Category Archives: Ancestry

Discovering My Ancestry: Part 5 – King Henry I

My last post talked about Mary Boleyn and her daughter Catherine who may have been the product of an affair with King Henry VIII. She may also have been the daughter of Mary’s husband, Sir William Carey. Because of the uncertainty, I will focus on the ancestors of Mary Boleyn.

Sixteen generations before Mary came Henry Beauclerc. Henry, the fourth son of William the Conqueror (1028-1087), was born around the year 1028. When William died in 1087, William’s eldest son, Robert inherited Normandy and William’s third son, William, inherited England. The second eldest son, Richard, Died in 1075. Henry was left without land but he did receive £5000, which I am sure was a lot of money back then.

King Henry I

William died in a hunting accident in 1100. Henry was with him at the time and some suspect it may not have been an accident. Henry moved quickly to seize the English throne while Robert was away on a Crusade. He tried to gain favor by promising at his coronation to correct many of William’s less popular policies. He also married Matilda, the daughter of Malcolm III, King of the Scotts, three months after his inauguration. This, no doubt, bolstered his support from the north.

Henry had as many as 24 illegitimate children in his lifetime, 9 boys and 15 girls, many born before his marriage with Matilda. His firstborn son, Robert FitzRoy, my direct ancestor, was born about 1090. Henry and Mitilda had two children, Matilda, born in 1102, and William Adelin, born the following year.

By July of 1101, Robert had formed an army and was ready to take England from Henry by force. Robert landed at Portsmouth on July 20 with a few hundred men that were quickly joined by many of the English barons. Their armies met at Alton where peace negotiations produced the Treaty of Alton. Under the treaty, Robert recognized Henry as king while Henry renounced his claims on most of western Normandy and agreed to pay Robert £2,000 a year for life.

During the next couple of years Henry gained influence with many of the Norman barons and eventually invaded Normandy in 1105. By late 1106, Henry had conquered Normandy and taken Robert prisoner. He remained Henry’s prisoner for 28 years until his death in 1134.

The king’s only legitimate male heir, William Adelin, died when the ship he was on, The White Ship, struck a rock in the English Channel and sunk in 1120. The accident happened because William supplied the crew with plenty of wine and they were probably drunk at the time.

Henry wanted his daughter, Matilda, to succeed him but after his death in 1135 there was great resistance to her rule. Stephen of Blois, a grandson of William The Conqueror, took the crown. Henry’s oldest son, Robert FitzRoy, was not eligible because of his illegitimacy.

Matilda contested the crown going to Stephen and years of civil war, known as “the Anarchy,” followed. A compromise was reached in 1153 called the Treaty of Wallingford. Its terms stated that Stephen was to retain the crown for the remainder of his lifetime. It would then revert to Matilda’s son, Henry, who would become King Henry II, the first of the Plantagenet’s dynasty.

While double checking the accuracy of my connection with Henry Beauclerc, I followed his line down a different path and was surprised at what I found. It turns out that Sir William Carey is a direct descendent of King Henry I

Discovering My Ancestry: Part 4 – The Other Boleyn Girl

My ancestry research eventually led me fifteen generations back to Lady Catherine Mary Carey. The name didn’t ring any bells at the time but then I learned the name of her mother, Mary Boleyn. That name seemed familiar but I didn’t know why so I looked her up.

Mary Boleyn

I discovered that Mary Boleyn was the Sister of Queen Anne, the second wife of King Henry VIII, who was beheaded for High Treason. She was charged with adultery, incest and plotting to kill the king. But several years earlier, Anne’s sister Mary Boleyn, was the mistress of King Henry while he was married to Catherine of Aragon.

I had heard of the book and movie called “The Other Boleyn Girl” but never was interested in watching it until I learned that it was about one of my ancestors. I asked my wife if she wanted to watch the movie and she was more than happy to help me by watching a chick flick.

I realized that the movie was probably highly speculative and overly dramatic but it was still somewhat informative and I was interested to learn what life was like for an ancestor of mine at that time. The movie paints Mary as the younger, more reserved sister while Anne was outgoing, cunning and opportunistic. If my memory is correct, It also shows their parents as power hungry people who practically steer their daughters into the king’s bed. From what I have read since, Mary was probably the older daughter and their parents may not have been as bad as portrayed.

While Mary was the king’s mistress, she bore two children, Catherine in 1524 and Henry in 1526. Some historians believe that Catherine, and to a lesser degree Henry, were illegitimate children of King Henry VIII. Some point to the fact that Mary’s husband, William, received land grants from the king that coincided with the birth of Catherine and Henry. Others talk of the resemblance between Henry and Catherine.

King Henry VIII and Catherine Carey Knollys

It was also noted that Queen Elizabeth I, The daughter of Henry and Anne, gave special favors to Catherine and Henry, more than would be expected for mere cousins. It also seems unlikely that Mary would name her first son after the king if it was William’s child.

Whatever the truth is, it complicates my family tree. I have had to stop research on that part of the family because of the uncertainty. It would be helpful if family tree programs could allow people to have two or more branches that are listed as uncertain. I wondered why nobody ever did a DNA test on living ancestors to determine if Henry did indeed father Mary’s children but I learned that none of Henry’s four known children produced children of their own so there are no confirmed living relatives. I suppose DNA tests could be performed on decedents of close relatives of King Henry’s but those findings could be made more difficult by the fact that Mary Boleyn was actually a distant cousin of Henry’s, as we shall see in my next post.

Discovering My Ancestry: Part 3 – Royalty

A few years ago, I would occasionally go to the library when I had some free time to do family research. I was too cheap to pay for Ancestry.com so I would access it from there. It was a valuable tool in my research but it was not the only one. When I would find a new person on my tree I would then go home and research that person on other genealogy websites like Familyserch.org or Wikitree.com. Sometimes those sites would have information that was not on Ancestry.com. Combined, I was able to greatly expand my family tree.

I gradually started finding ancestors of greater and greater importance. It was like following a stream to a river and then to the ocean. The fact that these people held a high stature made finding information about them so much easier. After all, how many records were kept on commoners hundreds of years ago?

The turning point in my investigation came when I learned about my great, great, great, great, great grandmother, The Honorable Martha Edwardes. She was born in England in 1764, the daughter of William Edwardes, 1st Baron of Kensington, and Elizabeth Warren (no, not that Elizabeth Warren). Starting with Martha, my family expands back through time to increasingly more important positions in society.

Sir Henry Rich

Four generations earlier came Sir Henry Rich, 1st Earl of Holland (1590-1649). I’m just guessing but I bet that is where the term “rich” comes from. The Earl had an army of 500 men during the English civil war, which lasted from 1642 to 1651. The war pitted the supporters of King Charles I against the supporters of Parliament. Henry was captured during The Battle of St. Neots. He ceded the city under condition that his life would be spared. He was then put on trial and executed on February 27, 1649, less than a month after the execution of King Charles.

Other notable ancestors of Martha include Robert Rich, 5th Earl of Warwick (1616-1645); Sir Walter Devereux, 10th Baron Ferrers of Chartley/1st Earl of Essex (1539-1576); Sir Robert Rich (1537- 1581); Sir Richard Deveroex (1516-1547); Sir Francis Knollys (1511-1596); First Baron Sir Richard Rich (1496-1567); Sir William Jenkes (1480-1571); The list goes on and on.

This line would eventually lead me to kings, emperors and saints, but those are stories to come.

Discovering My Ancestry: Part 2 – Making a Living on Death

Patrick Blake

My great, great grandfather, Patrick Blake, was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1833 and was brought to Ontario, Canada when he was about a year old. This is when details get murky. As I mentioned in my last post, historical records tend to be conflicting which is the case here. According to my research, he left Ireland with both his mother and father, John and Catherine Blake. My research also says John Blake died in 1842 in Ontario but I recently read an obituary for Patrick that says his father died when he was an infant and his mother brought him to Canada shortly thereafter. I did find a John Blake in the 1842 Canadian census for Quebec but the census is practically worthless since it did not list ages or the names of family members. John Blake is not exactly an uncommon name.

