There is an advertisement for American University’s Kogod School for Business on the back of the bus stop near K street and 18th, that reads, “I will learn from failure instead of fearing it.” Have you learned this lesson yet in your genealogy research?
First, how can failure be defined in the scope of your genealogy needs? For most genealogists, failure is the inability to find direct evidence of an event, where it is expected to be. For example, you know that your ancestors lived their entire lives in one county, and you are able to estimate their marriage date from the births of children and later records, but when you search the marriages in that time and place, there is no record of your ancestor.Now what do you do? Some researchers will get frustrated and stop looking, chalk it up to either their own faulty reasoning or a missing record, stop looking, and move on. This is the equivalent of “fearing” your failure, and what it implies, rather than learning from it.
Before concluding that a record does not exist, however, you must complete a reasonably exhaustive search. In the example cited, have the marriage records of neighboring counties been searched? Is there a “gretna green” nearby – that is, a jurisdiction where marriage laws were more lenient, and therefore drew couples from the surrounding areas? What were the marriage laws in the area at that time? Did you check actual marriage records, or simply marriage licenses? Were marriage banns a legal alternative? Have church records been searched?
One of the persistent stumbling blocks in my research was caused by a tombstone that stated that my ancestor was born in Stamford, Connecticut. All available census records also stated that he was born in Connecticut. Vital events for that time and place were recorded among the town records, and have all been compiled into a single collection. Yet for some reason, my ancestor could not be found. For years, I struggled with this question: why was there no record of his birth? I spread out into the surrounding towns in Connecticut, looked at other birth dates, other individuals with similar names, etc. It was not until I discovered an autobiographical memoir that my ancestor wrote, published in a religious newspaper, that I learned that he was not born in Connecticut at all! His father had moved to nearby Westchester Co., New York, which is where my ancestor was born. His father then died when my ancestor was only an infant, and he was sent back to Stamford to be raised by his grandfather. This is why there was no record in Stamford.
The flip side of no record being found is what is called “negative evidence.” This occurs when a researcher cannot find any record, even after an exhaustive search. Evaluation of existing evidence would then include the fact that no record was found, as evidence in its own right.
Say that you are searching for your African-American ancestor in the census records. You find him in the records from 1870 through 1900. But thorough searching in indexes, as well as a line-by-line search for the individual in the areas in which he lived, have come up with nothing in either 1860 or 1910. The lack of a presence in the 1860 census serves as “negative evidence” that this individual was a slave at that time. The lack of a presence in 1910 serves as “negative evidence” that the individual had died before 1910.
Using “negative evidence” properly can be tricky, though. In order for “negative evidence” to be credible, an exhaustive search must first be completed, and there must be a reason for no record to exist. In the example in the last paragraph, the negative evidence for the individual’s death must be cited in a proof summary that also explains, for example, that vital registration did not begin until 1912. If vital registration began in 1898, then in addition to the absence in the 1910 census, you must also explain why no death certificate exists. In other words, negative evidence is rarely accepted by itself, but only with (1) proof of an exhaustive search, and (2) an analysis of other circumstances that lend significance to this negative evidence.
What have you learned from your genealogical “failures”?
Comments
I've learned that many of the "failures" I encountered were actually details/info that I missed OR that the record taker got wrong. There have been times when on closer examination a record revealed exactly what I'd looked for.
The key is performing the reasonably exhaustive search process - this is the key to identifying if there is a true failure or just a record needing further validation.
Great article Michael!:-)
Luckie
www.OurGeorgiaRoots
Your example is perfect. The next time some one tells me they can't find their ancestors I'll just hand them a copy of your article. Always keep looking.
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