Pages

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

WHICH HANNAH?

While I'm researching and adding collateral lines on my Ancestry tree I'm
also rechecking each ancestral generation. Right now I'm concentrating on my
Houghton line and in doing that I discovered a problem the other night.
Back when I first started, I'd found what I thought was the mother of my 5x
greatgrandmother Meriah (Peirce) Houghton.   Somewhere I found information
that Meriah was the daughter of John Peirce(Pirce/Pierce/Pairs) and his wife
Hannah. Where I found it, I don't know, because at time I was not keeping
a record of sources. I suspect it was the old FamilySearch because that was
my "go-to" spot back then.

So I set out to find the maiden name of Hannah Peirce and again, I found the
information that John Pirce had married Hannah Stone in Harvard, Worcester Co.,
Ma on  Nov. 22, 1744. From that I was able to extend the line back through Simon
Stone and discovered some interesting  stories about the Stone family's part in
the colonial Indian wars.

I bet some of you can already see where this is going, can't you?

The other night I was, as I said, working on that Houghton line. I was checking
the birth, marriage and death dates I had against the Early Massachusetts Vital 
Record site. One of my collateral Houghton cousins was Hannah Houghton
and while I couldn't find a record of her birth I did find one of her marriage
intentions....to John Pirce. Hmm. Could it be the same John Pirce who was
Meriah Perce's father?

Next I searched the various spellings of Peirce/Pirce/Pierce/Pairs and found the
following:
    John and Hannah Stone, Nov. 22, 1744.
    John and Hannah Houghton, int. Mar. 10, 1747.

So I'm now left with the question which Hannah was the mother of Meriah Peirce?
Meriah was reported to be born on  Oct 19, 1748. So if Hannah (Stone) Peirce died
sometime before Marh of 1747, it's quite possible that John then  married Hannah
Houghton who then gave birth to Meriah.

Sigh.

No comments: