It’s exciting when you’re digging into your family tree and you find some of those “WOW” facts. The first of this, the first of that. Mr. Hero or the Matriarch of the County. One of my early wows came when my research led to this tombstone:
Now that’s cool. Sarah here is my 5th ggrandmother and, according to her tombstone, she “was the daughter of the first american born Methodist minister.” Why in the world I was so pleased to find this I can’t say because it certainly isn’t my accomplishment. But I still thought it was kind of neat. Thanks, Find A Grave!
Except…hold on. The online memorial states Sarah was the daughter of Nicholas Watters. But the memorial for Nicholas’ brother, William Watters, says it was William who was the first american born Methodist minister. Time to do some more digging. 1. Who was the first? 2. Who was the father of my Sarah?
For question one the Methodists have lots of documentation indicating William Watters was indeed the first natural born of their ministers. There are several publications dedicated to the man, such as “William Watters, First American Circuit Rider” compiled by Duane V. Maxey from the writings of Nathan Bangs, Abel Stevens, and Matthew Simpson. A cursory Google search will bring up a dozen or more websites where you can read more. The preponderance of the evidence, and history as told by the Methodist church, shows William Watters to hold the title in question.
Now for the paternity of Sarah. Nicholas himself holds a place in the early Methodist church in this country as he, too, was one of their first circuit riders. Was Sarah’s tombstone a way to say she was William’s daughter? Or was the tombstone saying she was Nicholas’ daughter but taking a stab at William by claiming that Nicholas should have been recognized instead? My honest answer as of today is I don’t know. I’ve found trees that claim each brother as Sarah’s father but not a lot of documentation to support the claims. DNA results won’t do me much good here, I think, as we’re dealing with brothers. It is something I am still researching and something I may never have the answer to. But, good golly! We’re talking about a question dealing with my 6th great grandfather! What a problem to have! I’ll update you if I ever get definitive proof either way.
Let me also take this moment to caution about grave websites such as Find A Grave, Billion Graves and the like. These sites are awesome but they are the Wikipedia of genealogy with all information being sourced from the general public. Some folks get carried away with linking memorials that shouldn’t be linked or adding information that is just completely wrong. This is kind of a pet peeve of mine as my own dear Mammaw has an online memorial linked to WRONG WRONG WRONG information. I have contacted the person who could edit the source of the problem but he/she just will not do so despite sound documentation to support the correction. Even worse is that I’ve already found an online tree duplicating the errors. Lazy research is another peeve of mine; while I do a good deal of research online I try to make sure I’ve got solid sources for my information and I try to remain open to correction. I always try to do good research.
For Sarah Watters Oslin, I don’t know if she was the victim of poor research or an error in the linking of her memorial. But she is still one of my wow moments.
What have been some of your “WOW” moments in your research?
-T