A hunch

Please note:  this blog is a sequential narrative.  To start at the beginning, click on "Blog Archive" on the right and select the entry at the very bottom "Jennie Louise Van Buren...or was she?" or click here.

I had just found Benjamin Sly, who was probably my 3rd great-grandfather, and I was reasonably sure that his wife, Mary L. Avery Sly, was my 3rd great-grandmother.  Their daughter, the woman my family knew as Jennie Louise Van Buren, was the reason I had started down this road to begin with.

Jennie Van Buren Ham, late 1800s

Jennie was a woman who didn't talk about her past with anyone. Her daughter, Edith, didn't even know where Jennie had been born, and knew almost nothing about Jennie's parents.

The State Board of Health of Missouri, Standard Certificate of Death, filed August 23, 1945, No. 26786

Edith (Mrs. T. W. H. Irion) was the informant on Jennie's death certificate.  This was the only record I had that listed "Michigan" as a place of birth. I didn't think it was accurate. Jennie's father was listed as "Henry Sly". I was fairly sure that this first name was wrong, as well. I doubted it was shock or anguish that made Edith forget the details of her mother's life; rather, I think she didn't know anything to begin with.

All parents keep things from their children.  Some hide little details; others hide big things. Some do it to protect their kids; others because they are ashamed or afraid to share; some parents are fiercely protective of their "pre-kids" self; others don't want their children to know that they they did all the things they now tell their children not to do. All parents have little or big secrets, as do their children.

So what was it about Jennie's past that made her hide all of it from her only child? From what I had found so far, this family looked fairly normal, if there was such a thing. Jennie's grandmother, Polly Avery, had a many kids. This was common in the early 1800's. Presumably, Polly's husband had died rather early - also not uncommon for the early 19th century. Sometime in the early 1850's, Polly's daughter, Mary, married Benjamin Sly, and together they had a daughter, Lucy, in 1857.

When did it all go so horribly wrong that Lucy, or Jennie, never shared anything about her family with anyone after she moved to Ohio? Was family lore correct that Jennie had lived with distant relatives after her mother died? This, too, was not uncommon in the 1850's.  I'm sure it was difficult for Jennie, but why the secrecy? How did Benjamin Sly fit into this picture? If he survived his wife, Mary, why did he lose all contact with his daughter Jennie?  Why didn't Edith ever meet her grandfather?  What became of Benjamin, anyway?

Why were Mary and Benjamin living apart in 1865? Was this evidence of problems within the family? And who were Sarah and James Van Buren? They raised Jennie from at least the age of 13. Was this arrangement not as loving as it sounded? Why did Jennie marry a man from rural Ohio in 1877 and never look back?

Jennie Louise Van Buren Ham ca. 1877, at the time of her marriage

Jennie's story, or lack thereof, was eating away at me.

It was time for another list, this time about what I knew so far, arranged chronologically.

1850    Mentz, Cayuga Co., New York        Polly Avery, 43
                                                                     Thomas Avery, 20              
                                                                     Mary Avery, 14
                                                                     Edward Avery, 10
                                                                     Henrietta, 8
                                                                     Enos Avery, 6
                                                                     George Avery, 4
                                                                     Marietta Avery, 83
                                                                     Lewis Newman, 21
                                                                     Jane Newman, 16

1857    NY, IL or OH                                   Lucy J Sly, born

1860    Mentz, Cayuga Co., New York       Polly Avery, 54
                                                                    Edward Avery, 20
                                                                    George Avery, 14
   
            Mentz, Cayuga Co., New York       Benjamin Sly, 40
                                                                    Mary L. Sly, 23
                                                                    Lucy J Sly, 3
                                                                    Samuel B Lent, 6

1865    Auburn, Cayuga Co., New York    Polly Avery, 59
                                                                   Mary Sly, 28
                                                                   Thomas Avery, 37
                                                                   Edward F Avery, 24
                                                                   Lucia J Sly, 8

1870    Buffalo, Erie Co., New York         James Van Buren, 59
                                                                  Sarah J Van Buren, 38
                                                                  Henrietta Seaman, 27
                                                                  Jenny Sly, 13
                                                                  George Avery, 23


I really wanted to figure out how Sarah J. Van Buren was related to Jennie.  I had a hunch.  What if Jennie hadn't lived with distant relatives, but had gone to live with an aunt? I had tried to figure this out before, and had been disappointed when I hadn't found a "Sarah Avery" living with Polly Avery and everyone else in 1850 in Mentz. One of the notes I made at the time was that it was possible that Sarah was already living on her own in 1850. She would have been between 16-18 years old then.

Now, I thought it was worth looking for Sarah in Buffalo.

