A Bill for annexing part of the County of Craven to Pitt County (1786)
The following was found in the General Assembly Session Records at NCDCR online. Here is a direct link to the Bill and accompanying petition....
Research Blog
Laban Henby / Laban Morris Name Change – High Resolution
NCDCR now has General Assembly Session Records online. I have been going back through the records for 1810, the year that Laban Morris had his name legally changed from Henby, along with his sons John and William. Now, I'm more convinced than ever that the name was...
Laban Morris of Craven County, NC is NOT the son of Thomas Morris & Rachel Platt!
The whole purpose of this video is to explain who Laban Morris's parents probably are and to correct the record of who they DEFINITELY AREN'T. They definitely aren't Thomas Morris and Rachel Platt of Burbage, Wiltshire, England. That is incorrect information that was...
GAMECHANGER! FamilySearch Full Text Search Tips – Use AI to search old documents for your ancestors!
FamilySearch Full Text Search is a gamechanger for those of us researching our family trees. Finally, we have another set of tireless eyes to read through millions of pages of documents in old handwriting to help find our ancestors' names! In this video, I talk about...
Abraham Kornegay (Jones County) to James Cremer (Beaufort County), 1787
This is another item I found using the Full Text Search at FamilySearch. I normally wouldn't be searching deeds for these men, but my ancestor John Holmes and a person of interest, Elisha Morris, both show up as witnesses to the deed. I'll put abstracted data below...
Elisha Morris to Levi Nelson, 1798 (Beaufort County, NC) then transferred to John Williams
I found this deed using FamilySearch's new AI Full-Text Search tool. I was searching for "Elisha Morris" and I set the place to North Carolina and I stumbled on this. (Actually, I had tried a variety of counties because I've found the AI sometimes gets confused about...
Mapping Craven County with Edwin Averette – How to map your ancestors deeds and grants, and why you should!
https://youtu.be/ZLIW2EOkQNE Have you ever wondered where your ancestors lived? Delving into historical land deeds can unlock a wealth of information about their property and lives. This guide — which has been put together to add written instructions to the techniques...
Traversing the Past: Colonial Travel in Eastern North Carolina
Traveling through New Bern on Martin Luther King Jr Blvd or to Chocowinity on Hwy 17 or Greenville on 43, we can take for granted how easy it is to get from one place to another — and in about a half hour or less to or from any of these places if Vanceboro is your...
Beaufort County, North Carolina Ancestors by Roy Archbell, Jr.
I was thrilled this past week to receive in the mail a great big heavy package postmarked from Virginia. As soon as I saw the from address, I knew it was the book I ordered a couple of months ago, Beaufort County, North Carolina Ancestors by Roy Archbell, Jr. Before I...
WARNING! Be cautious using ChatGPT for genealogy research
https://youtu.be/Njxpxpbmjx4 I love technology and I'm always up for trying new things. Last month, I used ChatGPT — a site I have used many times since its launch — in an attempt to do some creative genealogy research. The results are nothing short of a bad trip by...
Heirs of John Holmes to James Creamer
I've referenced this deed previously on this site, but I realized I've never transcribed it. This relates to the John HOLMES family of Beaufort County, Craven County and Pitt County, North Carolina and later Smyth County, Virginia. John HOLMES had several children....
GET MORE from Ancestry DNA & FamilyTree DNA – TOOLS to use for Solving Genetic Genealogy Problems 🧬
I was invited to give a presentation to the Craven County Genealogical Society about how to get more out of your Ancestry DNA, FamilyTreeDNA or any DNA results with some very useful tools, as well as some bonus content about how to find what you seek in the unindexed...