1/1/2006
By Emily Anne Croom
Need a hand circumventing those pesky brick walls? Turn to elusive forebears' clusters of friends, relatives and neighbors for clues to your own ancestral ties.
You've heard the expression “We're all in this together.” Well, just like you, your ancestors were part of a family, with siblings and cousins, aunts and uncles, parents and grandparents. Groups of relatives often lived near one another, worshipped together, witnessed one another's documents and were laid to rest in the same cemetery.
Like you, ancestors had friends and neighbors. Their spouses frequently came from neighboring families or were the siblings of classmates and military buddies. They and their friends were lodge brothers or officers in the ladies' literary society.