There’s No Place Like a New Home

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks: Week 4 – Theory in Progress

Prompt: There are times when you aren’t quite sure what is right in your research. This is a good week to explore a theory that you have about someone in your family tree. Feel free to post your links and stories in the comments.

Often in my family research, I have found a plausible explanation(s) for major events in an ancestor’s life or death:

• A female ancestor had two spouses.
  • Further research showed that her first husband died in the Civil War.
• A Covenanter family relocated hundreds of miles away.
  • Further research revealed that the area to which they relocated also had a large Covenanter community.
  • Further research revealed that their church prohibited its members from owning slaves. The family lived in the South in the middle of the 19th century, on a farm.
    • Given the scenario, how could the family successfully farm and remain competitive in production and pricing when many other local farmers used slave labor?
• Two different burial records were found for one ancestor. After further research,
  • A double headstone was found for a spouse that predeceased the ancestor. The stone also has the ancestor’s name and date of birth with the death date left open. The ancestor also shares a headstone with a second spouse, including the date of death. Presumably, this ancestor had been buried alongside the second spouse.
  • One citation was found that references a military burial in a National cemetery. A second citation references the ancestor’s parents’ burial site where either a second stone had been erected there for the ancestor or the ancestor’s name was included in a list of children on the parents’ headstone.
  • Records showed that the body was exhumed and reburied in a different location.

But if no supporting documentation can be found, one is left to conjecture.

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In 1887, my father’s maternal great grandfather, David Williamson (1846-1908), emigrated from Scotland directly to Pittsburg, Kansas, with his family. His brother, William Williamson (1838-1893), had immigrated to the area the previous year. The brothers had been coal miners (referred to as colliers at the time) in mines (collieries) near Hamilton, Lanarkshire, Scotland.

But why southeast Kansas?

• Did William assure David of employment in the area upon his arrival?
• But even if that had been the case, how did William himself come to settle in southeast Kansas when there were established mining operations in the East?
  • Was there a relative already there who had encouraged him to come to Kansas?

I find it implausible that, in 1880, a member of Scotland’s working class would be able to come up with the cost of passage to America for a family of seven—and one on the way—and just arbitrarily choose to relocate his family to Pittsburg, Kansas.

So far, I have not found any of the following:

• Relatives who were already in residence in the area.
• Other families who had settled there who were from the Williamsons’ hometown in Scotland.
  • The immigrants who were employed by the mines in the tri-state area (comprised of southeast Kansas, southwest Missouri, and northeast Oklahoma) at that time were predominately from Central Europe, Russia, England, Ireland, Wales, Italy, France, and Yugoslavia. Not Scotland.
• Newspaper advertisements in Scotland or in America for jobs in the mining industry in southeast Kansas.
• Family correspondence that would shed any light on how this location had been chosen.

I find it implausible that, in 1880, a member of Scotland’s working class would be able to come up with the cost of passage to America for a family of seven—and one on the way—and just arbitrarily choose to relocate his family to Pittsburg, Kansas.

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In 1876, three years before the Williamson family came to Pittsburg, the very first lead and zinc deposits were discovered in southeast Kansas. Prospecting began immediately, and thousands of people soon descended upon the area.

Although zinc was abundant with lead, little attention was paid to it. Within a few years, however, it was found that the abundance of coal made the smelting of zinc profitable. Lead and zinc mining quickly became a booming industry, and workers camps quickly popped up in order to house the rapidly growing work force.

Had news of the discovery of this previously unknown and untapped mineral source and resultant mining boom spread via word of mouth, then? Perhaps.

My guess is that I will eventually find this information reported in a contemporary article or advertisement that appeared in a local newspaper that could have been read by or shared with my ancestors.

Or it’s possible I might find mention in a contemporary trade journal of the discovery of the lead and zinc deposits in the tri-state region, an area that already boasted a lucrative coal mining industry. Because they worked in collieries in Lanarkshire—Scotland’s premiere coal-producing area of the time, earning it the moniker the “King of Coal”—it’s possible news of the sudden need for miners in that area of Kansas could have been shared through some local professional publication.

Until I make such a discovery, I’ll keep mining the internet and relevant sources.