Births and deaths within the census year

This is a repeat of a previous post. I thought a little reminder would be beneficial.


There is a little confusion about what to do when individuals are born in the census decade, but after the census was taken. There is also confusion about what to do when individuals die in the census decade but before the census was taken.

If the individual was born after the census was taken in a given decade, the system will not add a black dot for that decade. Please make that decade a black X (for not searched). For example, if a person was born in 1880 after the census was enumerated, the system will have black dots for the decades 1850, 1860, and 1870. Mark 1880 with a black X.

If the individual died before the census was taken in a given decade, the system will not add a purple gravestone for that decade. Please make that decade a black X (for not searched). For example, if a person died in 1920 before the census was enumerated, the system will have purple gravestones for the decades 1930 and 1940. Mark 1920 with a black X.

This does not hurt the data. From a data perspective, black dots, purple headstones, and black Xs all mean the same thing. They are just administrative tools to make our jobs easier.

Civil War Christmas poems

Here are a couple of poems written at Christmas during the Civil War.


Christmas Night of '62

The following is a poem by Confederate soldier William Gordon McCabe giving his thoughts on Christmas Night 1862.

The wintry blast goes wailing by,
the snow is falling overhead;
I hear the lonely sentry's tread,
and distant watch-fires light the sky.

Dim forms go flitting through the gloom;
The soldiers cluster round the blaze
To talk of other Christmas days,
And softly speak of home and home

My saber swinging overhead,
gleams in the watch-fire's fitful glow,
while fiercely drives the blinding snow,
and memory leads me to the dead.

My thoughts go wandering to and fro,
vibrating 'twixt the Now and Then;
I see the low-browed home again,
the old hall wreathed in mistletoe.

And sweetly from the far off years
comes borne the laughter faint and low,
the voices of the Long Ago!
My eyes are wet with tender tears.

I feel again the mother kiss,
I see again the glad surprise
That lighted up the tranquil eyes
And brimmed them o'er with tears of bliss

As, rushing from the old hall-door,
She fondly clasped her wayward boy -
Her face all radiant with they joy
She felt to see him home once more.

My saber swinging on the bough
Gleams in the watch-fire's fitful glow,
while fiercely drives the blinding snow
aslant upon my saddened brow.

Those cherished faces are all gone!
Asleep within the quiet graves
where lies the snow in drifting waves, -
And I am sitting here alone.

There's not a comrade here tonight
but knows that loved ones far away
on bended knees this night will pray:
"God bring our darling from the fight."

But there are none to wish me back,
for me no yearning prayers arise
the lips are mute and closed the eyes -
My home is in the bivouac.

http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/on-the-homefront/culture/christmas-night-of-62.html




Christmas Bells
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
    And wild and sweet
    The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And thought how, as the day had come,
The belfries of all Christendom
    Had rolled along
    The unbroken song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Till ringing, singing on its way,
The world revolved from night to day,
    A voice, a chime,
    A chant sublime
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

Then from each black, accursed mouth
The cannon thundered in the South,
    And with the sound
    The carols drowned
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

It was as if an earthquake rent
The hearth-stones of a continent,
    And made forlorn
    The households born
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!

And in despair I bowed my head;
“There is no peace on earth," I said;
    “For hate is strong,
    And mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good-will to men!”

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
    The Wrong shall fail,
    The Right prevail,
With peace on earth, good-will to men.”


https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/christmas-bells

Black dots and not searched

From the user's perspective, what you see as a black dot (not born) or a black X (not searched) on the Grid are the same thing. They each just mean there is no data in that decade. Because of this, on your checks, there is no need to tell the inputter to replace black Xs with black dots. It is not worth spending the time.

We distinguish between the two as an administrative tool to help you input. Continue to use black dots and black Xs as instructed. There is just no need to write it on the checks.

Progress report as of December 21

Here is our progress as of December 21, 2016.

	Project 1	Project 2 - USCT
	n = 8,500	n = 4,500
Total soldiers complete	5238	1681
Soldiers completed during last  week	60	15
Soldiers w/o children (to be removed from sample)	509	294
% of completed soldiers w/o children	9.7	17.5
Soldiers with children complete	4729	1387
% with children complete	55.6	30.8

Progress report as of December 14

Here is our progress report as of December 14, 2016.

	Project 1	Project 2 - USCT
	n = 8,500	n = 4,500
Total soldiers complete	5178	1666
Soldiers completed during last  week	69	10
Soldiers w/o children (to be removed from sample)	502	291
% of completed soldiers w/o children	9.7	17.5
Soldiers with children complete	4676	1375
% with children complete	55.0	30.5

As you might recall, we set a goal to be finished with 55% of Project 1 by January 1, 2017. As you can see from the table above, we've reached our goal 2 1/2 weeks early. Excellent work!

Civil War trivia

Here are some Civil War trivia questions. Scroll to the bottom for the answers.

