GRAVES FAMILY BULLETIN
A
Free, Occasional, Online Summary of Items of Interest to Descendants of all
Families of Graves, Greaves, Grieves, Grave, and other spelling variations
Worldwide
Vol.
10, No. 9, August 25, 2008
===============================================
Copyright
© 2008 by the Graves Family Association and Kenneth V. Graves. All rights reserved.
Information
on how to start a free subscription to this bulletin and how to be removed from
the subscription list is at the end of this bulletin. If you received this bulletin directly, then
you are already subscribed.
Visit
the GFA web site at https://gravesfa.org
===============================================
CONTENTS:
**
General Comments
**
Trip to England in June 2009
**
Significant Change to Greaves Family of Stepney, London, England, and Rear Adm.
Thomas Graves of Charlestown, MA
**
Graves Family Association Website Changes
**
Special DNA Testing Offer From Family Tree DNA for New Customers, and Free
Testing for Those in the UK and Ireland
**
New Discoveries from Our DNA Study
**
DNA Testing at Family Tree DNA versus Other Companies
**
How to Find Information on Websites
**
Research and DNA Testing Participation Needed for Families in the U.K. and
Ireland
**
Details and Interesting Stories for Genealogies
**
An Example of Interesting History in Early Massachusetts Involving a Graves
Family
**
Documents Available About Some Descendants of Deacon George Grave of Hartford,
CT (Genealogy 65)
**
To Submit Material to this Bulletin & Other Things
===============================================
GENERAL
COMMENTS
The
most urgent items in this issue of the bulletin are the call to sign up for the
trip to England next June, and the opportunity to take advantage of a special
reduced price offer to get your DNA tested.
Letting me know of your desire to go with us
to England next June is important because the cost will be reduced if we get
more people, and we need to have at least 25 in our group to make the trip
viable.
The
DNA testing offer is of special importance because there are still many
branches of the family that have not yet been tested. The offer is for new customers (not for upgrades) but orders must
be placed by the end of August.
The
Graves Family Association will also pay for 100% of the cost of new Y-DNA tests
for any male Graves/Greaves/Grieves/etc. descendant in Britain from a family
that has not yet been tested. Now is
the time to get tested or find another family member who will.
===============================================
TRIP
TO ENGLAND IN JUNE 2009
The
long anticipated tour of England, “A Journey to the Land of Our Ancestors,”
will be June 4-16, 2009. Cost will be
$2975 per person, airfare additional.
It will start with arrival in London the morning of June 4, followed by
a sightseeing tour of London that afternoon.
The tour will include Oxford, the Cotswolds, Kings Norton in
Worcestershire, the Peak District and Derbyshire, Cumbria and the Lake
District, Yorkshire, Cambridgeshire, and back to London for a farewell dinner
on June 15. Departure for those
returning to the U.S. is on June 16.
Many
other sights and places will be included, as well as meetings with Greaves and
Graves family members who live in England, many of whom may be related to the
tour members. A tour brochure (with
lots more details) will be mailed to all those who have already expressed an
interest. If you are not sure whether
you have told me you might want to go with us, let me know now.
An
initial deposit of $250 per person must accompany your registration. There will be a discount of $75 for those
who register before Oct. 31, 2008. A
second deposit of $500 per person will be due on Jan. 31, 2009. full and final payment will be due on April
8, 2009. All travel arrangements and
financial details will be handled by Select Travel Services, West 115 Century
Road, Suite 330, Paramus, NJ 07652.
===============================================
SIGNIFICANT
CHANGE TO GREAVES FAMILY OF STEPNEY, LONDON, ENGLAND, AND REAR ADM. THOMAS
GRAVES OF CHARLESTOWN, MA
The
book I published in 1994 about Rear Admiral Thomas Graves and his descendants
includes several generations of his ancestry in what is now London, back to a
Thomas Greaves, born about 1530.
However, the Greaves ancestry and the descendants of John
Graves/Greaves, eldest son of Rear Adm. Thomas Graves, had never been
incorporated into the genealogy. That
has now been corrected, and the result (genealogy 28) is now on the GFA
website. This family is part of the
largest Greaves/Graves family in England and North America.
===============================================
GRAVES
FAMILY ASSOCIATION WEBSITE CHANGES
The
Charts page has now had a section for Warwickshire families added. For all the families in that group, as well
as for most other Graves/Greaves/Grave/Grieves families in England, we very
much need your research help and male descendants with the Greaves, etc.
surname to take the DNA test. If it
seems likely that the DNA testing will advance our knowledge of the family, we
will pay for the entire cost of the test.
