Trip to Ireland, Great assistance from Search firms

I will be in Ireland August 28-Sept. 8. We have made appointments to get into some of the reading rooms to view documents. I have had a great response from some of the churches, newspapers, forums, and government agencies. Everyone has been cooperative. We have a lot of information now that we did not have before and I hope to add to this with the visit in Ireland.

The biggest piece of the puzzle came from the death certificate ordered from New Zealand. It listed the parents, cause of death and amount of time that my grandfather spent in the country. This greatly helps in the search for other members of the family.

We also got a lot of information from the 1911 census. Great reference.

Trip to Ireland, Making Family Tree

I am working on a trip to Ireland for this fall. If we can get it scheduled, we plan to take pictures of as many gravestones at all the churches we can make it to.

Also working on plotting out the Family Tree with the info we have now to see what we need and try to plot out the trip.

Emerald Ancestors

I just want to say how helpful Emerald Ancestors.com has been in searching for all the ancestors. It has been one of the best websites I have found. The other site that has really been helpful is the Ellis Island site to search the immigration records.

I have so many letters and e-mails pending for information requests that I am at a standstill until I get some responses back. I plan to take all the information I have confirmed and place it on a poster board in a family tree to see if it will all work with the dates. Sometimes it seems things look right until you put it on paper and then nothing works.

The relatives in PA have been very helpful and I think we may have found the next generation of ancestors. This is really big. Once I get all this plotted I will start the search for ancestors from that time frame in the hopes that it will take us to the next generation.

Mossisde, Dungannon church request letter sent

Today I am mailing out letters to about 4 different churches for information on the Ross and Davidson families. I have information that the families may have been members of some of these congregations many years ago. I am hoping they have some of the records.

So far I have encountered some wonderful people that are more than willing to assist as much as they can. It has been great to have such helpful people all over the world.

I have also connected with a couple of the Simpson relatives and hope that they will have some more info when they go thru their records to see what paperwork they might have. They are anxious to see what we find out.

Ballymoney Times Article

Today I received an e-mail from the assistant editor of the Ballymoney Times that there will be an article in the newspaper and online about this search. I can't find it yet. I will try to post it here when I find it.

Arrival at Ellis Island

Sarah Ross arrived at Ellis Island on March 20, 1906. She was on the ship Columbia. It left Londonderry, Ulster, Northern Ireland. We know she was 19 at the time she left Ireland, and we believe she was pregnant. As of now I have no confirmation on the pregnancy but I am working on it. The ship manifest states that she was a servant. Her final destination was listed as Canonsburg, PA to stay with her uncle Thomas Ross.

I Googled Ross in Canonsburg, PA, and found 23 households in the area. I sent out letters to each household asking if it is possible any of them might be related. I did get an e-mail from one of the Ross family members. He thinks we might be related. He had an uncle Thomas and he had a sister Sarah. I think we might be one generation off but the names usually do run thru families. I sent him an e-mail back with more information and hope that he is going to check further. He seems interested so we might get somewhere.

I have also sent a form with the fee for a birth certificate search at the Carnegie Library for a birth certificate for Matilda Ross. We believe this is the child Sarah was carrying when she arrived at Ellis Island.

Start of Search

I have started genealogy research for relatives of my Grandmother Sarah Ross. Sarah was born in Moycraig, Northern Ireland on March 16, 1887. She died in Bushmills, Northern Ireland on March 6, 1980. Sarah married James Davidson, (from Tyrone?) on January 15, 1911 in Irvington, NY.

I will update as I get more information and fill in the family tree. I have sent out letters to possible relatives and should have a little announcement in the Ballymoney Times newspaper about this search.