Christopher Osborne is my brickwall.  I have his will dated 1789, probated in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina.  He mentions sons Jonathan (c 1771-1826) and Christopher, Jr. (1785-1854), as well as his 8 daughters.

Oh, and by the way, his wife Sarah might be pregnant, he says.

Son Jonathan marries, remains in western North Carolina, and has 10 sons with his wife Martha.

Christopher Jr. marries about 1802 to Elizabeth Kizor in Cabarrus County.  In 1807 he marries Catherine Furr, and they move to Dallas County, Alabama in 1818.

Despite lots of Osborne families in western North Carolina about this time, I cannot place Christopher in one of them.  DNA at the Osborn/Ausburn has turned up two more matches.  One is a known descendant of Christopher, Jr, who varies on two markers on a 37 marker test from my brother, a descendant of Jonathan.  This is apparently within the scope of acceptibility for these two men being 3rd and 4th great-grandsons.

The other match is for a man in Georgia named Ausburn.  He is descended from a James Osborne who appeared in Georgia about 1875, married, fathered a child and then disappeared, building railroad depots, according to family lore.  Ausburn and Osborne match precisely on 37 markers, and James was known to be from North Carolina.  This leads me to believe that James and Jonathan are perhaps more closely related than are James and Christopher Jr.

Enter Moses.  To further complicate things, there is a Moses Osborne (c1785-?) in the same neighborhood as Christopher Osborne, Jr., both owning land near Rock Hole Creek in current day Rowan County.  Moses is the brickwall for another branch of Osbornes, many of whom remain in North Carolina.  Unfortunately, the person most interested in solving the Moses-mystery is not an Osborne and cannot be tested to match Christopher.  I was able to track down another descendant of Moses-she was not really interested in knowing more about the family history.  She did provide some tenuous male Osborne leads that I need to pursue.

My current theory is that James, progenitor of the Ausburn line, is related to Moses.  This James would have been born about 1850 in North Carolina.

But who is Moses?  A brother to my brickwall Christopher?  Or is he the son born after Christopher’s death?  Or could he a child of Christopher, Jr. from his first marriage?  If the dates we have for Moses and Christopher, Jr. are correct, Moses is probably too old to be Christopher Jr.’s son.  Or is there any relationship at all?

I feel like we are so close to solving the Christopher mystery, and yet, so many unanswered questions!  Writing this summary helps–I’ll just keep working.  May the dna gods be kind.

In a genealogical frenzy than could only be matched by the Tasmanian Devil, I tracked down Moses’ descendants.  I was determined to find someone to DNA test to see if there was a link with my Christopher.  I’d been contacted by one of Moses’ descendants, but he was not an Osborne so I couldn’t ask him to do the test.  I did ask him if he knew any of his Osborne cousins and he did not.  So I was thrilled when I found another descendant.  It was a female but her birth name was Osborne and maybe she had brothers or uncles.

I composed my letter (despite my best efforts, I couldn’t find an email).  I had to re-write that letter after I asked a colleague to read it.  He works with me and he’s a great sounding board because he all this “genealogy stuff” is new to him.  He’s very interested but he’s very new.  He indicated that I might want to not mention the DNA test in the first letter.    He was right.

When I heard back from my contact, she, as she said, “couldn’t be of much help.”  Actually, though I didn’t make a contact for testing, she did help quite a bit.

I learned a lot from this experience.  Assumptions, as we all know, can be dangerous, but I was making all sorts of them.  One assumption was that because this line had stayed in the same region for generations, they all must know their family history.  And, because this sort of research is central to my being, I assume that everyone is interested.  That is just not so.

So what is Plan B?  I have the names if not contact information for a couple of other Osborne males.  I’ll see if I can find them.  I’ll also keep working on looking for additional descendants.  It is interesting to me that there’s not much information out there about this Osborne line–they are “dead-ended” at Moses, which adds to my belief that there is some connection between he and our dead-end Christopher.

I’ve been going through my North Carolina Osbornes again.  I received a query from a descendant of Moses Osborne wanting to know if I knew of a connection between Moses and Christopher (est 1732-1789).  The person asking had been referred to me by a man who has done some very valuable work in putting together some of the families through land records in Mecklenburg (among others) County, North Carolina.  George Thomas’s site is primarily his own family, but his re-creation of the land relationships has been an immense help to me with  my Osbornes and related families.  For instance, in proving who his ancestor Charles Love married, he provided me with another name and family for another of Christopher’s 8 daughters–Phereby.

I have that one match with my brother’s DNA–a James Osborne who appears in Georgia in 1875, marries and has a son, and disappears.  But his descendant’s DNA is a perfect match for my brother’s DNA.  On a related note, my cousin and fellow-researcher in Alabama had his DNA tested, and we differ on 3 markers!  How is that possible?  He is descended from one son of Christopher and I am descended from the other.  How significant is a difference of 3 markers on a 37 marker test?