As
usual, genealogies continue to be updated on the website, and news items
continue to be added to the Current News page.
===============================================
SPECIAL
DNA TESTING OFFER FROM FAMILY TREE DNA FOR NEW CUSTOMERS, AND FREE TESTING
FOR THOSE IN THE UK AND IRELAND
In June, Family Tree DNA ran a successful
promotion, in which they offered a significant discount on many of their test
upgrades.
This new announcement is for new customers
only, and the offer of most interest to us is the 37-marker Y-DNA test. If your part of the Graves/Greaves/Grieves
family has not yet been tested, please consider doing this or getting a male
relative with the Graves/Greaves surname to take part.
For those of you in the UK or Ireland, we are
now offering free Y-DNA testing for those whose families have not yet
been tested or where additional testing is needed. This will be paid for by the Graves Family Association, so we
would like to get as much of that done as part of this special offer before the
end of August also. Please let us know
as soon as possible.
In their announcement, Family Tree DNA wrote:
“Now that our lab has had time to process the high volume of orders generated
by the June promotion, we are ready to challenge the record that we set in June
by returning to you with our “Sizzling Summer Sale.” This time, the promotion
is geared towards bringing new members to your projects by offering the
following big incentives:
·
Y-DNA12 orders
include a FREE mtDNA test (Y-DNA12+mtDNA promotion price of $99; normally $189)
·
Y-DNA25 orders
include a FREE mtDNA test (Y-DNA25+mtDNA promotion price of $148; normally
$238)
·
Y-DNA37 orders
price REDUCED to $119 (normally $189)
·
Y-DNA37+mtDNAPlus
orders price REDUCED to $189 (normally $339)
·
Y-DNA67+mtDNAPlus
orders price REDUCED to $288 (normally $409)
·
mtDNAPlus price
REDUCED to $149 (normally $189)
This promotion goes into effect immediately
and will be available until August 31st, 11:59PM CST.
We would also like to make you aware of a
change in shipping costs. Since our inception we never increased our shipping
charge, even though in the meantime USPS has increased its rates 6 times. For
that reason, our shipping cost will increase by $2, effective immediately. We
appreciate your understanding.”
I urge you to take this opportunity to order
that DNA test you may have been considering.
The one that I especially recommend is the Y-DNA37 test.
===============================================
NEW
DISCOVERIES FROM OUR DNA STUDY
Bruce
W. Graves of Gresham, OR has discovered that he is apparently descended from
Thomas Graves of Hartford, CT (genealogy 168) rather than Capt. Thomas Graves
of VA (genealogy 169). He did some
research several years ago, when he was just starting to try to find his
ancestry, and found what he thought was a connection to Capt. Thomas
Graves. He then took a Y-DNA test which
seemed to confirm that. However, he
only tested for 25 markers, and the result he got put him in the group for gen.
169, gen. 168, and gen. 65. We depended
on his research to place him in gen. 169, since 25 markers is not enough to
indicate which family in that group is the correct one.
He
has now done more research and has shown a Vermont origin for his line,
consistent with genealogy 168 but not with genealogy 169. He is ordering additional markers to verify
the changed connection.
Recent
DNA test results for genealogy 280 (Thomas Graves of VA, TN & AR) show that
it shares common ancestry with genealogy 90 (Bachelor/Bartlett Graves and Rhoda
Clay of VA & Wilson Co., TN). It is
possible that Thomas Graves of gen. 280 is a son of Bartlett Graves of gen.
90. However, there are some discrepancies
that suggest the possibility that he was a nephew, and could take the family
back one more generation. More research
is being done. Genealogy 280 has been
updated, and charts have been added for that genealogy and the possible
connection with genealogy 90.
===============================================
DNA
TESTING AT FAMILY TREE DNA VERSUS OTHER COMPANIES
There
are a number of companies that offer DNA testing for genealogical
purposes. You can see a comparison of
Y-DNA testing from various companies at http://www.isogg.org/ydnachart.htm
and a similar chart for mtDNA testing at http://www.isogg.org/mtdnachart.htm. On those charts, DNA Ancestry is the same as
the service offered by Ancestry.com.
