just not accurate anymore. Genealogy as you might not know is very fluid and things you thought you had checked and double-checked could always use a triple check.

    First things first, Joseph and Christina’s first daughter was not Adelaide as I had assumed but Ancilla Boldt, this was not a middle name or nickname but her actual name. Ancilla was born on August 7, 1869, and she passed away on March 18, 1881, when she was 11 years old.

    Burial records 1881 St. Croix, Danish West Indies

    This record was the reason I went back through the records I had for Adelaide and realized that there were records for 3 people. There was Ancilla born in 1869, Adelaide born in 1883, and another Adelaide Boldt born in 1853. I now have Ancilla and my Adelaide accounted for but have no idea who the older Adelaide is. I’ve been trying to build a mirror tree for her but she is a complete mystery to me and I’ve shelved it for a little while. I’m more interested in Joseph and what secrets he has for me.

    So, Joseph, I know was born in the 1840s and his mother’s name was Precill or something close to it so I focused on looking for birthdates with names close to it. I came across this entry:

    Baptism records 1842 St. Croix, Danish West Indies

    The name Sames made no sense to me so I looked at the record more closely and the name is obviously James.

    Joseph was born on April 3, 1842, parents are James and Priscilla from Mt. Stewart.

    This could be his parents, this could be my 5th great-grandparents but I’m not sure. They both have no surnames so I’m assuming they are slaves. I viewed a Session during RootsTech Connect that said slaves took names that had a meaning to them. The name of their master, their master’s mother, or grandmother, whoever it was the slave knew them and took the name for themselves during slavery and kept it. I’m now tracking every Boldt I can find on the Island. Somewhere there has to be a clue.

    Very recently I found some new records that suggest there was another daughter named Rebecca, there’s no image available to view but the Household number leads me to believe this was one of my great aunts.

    1880 Census St. Croix, Danish West Indies

    Unfortunately, she passed away in 1900 before she could turn 23.

    Burial records 1900 St. Croix, Danish West Indies

    She’s old enough to have had children but I haven’t come across any so far.

    As for Christina, I think I found some of her family, possibly her father and two aunts. I was looking over the 1870 Census when I noticed a familiar last name, Chamberlain. Family in the Danish West Indies almost always stuck close to each other so it’s telling that the only other family I found with this last name lived right next to Christina and Ancilla.

    1870 Census St. Croix, Danish West Indies

    Going back to Joseph’s parents in the 1870 Census Priscilla shows up as Precill Karen. She’s an Invalid living with her son Joe and sister Magdalene Karen who is also invalid.

    1870 Census St. Croix, Danish West Indies

    In the 1880 Census, she is Percila Boldt, there’s no image available for this record so I have if I look at the household number it’s safe to assume she was living with Joseph and his family.

    Percila is very close to Priscilla so even if these specific people aren’t my great grandparents I’m going to refer to Precill as Priscilla from now on.

    I haven’t had much luck finding any other Karens on the Island so it just might be a misspelling. So far the closest names I have found are Caren, Cairnes, Cairns, Karn, Kern, and Keron.

    My Boldt Collection:

    After going through the Census records which include Baptism, Burials, and Marriages I have collected quite a few Boldts to see if I could find a link to my family.

    • James Boldt born on 28 November 1854 in St. Croix, Danish West Indies, he went by the name Bolde while becoming Naturalized in Massachusetts.
    Familysearch

    I have not found a baptism record for him. I did find him in the 1870 Census living in a house owned by Sarah Jane Boldt. I’m still doing research into who this might be.

    I’m now trying to work downwards from the connections I have made but it is very slow going because I’m not sure if they went to other Islands or other countries.

  • New MyHeritage Genetic Groups

    This being the first day of the new year I thought it only fitting that I write about MyHeritage’s Genetic Groups update that dropped on December 24. They are free to anyone who has taken a test at MyHeritage or uploaded it there. I have three uploads, my 23andme which was uploaded in Sep 2018, my brother’s Ancestry which was uploaded in Mar 2018, and my father’s 23andme which was uploaded in Aug 2020. Since my brother and my uploads were done in 2018 we were grandfathered into having access to most of the DNA tools without having to pay. It’s interesting how both our uploads perform, my brother’s upload has 520 DNA relatives while I have 500. Our father on the other hand has 1,006 DNA matches!

    Here’s my Ethnicity on MyHeritage, I didn’t receive any Genetic Groups, unfortunately, these results don’t really make much sense to me and have never changed since I uploaded them.

    Here’s my brother’s Ethnicity, he has one Genetic Group in, the Netherlands, which makes sense since I knew we had relatives in the Netherlands.

    My father’s upload was stuck behind the paywall because it was uploaded after MyHeritage stopped allowing the free uploads but I never really thought about paying for it since I could see his ethnicities by comparing his account with mine or my brother’s, I have to admit though, seeing that he had 3 Genetic Groups and I had no way of seeing them unless I paid made me very curious. I ended up paying 34,80€ to unlock his DNA results.

    I’m not sure if being able to change the Confidence level of the Genetic Groups is part of the paid DNA account or if it’s due to the fact that there is more than one Group.

    Puerto Rico and USA Genetic Group make perfect sense as my father has a lot of families that moved to Puerto Rico and then their children later on moved to the USA.

    The other two Genetic Groups I wasn’t expecting if you read the About this Genetic Group section it’s mostly British and some Irish and German settlers, on my father’s paternal side we have a few Irish/British lines so this makes sense.

    In conclusion, the Genetic Groups have been a pleasant surprise just waiting on an update to the Ethnicity because I’m not really sure what could be contributing to the South Asian in both mine and my father’s composition.