What's in a Name?

Breaking down brick walls in search of ancestors...

I have a brick wall in my genealogy research, but I suspect I’m on the right path to eventually solving the mystery with the Creighton family. Many of the clues appear to have been hidden in plain sight.

The grandparents of the owner of The Creighton Cabin, James Creighton, has been a bit of a mystery to me. A few years ago, I think I made a bit of progress, but then this week, out of the blue, an idea came to me. When I had a minute the other night, I looked at some info… I think I’m on the right track!

What am I talking about? Ok, so originally, I knew nothing about James’s father’s family. I knew his dad was named John Creighton, but that was it. Just reading through some random books about the area years ago, I noticed that a woman by the name of Anna Creighton married a Jacob Davies (eventually Davis). Anna was born a few years before John, and they were both born in Washington County, Pennsylvania. That got my attention. I kept scouring records and realized that Anna and Jacob would have lived just down the road from John when they moved to Ohio. Coincidence? I couldn’t prove anything but it was becoming highly suspicious.

It’s been a few years, so I can’t remember the exact details about when I found what and what made me go down various rabbit holes, but I remember eventually doing similar things for a Mary Creighton (written as Clayton in some books) married to a George Passmore. And, they ended up being buried in the same cemetery as John and his wife.

Same situation with a Sarah Creighton married to a Joseph Moose.

I knew that these Creightons all claimed to have been born in Washington County, PA, and I also knew that many times, they married someone who grew up close by. I looked at the old census records in Washington County to see if I could find a Creighton that lived near a Davies, Moose, or Passmore. Sure enough, there is a Richard Creighton recorded.

Still not proof but it’s the best I have. (I now do have dna matches that descend from the Moose, Passmore, and Davies line, by the way.)

Back to James’s father, who was John Creighton, and his mother, who was Mary (Powell) Creighton. I know that Mary’s parents were Reuben Powell and Dorcas/Dorcus (Alford) Powell. Mary named her second son Reuben and her second daughter Dorcus, after her parents. Guess what the name of the first son was? Ding, ding, ding! You guessed it: Richard. I’m thinking they named the first son after John’s father.

Still not proof, but this might be as close as I’ll ever get, since this was late 1700s/very early 1800s.

So, the other evening, it dawned on me: go back to the tree and look at the order of the kids and the names. Maybe there is another clue.

I finally spotted it. The second male and second female were both named after Mary’s parents. As I said, I highly suspect that the first male is named after John’s father. To continue that logic, John’s mother’s name would be whatever he named their first female child. In this case, it would be Sarah.

Now at least I have another name to look for in records. Since this was before the spouses were listed in the census records, I might not be able to ever prove it. I’ll have to search for old church records or birth and death records that I haven’t been able to find yet. At least it gives me one more clue.

One reason I had missed this somewhat obvious clue, besides that it was hidden in plain sight, was that I had George Creighton’s (the third son) birth year off a bit. I had records that put him younger than Dorcus, but I had not updated my cover-chart where I had been looking all this time. This served as a good reminder to go back to your records and look again!

While we are talking about names in the Creighton family, let’s look at another situation.

A couple years ago, I was searching my dna matches for the name “Creighton.” Lo and behold, I found one. I looked at their tree, but it listed a man in the county north of my research area. I wasn’t familiar with any Creightons in that county, but I looked closer. The man’s name was Reuben Richard Creighton.

I didn’t have a Reuben Richard Creighton in my tree, but c’mon! The name! This gentleman was born in 1864. I finally figured out that he was the fourth child of Reuben and Ruth Creighton. They had both died prior to the 1870 census, and Reuben Richard had simply fallen between my census cracks. I had not found a birth certificate for him, either.

Seeing this young man living in the county north rang a memory in my head. I have his uncle’s (Richard Creighton) family Bible. Richard and his wife had six children but none of them ever married or had children of their own, so that line ended. Somehow the Bible went to one of their cousin’s who passed it to my Grandma, who passed it to me.

I remember looking through this family Bible and seeing photos of people I did not recognize. One photo though had the photographer and the town where it was taken. The town is in that county north of my research territory! I remember thinking, “Who would that be? Why would they have that photo in the family Bible? There wasn’t any family from that county.” I actually thought at the time it must have been someone from the mother’s line.

I went upstairs and pulled the photo. I sent a message to the dna match asking if they had any photos or if they would recognize a person. She replied and said her mother-in-law, who was in her 90s, had only ever seen one photo of this man. She had it, had given it to her son, and he lost it. She said her mother-in-law would recognize him though.

I emailed her a copy of the photo. I heard back almost instantly. “That’s him!” She then sent a photo of what would be his grandson. Woah! There was an uncanny resemblance, down to the haircut! While I don’t have permission to share the living relative’s photo, I’m happy to share the mysterious photo of Reuben Richard Creighton, James Creighton’s nephew. (I wonder if he was ever able to visit The Cabin?)

The names can give us so many clues! They are just hidden in plain sight, and we have to “listen” more carefully.

Thanks for joining me at The Creighton Cabin as we solve more mysteries about the Creighton clan. I hope this gives you ideas about how you might look at your old information in new ways. Good luck!

If you think this might help someone else solving their family mysteries, please feel free to share.