A marriage that never happened?


CliffieDuckie
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Where are you looking for this information? Since you found her death info, I'd try to find her obituary in the local paper. That may list any relatives still living and who she married and perhaps her parents and where she came from and some dates. Relatives often attended the funeral too. Who bought the grave site? The cemetary may have some sort of record about that. There may also be other relatives buried in that same cemetary.

When was she born? If before 1930 you could possibly find her on the 1930 US Census if you know her maiden name. The obituary may have a name of her brother, and that would give you a maiden name. If not, you may still be able to find her father in the 1930 Census or any older siblings..........hope that helps a little and gives you somewhere to look.

Regarding her son Vincent -- if he's still living then information about him and any living people will be hard to come by. The records of living people are protected for privacy reasons. That's why you can't find you either! That's the reason we don't have access to any census after 1930.........all those ppl may be living. The 1940 Census will be available to the public in about 15 more years.

Edited by SundaeSarah
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Do you know when she was born? What state, county, and city (township)?

Once you have her birth information, you can go on line to familysearch.com and check out the census they have if the years match.

My Grandmother was born in 1899. Her first census was 1900. She and Grandpa got married in 1919- so they showed up in the 1920 census. My mother was their second child and she was born in 1924.

You can always go to your nearest Family History Center and get loads of help from the volunteers there.

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  • 1 month later...

I have a similar problem with my maternal line. If you are simply looking for evidence that Claude existed, census data would do it, but a census does not document a marriage and in many areas the recording of marriages was ecclesiastical only until fairly recently so civil records are lacking entirely.

I have obituary, multiple census, death certificates and, just recently was able to find a "delayed" birth certificate for my maternal grandfather.

My grandfather was my grandmother's third husband; I have always been told she was widowed twice before marrying him. I do find records to support marriage to the first husband, and for his death in 1907; I find census records for him prior to his marriage to my grandmother and of my grandmother following his death living in a household with the children of her first marriage and through her second and third marriages she continues to live at an address next door to the parents and then to the living siblings of the first husband and their families. I'm pretty sure my grandmother was married to her first husband, but still, I have no "proof" as in civil or ecclesiastical records and at this point am not going to hold my breath until I find any since I do have this family otherwise reliably recorded.

I only find this grandmother actually living with any of her three husbands in one census, that of 1920 in which she is living with her second husband, two children from that marriage and the children of her first marriage. The second husband, however, apparently exists nowhere except for this one census year; in this census it is listed that he was born on VA, but states his parents' birthplace/state as "unknown", so I have no record of his birth, death, or existence other than that one census and the fact that in my youth I knew his two daughters, now deceased, and one of my brothers was left the possessions of one of the two daughters. Marriage data aside, I'd love to simply find any evidence that the second husband was born and died. Parents would also be nice.

By the 1930 census I find my grandmother living with her children from first, second and third marriages including my mother. I have always been told that my maternal grandfather was injured in WWI and spent the remainder of his life in veterans' and other public hospitals, spending only short "furloughs" at home; with my grandmother often taking the children by train to adjacent states to visit their father for holidays, etc. I am, in fact, able to find this grandfather in census records for 1920 and 1930 in these hospitals; he did not die until 1963 and then, in a VA hospital. Good records of that, including gravesite, buthe is buried in a veterans' cemetery so gravesite info isn't useful when it comes to proving marriage. But, in both the 1920 census and the 1930 census his marital status is listed as single. For 1920, this is most certainly (I hope) true, because in 1920 my grandmother is living with husband number two, his two children, and the three children from her first marriage. But, by 1921 she has borne my mother's only full sibling, a brother, and in the 1930 census, where my grandmother is found living as HOH with children from first, second, and third marriages, my grandfather is found in a military hospital in another state with his marital staus listed as "single". So, who knows....in my grandmother's obituary, the third husband is the only one mentioned, and no children are mentioned.

I now do genealogy professionally, and can tell you that finding a marriage is not always easy. If the relatives in question lived recently, you won't be able to find census records since those after 1930 are not public. In such a case, your best bets are church/ecclesiatical records (including LDS if the persons were LDS, but also referring to other church records) and relatives who may be able to help you to directly find civil marriage and/or death records, gravesite and obituary records.On my paternal side I have a couple of second or more distant cousins who have been a very valuable source for me, but in many cases family records like family Bibles and old genealogical charts scratched on the back of butcher's paper, and, even moreso, family "lore", can also be inaccurate, but, they are a good start. If you need to find primary records that are not, or apparently not yet, digitized and online and have a good idea, at least the state, where these people may have married you can often contact that state's genealogical society via their website. They will often have local volunteers who attempt to find the original record for you although you may have to pay to get an actual copy. This is assuming you really don't want to make a trip yourself to say, South Carolina, and don't have a sister,brother,cousin who lives in the area in which you need to look........been there, done, that, use whatever means you can.

One place to start is to try building a tree at Ancestry.com, entering yourself as the index person, then as much as you know about both your parents and your grandparents and seeing what comes up, or doesn't come up.You do not have to be a paid member to do this, but it may give you a hint as to where else to look and is a good way to start. I have many,many times failed at locating a person or family at FamilySearch.org and been able to find some kind of information using Ancestry.com since what is available online at FamilySearch is accessible through Ancestry, but the reverse is not true since the Ancestry database of compiled records includes not only LDS submitted material, but the material submitted by non LDS sources and you can directly access primary records, like census and draft, which is not possible using ony FamilySearch.org.

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