Back to the perfect match on 37 markers–I started looking at Moses’ family for a James who is the right age.  The more I searched, the more I believe that I may be onto something.  The first names and the vicinity and the lack of obvious roots for Moses make me want to know more.  I’m looking for a descendant who will agree to be tested.  The person who contacted me is not an Osborne male, but surely we can find one.  In coming days, I’ll post more about my journey.

Stay tuned.

Now if I could only find a Mitchell male in my line . . .

For those of you who didn’t see it, it’s the story of two people who discover through DNA testing that they are related. One is Vy Higginson, an African American woman from Harlem, and the other is Marion West, a white rancher from Poplar Bluff, Missouri. There have been lots of these sorts of stories lately–even Henry Louis Gates, Jr. discovered his own heritage was 50% European when he was hosting the show about Oprah’s roots. I loved his wry response–what impact this might have on his career.

At the end of 60 Minutes, Vy and Marion are talking about what this find means. Marion says something like, “This is real life” and Vy says “It’s like learning history through my life.”

Despite the condescension to those of us who use DNA as not really knowing its limitations (see Megan Smolenyak’s post), I found the re-run episode enjoyable. Probably because of Marion and Vy’s responses–they had visited back and forth in each other homes and lives and had embraced their connection.

If you’re going to go hunting ancestors, you have to be ready for what you find. It’s part of the grand adventure.

Who knew there were palm trees in Ireland? I certainly didn’t.

And then one of our side trips took us to Newgrange. What a wonderful site. I’m so glad my traveling companions made arrangements for this excursion.  This mound is older than the pyramids and I got to go inside!

On the way to Newgrange, our terrific tour guide Mary read us an article from the Irish Times entitled “No Petty People, the Ulster Presbyterians,” published 15 May 2007. She read it to us as we traveled through the Boyne Valley, beside and across the River Boyne, scene of the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. One of those battles I’d probably read about in some history class, but it only came alive to me when I was there and hearing about the Ulster Presbyterians, aka the Scots-Irish, in the article.

These folks came to America in the early 1700s, were largely Protestant, particularly Presbyterian, and worked the land. I’ve come to believe that Christopher Osborne was probably Scots-Irish–he’s found in western North Carolina before 1750, he’s Presbyterian, and he worked hard to acquire land. That, of course, does not prove the issue, but it does provide some clues. I think I remember my dad saying some of his family were Scots (he said “Scotch”) Irish–honestly, I don’t know if he was talking about his father’s Osborne line or his mother’s Cooper and Landrum lines. I do believe the Landrums were from Scotland, however, not necessarily via Ireland, according to the research of others that I’ve read. The earliest Coopers we’ve found in our line were in Hampshire County, WV and Maryland.

I have read both James Leyburn’s The Scotch Irish: A Social History (1962) and David Hackett Fischer’s Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America (America: a cultural history). The latter uses the term “borderers” rather an “Scots Irish,” and notes that these folks have substantial Anglo-Saxon and Viking and/or Scandinavian heritage–again, this matches what the Christopher Osborne DNA test reveals. Fischer says,

Some historians describe these immigrants as “Ulster Irish” or “Northern Irish.” It is true that many sailed from the province of Ulster… part of much larger flow which drew from the lowlands of Scotland, the north of England, and every side of the Irish Sea. Many scholars call these people “Scotch-Irish.” That expression is an Americanism, rarely used in Britain and much resented by the people to whom it was attached. …”

So I have more work to do–learning more about the “borderers,” the Scots Irish, and determining what, if any records exist of their migration. The better I understand the people and their history, the more clues I’ll find in the pitifully small amount of information known about Christopher.

Despite finding palm trees in Ireland and learning more about what I don’t know, I think I can move on.

I know enough about the nature of information to know that the more you know, the more you want to know–sort of a variation on the genealogist’s old saw, “You get one question answered and then you have at least 2 more.”

My first thought goes to the irksome Christopher Osborne. He’s the one that I can’t get beyond. He may be my immigrant ancestor, but I can’t find his origins so I don’t know for sure. I’ve written about him before, including what I found by going with the DNA test.

But I’d also like to talk to my 3rd great-grandmother, Elizabeth Landrum Cooper. I’d like to know more about her mother and father, and I also would like to talk to her about her losing 4 sons in the Civil War. Would knowing about her descendants and their admiration for her provide any comfort? What was the impetus for her and her family to pull up fairly deep roots in Tennessee and move to Texas in 1841?

And then there are those enigmatic Germans from Russia–the person from that line who I’d most like to talk to is probably my great-grandmother Matilda Amanda Buller Unruh. Yes, she’s the one who shot herself, and I do have some questions for her about that violent act. But I’d also like to know some more about her family and their journey from Russia to Philadelphia to Kansas to Oklahoma. She wasn’t on the original voyage, but her parents were and I guess I think talking to her would be the “most efficient” way to find out about her and her ancestors. And maybe knowing more about her descendants would bring her some peace as well.

The bottom line is there are too many I’d like to talk to. And while it’s not perfect, searching for details about their lives is the only way I know to converse with them. I’m determined that Christopher will give up his secrets.

We’ll see.

Do you have any ancestors you’d like to meet?

Remember the guy I said I matched on 36 out of 37 markers? The one whose last name — Hamilton — was not any where near “Osborne” but whose ancestors did live in Wake County, North Carolina, in the same neighborhood during the same time period as my ancestor Christopher Osborne? The one whose ancestor had 3 sons out of wedlock? Well, this match is another one of that family, and their surname matches his — Hamilton — and we match 25 markers out of 25. Supposedly, this means that we have about an 85% chance of sharing a common ancestor within 8 generations. Christopher Osborne, my earliest known ancestor, is my 4th great-grandfather, which I think means he is 7 generations from me. I don’t know if he fathered those children, or one of his brothers or other relatives did–but I sure would like to know.

As I said in my original DNA post, my hope was that DNA testing would answer some of these long standing questions, but it has instead generated more. There are some other matches with differing surnames, and I may be off the track by believing that this Hamilton match merits more attention because of the geographical proximity. But I had the opportunity to ask geneatology guru Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak when she was here last year and she said it was worth pursuing if the haplotypes matched and we matched at the 37 marker level. My guess is she would say we should go ahead and pursue the now-available 67 marker test available. It’s only money. (She wouldn’t say that last part–she’s much too nice.)

We have a copy of Christopher’s will and we know he died in Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, but where did he come from? There are lots of Osborne families, of various spellings, in western North Carolina at the same time as Christopher and his son Jonathan. When DNA tests became available, I thought this would help provide the link that we’d been struggling with for so long. There were other Osborne families in the area who had similar naming patterns–Jonathan had 10 sons and there were several families with the same names–Enoch, Ephraim, John–even a Sherwood or two–who were well documented. Surely we could link up with one of those Osborne family’s who knew the path of their immigrant ancestor.

I persuaded my brother to submit a cheek scraping–he was a little paranoid since his fingerprints are on file from doing a grad school internship at a state prison–but I assured him it would be safe.

Relatively soon, I got a notification of a match with a man with a different surname. We match on 36 out of 37 markers. The literature says there’s probably no close relationship with a person who doesn’t share a surname or a similar name, but this man’s relative was in the same area of Wake County, North Carolina, at the same time as mine, so I think there’s probably a relationship. He says they know his ancestor had 3 children out of wedlock (as they say) so I think there’s a strong possibility that we’re related–that sort of puts a new spin on surnames not matching for this case, I think. My results were posted at the Ausburn/Osborne DNA website for almost a year and a half before I got another hit. About 6 weeks ago, I got a perfect match with someone on 12 markers–her family name was Ausburn. When we corresponded, I encouraged her to upgrade her test to 37, hoping against hope that we’d have a match on those markers. Sure enough, all 37 markers match–we’re among the closest matches in the family project. That means, I think, that we have about a 97% chance of sharing a common ancestor within 8 generations. I’m the 7th generation from Christopher.

The bad news, so to speak, is that Rhonda can only track her line back to 1875. Her great-grandfather appears in south Georgia from North Carolina about this time, marries in Decatur County, has a son, leaves to build some railroad depots, and doesn’t return. That’s the family story.

She and I have consulted on how to verify these stories and to try to track her great-grandfather. I’m lamenting that I’ll have to learn to research another state. (Not seriously lamenting, you understand, but I’ve not known I had family in Georgia until now. AND, not only Georgia, but right down on the Georgia-Florida line, so you know what that means!)

Part of me is thrilled to have found a match–it’s a whole new day. Great Aunt Fannie and/or Cousin Fred had a story devised about how the Osborne name came to be spelled with an “e” on the end. Something about Aunt Hattie adding it when she came back from boarding school. What would they say if they knew the DNA shows a perfect match between an Osborne and an Ausburn? Those of us who do genealogical research know that how a name is spelled is not all that important, but Fannie and Fred lived in a different day and I doubt they had an understanding that fixed spellings of surnames is really a fairly recent phenomenon.

Rhonda and I have lots of research to do. I’ve posted much of what we know at my All My Ancestors site. Rhonda had always heard her great-grandfather’s name as James F. Ausburn, but when she got her grandfather’s death certificate (James Alexander Ausburn, the son of her great-grandfather), the name for his father was given as John A. We all know the problems that can arise from the information on a death certificate, but this “new” twist on the given name has to be considered. It was provided in 1937 by James Alexender’s wife–the daughter-in-law of the man who appears in south Georgia about 1875. We should be able to find him living in a household in 1870 or 1860 or maybe even 1850, right? Evidently, that’s too easy. We have some possibilities, but with such common names, we need more evidence to be able to narrow down the field.

So, despite the great hope for the problem-solving potential of the DNA test, we have instead lots more questions. It’s the nature of information, though, isn’t it? Answer one question and at least two more emerge. Tell people what they want to know, and they’ll want to know more. We know we have a match, we know we have a common ancestor, but the question remains, who is that ancestor? And where does Christopher fit?