Patrick Blake moved to Detroit when he was young. Again, the records are conflicting but he arrived somewhere between the ages 12 and 20, possibly earlier. If my records are correct, he came there with his mother some time after his father died in 1842 which would make the obituary partially true. In another publication about the Blake family, Patrick was said to have come to Detroit with his mother and Father, which doesn’t match my records for opposite reasons. This information is not very important but it illustrates the difficulties in historical research.

At a young age, Patrick learned the art of shoemaking and opened a shoe store in Detroit. His shoemaking skills were exceptional and he even earned first prize for a pair of shoes he made for the first Michigan State Fair.

Eliza O’Rafferty Blake

In 1855, Patrick married Eliza O’Rafferty. Eliza left Ireland with her family during the Irish Potato Famine. I wrote about her in another post that you can read here. Together they had nine or ten children. I will explain the uncertainty later.

In 1862, Patrick opened a furniture store after giving up the shoe business. By 1865 he was selling caskets as well as furniture in his store. In those days, funeral homes did not exist like they do today. People just bought caskets and buried their dead.

Patrick, like many others, lost money after the Panic of 1873 and gave up the furniture business. He then conceived the idea of devoting his time to directing funerals. He thought the casket business lacked the compassion needed at times of death and originated many ideas that are now common in the funeral home business.

1901 advertisement

Patrick’s funeral business became very successful in Detroit and the man himself was well regarded in the city. In a 1914 publication titled Successful Men of Michigan, Patrick’s business, which was later called P. Blake and Sons after the addition of his sons William and Charles, was touted as “the first to furnish their establishment with a morgue of modern construction and equipment. They were first to introduce the process of embalming in this part of the country; first to use black covered caskets; first to establish a chapel in connection with their undertaking rooms; and first to introduce the modern square funeral car or hearse.”

Patrick was also a charitable man. He took a special interest in St. Vincent’s orphan asylum, of Detroit, He was also a member of the city’s poor commission, and a member of the board of superintendents of the poor of Wayne county. This will be ironic years later when one of his own sons will end up poor and destitute.

Patrick died in 1893 and had a very thorough obituary in The Detroit Free Press. They mentioned nine children, eight of whom were living at the time and listed seven of them. They did not list my great grandfather, Nelson Blake. He was also not listed in other publications about the Blake family at the time. Nelson was the youngest of Patrick’s children, born in 1875.

A second cousin of mine found evidence that Nelson might have been the illegitimate child of Patrick’s oldest son, Harry, and Nellie Palmer, who were unmarried at the time. Patrick and Eliza may have adopted the child but no other evidence has been found to support that. I did find an 1880 census that shows Nelson listed as a 5 year old son to Patrick and Eliza along with eight other children in the household. I believe there was another child that had died by this time which may explain why he was said to have nine children in publications that I have read.

There is far less information about Nelson than Patrick but I know he ends up in Chicago and marries Matilda Williams (or Bouer). In the 1930 census he is listed as a gardener. Also in that census, he lists his father as being from Ireland. So if he is really Harry’s son then he either doesn’t know it or doesn’t acknowledge it.

From what I picked up over the years, Nelson and Matilda didn’t get along very well. I believe Matilda would complain often about Nelson’s behavior, in particular about his drinking. I don’t know if it was the drinking that was the problem or if going out to drink was the issue. My grandfather didn’t say much about it but it seemed he felt his mother drove his father away.

Whatever the reason, Nelson left Matilda and had a very hard life afterwards. The 1930 census has him living in a place called “Old Ironsides Hotel.” I looked it up but could find no information about it except one reference to it in a book called Murder City: The Bloody History of Chicago in the Twenties by Michael Lesy. In the book he says “The Ironsides was a skid row flophouse.”

Things hadn’t improved for Nelson ten years later when he was listed as a patient at Oak Forest Infirmary in 1940. It was a place for the sick and disadvantaged. It was also known as the Cook County Poor House. Nelson died that same year.

