It’s been over six months since I’ve posted a family history story. Unfortunately, I wasn’t coming up with any ideas using the prompts provided by the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge (which is not to say it’s not a great project for someone to undertake!). My lack of inspiration, however, resulted in a dry spell for blog posts.
I didn’t stop researching my family history and making new discoveries during this time period, though. I continued focusing my research efforts on my great, great, great grandfather, Enoch G. Howard, and his family. Although I have discovered much about this interesting man’s life, I had never been able to identify who his parents were. Their names were not given in records I had found for him and no one else researching him seemed to know who they were either.
I decided to turn to DNA to see if I could find some clues that would point me in the right direction for identifying Enoch’s parents.
I am fortunate that I have a number of relatives who have granted me access to their DNA results on the Ancestry website and other DNA testing sites. This allows me to analyze all of their “DNA matches.” [1]
In order to determine who Enoch G. Howard’s parents might have been, I used the DNA test results of three of Enoch’s great, great grandchildren. Two of them descend from Enoch’s son George and the third descends from Enoch’s daughter Elizabeth. I began analyzing their shared matches to see if I could find a match who might provide DNA clues extending back over 200 years.[2]
What I discovered after analyzing the three great, great grandchildren’s DNA test results is that they all had a common DNA match, who I’ll refer to as “C.K.” C.K. had built a small family tree of 16 people on the Ancestry website. One of the ancestors in her tree was Rozaltha Pearl Howard, born around 1886 in Marine City, Michigan. When Enoch G. Howard and his wife Henrietta moved to Michigan in 1866, they settled first in Marine City. The Howard surname and the Marine City connection were indicators to me that C.K.’s genealogy might provide clues about the identity of Enoch G. Howard’s parents and/or siblings.
C.K.’s tree did not extend Rozaltha Pearl Howard’s line back further than Rozaltha herself. My first task, then, was to build out this branch of her tree more. Rozaltha’s father, I found, was James Demarest Howard, born in Michigan in 1861 to James Demarest Howard and Nancy Robertson Howard. The records I was able to find for James Demarest Howard (Sr.) indicated he was born in 1820, but the reported place of his birth wasn’t consistent – it was either Michigan, New York, or perhaps Vermont.[3]
I could see that other people on Ancestry’s website had been researching this James Demarest Howard family as well. I examined the family trees they had built and noticed that only one of them – that of Ancestry user Tom K. – named the elder James’ parents: William Morris Howard and Rebecca Demarest.
I began corresponding with Tom K. and learned that Rozaltha Howard was his adoptive grandmother. He had obtained much of the older Howard family information from his great aunt, Ruby Howard McAlpine, in the 1960s. Tom told me that Ruby had applied for membership in the DAR. After a bit of research, I found that her application and supporting documents were available to purchase online from the DAR website, which I did.
Ruby applied for membership based on the lineage of her paternal grandfather, James Demarest Howard (Sr.). Her application states that she was the daughter of James Demarest Howard (Jr.) who was the son of James Demarest Howard (Sr.). It further states that James Demarest Howard (Sr.) was the son of William Morris Howard and Rebecca Demarest Howard.[4]
Supporting documents in the application include a copy of an “old letter and original envelope written by sister of James Demarest Howard.”[5] The handwritten note, which is undated and has initials at the bottom of the second page which appear to be “SAH”[6], reads in part as follows
Howards grand father William Morris Howard was born in England (I do not know what town or county in England.) he came to new york, and married Rebekah. Demarest. A Penna Dutch women, for his wife the children were James Demarest (born 1820) Father Enoch George (don’t know Elizabeth when born)
The note stated that “grandfather” was killed in New York City when he was thrown off a fire engine. “Father” was thereafter bound out to a man whose surname was VanHorn and moved with Mr. VanHorn to “St Joe, Mich.” The note continued, “Father lost all trace of the family for years; After 30 years Uncle George and Father met.”
What’s in a name?
In the past, I’ve referred to Enoch G. Howard as Enoch Galusha Howard. That’s what most every family tree on the Ancestry website has as his full name. I followed suit and used that as his name as well. However, after reading Ruby Howard McAlpine’s DAR application and seeing the name “Enoch George [Howard],” I went back over all the documentation I had for this name. Not one record gives his name as Enoch Galusha Howard. Census records, newspaper articles, city directory listings, probate file – all state his name as Enoch Howard, Enoch G. Howard, or E.G. Howard. All except one, that is – his Civil War Pension file. When Enoch applied for Civil War pension benefits, he signed his application “Enoch George Howard.”
With this “new” information, I searched for birth records on Ancestry using the name Enoch George Howard. There it was, a birth/baptismal record in the New York City United Methodist Church Records for Enoch George Howard, born to William and Rebecca on April 5, 1825, baptized June 12, 1825.[7]
For me, this is good evidence that Enoch G. Howard’s full name was Enoch George Howard and that he was born to William Howard and Rebecca Demarest Howard in 1825 in New York City. (The April 3, 1885 Detroit News article I found about Enoch also correlates with this date and place for his birth: “It was a showery day in April, in 1825, in New York city, that E.G. Howard first put in his appearance…” See my February 17, 2020 post “Favorite Discovery” for the entire article as reprinted in the Alpena Argus.)
Some of Enoch’s descendants may have a hard time giving up the middle name Galusha, however – it has been part of family lore for many, many years.
Next post – what I’ve learned about William Howard.
[1] A “DNA match” is another person who has had his or her DNA tested at the same site as the original tester, and analysis of the two DNA samples reveals they share a sufficient amount of DNA to determine they are related. Although DNA testing companies estimate relationships between two people who share DNA, they generally cannot tell two people exactly how they are related, except in very close relationships such as parent-child and siblings.
[2]Enoch was born in 1825, so his parents were likely born a generation, or 20-30 years, before that. Analyzing DNA matches to find very distant family connections like this is a slow and tedious process. I won’t go into too much detail here about how that is done – suffice it to say that you:
- look at how much DNA a match shares with the tester whose results you are analyzing to see how closely they might be related;
- examine all the other matches the tester and the DNA match have in common to try to determine which line of the family they are related on; and
- review any family trees the match might have built on the DNA testing site to see if you can discover the family connection.
If the match you are interested in has put just a limited tree online, you then spend a considerable amount of time building their family tree out further back in the hopes of determining who the common ancestor is.
[3] Although the 1860 and 1870 Census records indicate James D. Howard (Sr.) was born in 1820 in Michigan, the 1880 Census and his death announcement in the Detroit Free Press state he was born in 1820 in New York City. Three of his children’s death certificates state he was born in New York and one states he was born in Vermont.
[4] Ruby’s eligibility for membership in the DAR was based on Rebecca’s paternal grandfather, James (Jacobus) Demarest, born April 21, 1735 in Schraalenburg, NJ to James Jacobus Demarest and Maria Smith Demarest.
[5] Application of Ruby Annetta Howard McAlpine for DAR Membership dated 27 August 1952.
[6] One of James Demarest Howard (Jr.)’s sisters was named Sophia A. (Anna) Howard.
[7] Ancestry.com. New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, U.S., United Methodist Church Records, 1775-1949 (database online), Vol 139, page 142 (written).
tracingthepast 