I searched for Sarah J Avery, living in Buffalo, Erie Co., New York, born 1834, -/+2 years.

And there she was.................

Ancestry.com. New York, State Census, 1865 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.

This was possibly THE Sarah J who had raised Jennie.  Was it possible that my hunch had been correct? Was she the sister of Mary L. Avery Sly?  A closer look was definitely necessary:

Ancestry.com. New York, State Census, 1865 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.

In the household were:

Sarah J. Avery, born about 1836 in Cayuga County, New York.
Underneath: Henrietta Seaman, "officially" now Sarah's sister, born about 1842 in Cayuga County.
George Avery, their brother, born about 1846 in Cayuga County.

And

James V. Buren, boarder.  Sarah J Avery's future husband.

It was really too good to be true. I was stunned.

Jennie was not raised by distant relatives.  She was raised by her Aunt Sarah and Uncle James Van Buren after her mother died.

This was my family, and I was getting to know them, bit by bit.

One word proves it all

Please note:  this blog is a sequential narrative.  To start at the beginning, click on "Blog Archive" on the right and select the entry at the very bottom "Jennie Louise Van Buren...or was she?" or click here.

Since embarking on this adventure, I had gone from knowing almost nothing about my 2nd great-grandmother, Jennie, to being fairly certain that her mother's name was Mary Avery, and that Jennie had a slew of aunts and uncles who were all from New York State.

The family tree I sketched out now looked like this:

Jennie Louise (Lucia J) Sly Van Buren Ham's family tree

There was still a lot of work to do!  Right now, I only had names and dates.  I didn't know anything about my ancestors who now filled my tree.  I still had no idea how Sarah and James Van Buren fit in the picture, nor who Lewis and Jane Newman were.  I was anxious to answer all of those questions. I knew I wouldn't be getting much sleep in the days to come. How could I sleep when I had new family members to get to know?

But before all that, the one question that was causing the most obsession and sleep deprivation was this:  who was my 3rd great-grandfather? All I had so far was:

__________ Sly, male, possibly blind.

This was where djnflskjdnglksdjfngrj

Family research interrupted by Samson, the kitten

Sorry. What I was saying was that this was where I wanted to focus next.  Who was Jennie's father?

I had done searches for Jennie Sly in New York many times without results.  Now I could try her "new" first name.  That was where I would start looking for her.  I opened the search window in Ancestry and started typing.  I referred to my sketch to make sure I would spell her first name correctly, and...

Ah, this is not going to be very productive. Kittens like genealogy, too.

Kitten shenanigans aside, I searched for Lucia J Sly, born in 1857, living in New York:

Search results for Lucia Sly on www.ancestry.com

The top result was the one I already had, for Lucia living with Mary and Polly, her mother and grandmother. The bottom result was new to me.  Here was a "Lucy" Sly, born in 1857, living in...

Mentz.

Mentz is where Polly Avery and several of her children were living in 1850.  Wow! Jennie, or Lucia, or Lucy, would have been 3 in 1860.  Whom was she living with?

Year: 1860; Census Place: Mentz, Cayuga, New York; Roll: M653_729; Page: 787; Image: 310; Family History Library Film: 803729 
www.ancestry.com

And just like that, it was possible that I had just found my 3rd great-grandfather, Benjamin(e) Sly, born about 1820.

Benjamin.  My son's name.  Benjamin.  Surely he didn't spell it with an "e" at the end?  Time to take a closer look at the 1860 Federal US Census:

Year: 1860; Census Place: Mentz, Cayuga, New York; Roll: M653_729; Page: 787; Image: 310; Family History Library Film: 803729
www.ancestry.com

Clearly, this Benjamin spelled his name just like any other Benjamin I have ever known.  No "e" on the end.  The "10" is the value of Benjamin Sly's personal estate.  He did not own any real estate. Mary now had a middle initial "L" I could add to my data base.

Why did every record I found only add to the mystery?  Who was Samuel B Lent, age 6??

Be that as it may, there were now 3 possible names for the woman my family knew as Jennie:

Jennie (Jenny) Louise Sly Van Buren

Lucia J Sly

Lucy J Sly

The initials still stayed the same, so that was good.

I could add these 3 names to the 3 possible birth places of New York, Ohio and Illinois. Wonderful! 

But this: This!

All the way to the right on the record was one word that proved to me that Mary was indeed my 3rd great-grandmother and that Benjamin was her husband. The proof was here, right here on my computer screen:

Blind.

Other than the last name of Sly/Sleigh/Sligh in my notes, the only clue I had about Jennie's dad up to that point was that he was BLIND.

It was genealogical gold.

I knew I wouldn't sleep for a very long time.