I can’t help wonder where his family was during those years he was poor and destitute. His parents were dead but he did have eight brothers and sisters, some of whom were probably well off considering the success of the undertaking business. Granted, I don’t know what happened to the business. It doesn’t exist today, at least not by that name, but I would think at least one of his siblings could have helped him at the time. Also, if Harry truly was his father, why didn’t he help? I guess I’ll never know.

Matilda lived in the same house in Chicago for the rest of her life. She died 13 years after Nelson in 1953. My mother visited her sometimes as a child and thought that she may have been waiting for her husband to come home. I wonder if she ever knew of his death.

Discovering My Ancestry: Part 1 – A Difficult Beginning

As I have aged, I have gained a respect and curiosity for those who have come before me. I have become interested in learning about my ancestors. I kick myself now for not being interested when I was young. So many people then could have told me so much, but now that knowledge is lost.

I think I became seriously interested in researching my family’s history after my father and three of my grandparents had passed away. It was the year 2000 or 2001. My only remaining grandparent at the time was my mother’s mother, Sadie (Thomas) Blake. I asked her about her parents but she said she knew nothing and had no interest in knowing anything.

That attitude came from the fact that she and her younger brother, Pat, were put in an orphanage when they were young. She had older siblings that did not suffer the same fate and I assume she was still bitter towards her parents for doing that to her. I don’t know the reason. Perhaps it was during the great depression and her parents were desperate.

I did manage to get some information at that time, although I don’t remember from where it came. I obtained photo copies of several important documents from both sides of my family. These documents had useful information but some also complicated my research.

For example, one document was my father’s mother’s passport. Elizabeth Höffler came to the United States when she was three years old with her mother, Eva. My grandma had told me years ago that she was from Hungary but her passport said she and her mom were both from Yugoslavia. Another problem was the spelling of the last name. The document spells the last name as Höfler in two places, with one “f,” but the signature is “Höffler.”

A couple of years ago I was able to clear up some confusion with the help of a Serbian coworker. She explained that many Hungarians lived in Yugoslavia at the time. She also pointed out that the alphabet is different there and the name was probably translated during their trip out of the country and the spelling was arbitrary. In fact, she said my grandmother’s name was really “Erzabeth” or something like that. My uncle also said that the time was just after World War One and Hungary did not really exist as a functioning country so it is possible that they entered Yugoslavia to get the proper paperwork to leave for America. What throws doubt on that theory is the fact that her Certificate of Naturalization in 1943 lists her as Yugoslavian. Since she was an adult at that time she probably would have corrected that if it was wrong.

Another problem is that Eva left with her three year old daughter but not her husband so I don’t know what her father’s name was nor do I know Eva’s maiden name. Perhaps Höffler is her maiden name and she was never married. My grandmother told me years ago her father was a German diplomat but my uncle said he was a German sailor. In either case, I was told he did not want to come to America and instead returned to Germany after the war.

On the other side of my family My mother’s father’s father was Irish and his mother was German. One document lists her as Tilly Williams and another as Matilda Bouer. Since her married name was Blake, one of those names is wrong or she was married to someone else first, which is probably unlikely since it was a hundred years ago and people didn’t get divorced like they do today, although her previous husband, if she had one, could have died.

These just illustrate some of the problems I had during my early research. It also is typical of geneology research in general. I have since encountered many conflicting documents that have complicated my research.

Another problem I ran into was finding information on my Grandmother’s parents, the ones who put her in an orphanage. In particular, her mother was listed on her delayed birth certificate as Rubina Slaughwhite, born in Marble Mountain, Canada. At the time, Google returned zero results for “Slaughwhite” or for “Marble Mountain” but Google was young at the time and there were far fewer web pages. Today I get 113 results and it asks if I mean “Slaunwhite” which I believe is the correct spelling. That spelling now produces 118,000 results. I also get 25,300,000 results for “Marble Mountain Canada.” What a difference 18 years makes.

I gave up my research for over a decade and when I started looking again I found more than I could have hoped for, at least on my mother’s side of the family. I uncovered many interesting stories along the way that I want to tell in future posts. One of those stories I wrote about a few years ago that you can read here. I hope you will join me for more.