1. What illness was nicknamed the "Virginia Quickstep?"
2. The CSS Virginia and the USS Monitor dueled in the famous Battle of Hampton Roads. Which ironclad won?
3. Aerial surveillance was first used in wartime during the Civil War. This was made possible by using what technology?
4. The Ketchum was invented during the Civil War. What was a Ketchum?
5. What position did Ulysses S. Grant obtain in 1869?
6. Who were nicknamed "Angels of the Battlefield?"
7. Did black soldiers ever earn the Congressional Medal of Honor, the Union's highest medal for bravery?
8. Little Round Top was a hill of strategic importance during the Battle of Gettysburg. Why did the soldiers of the 20th Maine Regiment use their bayonets to defend this hill?
9. How long did the Siege of Vicksburg last: 12 days, 47 days, or 109 days?
10. How many slaves were freed after the Civil War: 400,000, 1.4 million, or 4 million?

How do you think you did? Check your answers below.

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1. Diarrhea
2. Neither (it was a draw)
3. Hot air balloon
4. A type of grenade
5. President of the United States
6. Nurses
7. Yes, 21 black soldiers received the medal
8. They ran out of bullets
9. 47 days
10. 4 million

Project publications

Sometimes you probably wonder what anybody does with all this information we collect. One answer is that they write. Many people have written papers and books using our Early Indicators data. Visit our website for a list of publications. Thanks to Andrea for compiling the list.

Our samples

We've been collecting data for the Early Indicators project for more than two decades. Here are the major samples we've collected.

• Union Army - This was our original sample of over 39,000 Union Army veterans. These men were mostly rural and white.
• USCT - We originally collected a sample of about 6,000 black soldiers who served in the US Colored Infantry. We discovered that the sample was too small, and collected 15,000 more soldiers. This sample consisted of men who were from the north and south and slave and free.
• Urban - This sample was based on the most populous US cities in 1900. We collected more than 12,000 soldiers who enlisted in these cities: Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York, and Baltimore. With this sample we can look at the differences between urban and rural soldiers as well as intra-urban effects.
• Related to this sample was the Historical Urban Ecological (HUE) sample in which we collected and mapped information about each of the cities.
• Andersonville - We collected a sample of 1,000 soldiers who were imprisoned at Andersonville and survived to the year 1900. With this sample, we can examine later-life effects of acute malnutrition and exposure to disease due to the soldiers' imprisonments.
• Oldest Old - This soon-to-be-released sample consists of about 2,000 soldiers who lived to extreme old age, that is age 95+.
• VCC - Veterans' Children's Census. This is the sample you are currently working on. We are taking a subsample of our Union Army soldiers, about 8,500 and our USCT soldiers, about 4,500 and searching for census and death information for their children. We want to look at the intergenerational transmission of health and socioeconomic effects.

Review old blog posts

Please spend 30 minutes this week reviewing some of the older posts on this blog. Read the titles of  posts and select a few to read based on questions you might have, rules you're unsure of, or anything you might want a reminder of.

If you think of questions that aren't answered on the blog, email me, and maybe I'll write a post answering them.

November checking statistics

In November, we checked 48 soldiers under our system. I've reviewed all of the checks, and I've tallied the number of differences. Some of these are errors, and some are judgment calls. Here are the categories and the total number of differences for each category.

GRID Errors

• MILIN?/MAR? - 3
• Missing HH member - 4
• Duplicate people - 1
• Wrong person - 0
• Other - 8

Inferred Relationships

• Incorrect relationships - 16

Census Errors

• Name - 29
• Typo/Reading/Wrong - 98
• State Code - 0
• Missing/Wrong URL - 8
• Missing data - 21
• Additional finds - 8
• Quality Code - 18

Death Errors

• Typo/Reading/Wrong - 9
• Missing data - 37
• Missing/Wrong URL/Source - 9
• Quality Code - 1
• Additional finds - 15

Tree Errors

• Missing/Incorrect information/relationships - 11

The total number of differences for all 48 soldiers is 296. This is 22 fewer differences than October, when we checked 44 soldiers. Some differences/errors affect the data more than others. If we checked other pensions, we'd probably find similar differences. So, in November you checked more soldiers than in the previous month and reduced your errors. Good work!

Progress report as of November 30

Here is our progress report as of November 30.

	Project 1	Project 2 - USCT
	n = 8,500	n = 4,500
Total soldiers complete	5030	1642
Soldiers completed during last  week	48	13
Soldiers w/o children (to be removed from sample)	492	286
% of completed soldiers w/o children	9.8	17.4
Soldiers with children complete	4538	1356
% with children complete	53.4	30.1

As you can see from the table about we have completed 53.4% of the soldiers in Project 1. We only count the soldiers with children because the others will be removed from the sample. We are well on our way to reaching our goal of completing 55% of Project 1 by January 1, 2017. To reach our goal, we will need to complete 137 soldiers during the month of December. That will be easy! Keep up the good work!

Ever had child

Those of you who are working on Project 1 might remember that there is a column on your input log called "Ever had child." I thought I'd give you an explanation of what the information in this column means. The 1s and 0s in this column don't guarantee that the soldier did or did not have children. They merely indicate that he might or might not have children. In short, the numbers mean the following:

• 1 = something is entered in the pension children fields
• 0 = nothing is entered in the pension children fields

If a 0 is entered in this column, all it means is that there was no indication in the pension that the soldier had children. There weren't any letters, affidavits, or family circulars that noted the presence or absence of children in the soldier's family. We just don't know if he had kids. Often, if the soldier had children we would find mention of them in the pension, but this is not always true.

If a 1 is entered in this column, it means that there is some indication in the pension that the soldier did or did not have children. There will be a 1 in this column if the pension contained any of the following kinds of information in Children: Name field in the pension data:

• a child's name
• (child) - indicating that there is evidence of a child, but no further information
• (no child) - indicating that somewhere in the pension it was stated that there are no children

Often, you'll see a 1 and be surprised that the soldier has no kids. That's fine. Other times you'll see a 0 and think the soldier is childless only to find out that he has 14 kids. That is a bummer.

I hope this information helps as you use the information in the Ever had child column.

Completed family trees

This is just your periodic reminder that you need to download your completed family trees (GEDCOM files). We are saving these files for future use.

When you've downloaded them, you need to save them to the shared drive (those of you in the office) or email them to me. Please do not make me wait a month after you've completed your assignment to get your trees. They are due when you complete your assignment. The exception to this is for work that is out for checks. You may wait until a soldier is checked before providing me his completed tree. Please don't make me email you and ask for your trees. It creates more work for me and makes record keeping more difficult.

As usual, some of you are really great at downloading and saving your trees. I appreciate that. If you need help downloading your trees, please ask for help.

Arteriosclerosis v. Atherosclerosis

It was just brought to my attention that there might be some confusion between arteriosclerosis and atherosclerosis. These words are often misspelled in the records. We've told you to spell arteriosclerosis correctly, regardless of how it's spelled on the document. We don't want you to see atherosclerosis and assume it is a misspelling of arteriosclerosis. It is not. Atherosclerosis is a form of arteriosclerosis, but you should not use the words interchangeably. If you're not sure which word it is, ask.

In summary, these are two different words and should not be confused:

• arteriosclerosis
• atherosclerosis

Please use Family Search

Sometimes documents such as birth, death, and marriage records are not available on Ancestry, but they are available on Family Search. Please use Family Search when records you need are not available on Ancestry.

Additionally, sometimes you find a death date on Ancestry, but no death cause. Please look on Family Search to see if you can find a record with cause of death. This information is important to our study.

Some of you have not signed up for Family Search accounts. An account is required to look at some of the documents. The account is free, so please sign up for one the next time you need to use Family Search.

Cool photo

Sandy found this photo with James Maricle of A 32 WI INF. We don't know if any of these soldiers are Maricle, but it's still a cool photo.

Seeking examples for a training meeting

In February or March, we will have our fabulous genealogists come to Vienna for a week of training meetings. To facilitate this, we are seeking examples of individuals and families that you're having difficulty finding information for, either census or death. Through the end of December, please do the following:

• As you work, notice when you're having difficulty finding either census or death information for a family or individual you are working on.
• Please note, do not tell me about every yellow X on your grid. If you have one yellow X in a sea of green, I'm not interested in this person.
• We're more interested in the "I can't find this person anywhere" or the "I know I should be able to find this person, but I can't" sort of situations.
• I'm hoping you'll recognize the examples I'm looking for when you come across them.
• When you've found a good example, email me the following information
• RecId number
• Soldier's name
• PID of the person you're having trouble with
• Any information about it you feel we need (please keep this to a minimum as the genealogists will be doing their own research)

We are looking for families that will be good for training. I will create a list for Janice and Irene to review and research. Additionally, if you have any burning research related questions, feel free to send those to me as well.

An additional note about yesterday's NHDVS post

In yesterday's post about using National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, we told you to, "double check his military service to make sure it is the right soldier." How do you do this?

For both Project 1 and Project 2, the soldier's military service is indicated in his RecId number. Please review this post from September 2015 for more information.

National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers

Here is some helpful advice from Janice.

Anytime you see that a soldier’s last residence is the US National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, you should get a bit excited because that means you have a source that will give you a cause of death, which is a big part of this project. Go to the Ancestry site: US National Homes for Disabled volunteer Soldiers NHDVS Link (you'll want to bookmark this page), and type in the soldier’s name. When you pull up the record, you can double check his military service to make sure it is the right soldier. Be sure not to confuse the “disabilities when admitted” at the top of the page with the “cause of death” at the the bottom right of the page.

Progress report as of November 9, 2016

Here is our progress as of November 9, 2016.

	Project 1	Project 2 - USCT
	n = 8,500	n = 4,500
Total soldiers complete	4805	1580
Soldiers completed during last 2 weeks	182	32
Soldiers w/o children (to be removed from sample)	478	275
% of completed soldiers w/o children	9.9	17.4
Soldiers with children complete	4327	1305
% with children complete	50.9	29.0