Because of its large user base, Ancestry.com will undoubtedly be used by
more and more people, and they have recently provided price discounts to
attract new customers. For that reason,
I have recently set up a Graves/Greaves DNA project on Ancestry.com, and am
hoping that we will be able to include the test results of Ancestry.com
customers as well as those who have tested with all other companies in our DNA
study.
However,
the testing company we have used since the start of our DNA study in 2001 is
Family Tree DNA. They have by far the
most testing experience and the greatest number of surname and other
groups. They provide outstanding
customer support, have the broadest range of product offerings, plus other
advantages. In addition, the various
testing companies do not test all of the same markers. Therefore, when a company other than Family
Tree DNA does a Graves/Greaves test, it is more difficult to compare those
results to the rest of our test results.
If we receive a number of tests from other companies, our master DNA
results table will be expanded to include those other markers. Also, if people tested by other companies
choose, they can submit a sample to Family Tree DNA and have their untested
markers tested at a discount rate.
The
conclusion is that we encourage everyone to test at Family Tree DNA rather than
at another company, since we feel that it will be in your best interest and in
the best interest of our group.
However, we strongly urge anyone who does get tested by another company
to be sure we have your DNA test results so they can be included in our study
and compared to others.
===============================================
HOW
TO FIND INFORMATION ON WEBSITES
Many
people have great difficulty in finding information on the internet. The most commonly used tool for that is a
search engine such as Google. However,
even after finding a website, there is often difficulty in finding what is on
that site. Three things are of the most
help in searching a website. The first
2 items in the following list are not available on all websites, but they
should be, and the third item is available in all browsers (as far as I know).
1)
A
sitemap
2)
A
site-specific search function
3)
The
“Find” function in your browser. This
won’t help you find the page you want on the website, but it is of great help
in finding anything within a page.
The
Graves Family Association website has both a sitemap and the capability
to search the site. Links for both are
at the top right corner of every page (except in the genealogies
themselves). Whenever you want to find
a specific person or place in a genealogy, enter the word or words in the
search box on the website. If you want
two or more words to always appear together, put quotation marks at either end
of the series of words.
Those
of you occasionally looking for information on the Family Tree DNA website
should be aware that there is a Sitemap link at the bottom of their main
page. Click on that, and then select
the topic of interest to you.
===============================================
RESEARCH
AND DNA TESTING PARTICIPATION NEEDED FOR FAMILIES IN THE U.K. AND IRELAND
I
recently added much information to the genealogy for John Graves and Susanna
Tyson of Gayton le Marsh, Lincolnshire, England (genealogy 797). Most of the new information was from census
records. Much more is available in
church records and other vital records, and someone interested needs to gather
the material. This family is only a part
of the Graves families of Lincolnshire.
A look at the Charts page on the Graves Family Association website will
show that there are 15-20 other Lincolnshire families needing research. Most, if not all, of those families are apt
to be related, descended from a common ancestor. Since only one of the families in the list has been DNA-tested so
far, the need to find descendants who are willing to do the DNA test is even
greater.
And,
of course, the families of Lincolnshire are only one of the groups that need
both more research and DNA testing. It
would be wonderful if you would help advance our efforts in both research and
testing. Other family groups include
(in the order they are on the Charts page):
·
Grieve
and Grieves of Durham and Northumberland, England
·
Grieve
and Grieves of Scotland
·
Graves
of Ireland
·
Grave
and Graves of Norfolk, England
·
Graves
of Cambridgeshire, England
·
Grave
and Graves of Cumbria, England
·
Greaves
of Lancashire, England
·
Greaves
of Nottinghamshire, England
·
Greaves
of Yorkshire, England
·
Graves
of Yorkshire, England
·
Greaves
of Warwickshire, England
·
Graves
of Hertfordshire, Essex and Warwick, England
·
Greaves
of Northamptonshire and Buckinghamshire, England
===============================================
DETAILS
AND INTERESTING STORIES FOR GENEALOGIES
There
is an assumption by many people that genealogies are about bare facts of names,
dates and places, and that I am not interested in including stories about the
lives of people and the times in which they lived. That is not at all true.
I encourage all of you to submit stories, interesting details, and
pictures for all those in your family tree.
Anything that is interesting to you is likely to be of interest to
others.
I
previously addressed this issue in an article in the Bulletin titled “Making
Genealogies More Interesting” in vol. 10, no. 5, April 28, 2008. In that article, I said that genealogy is
really about the stories of our ancestors and relatives, the times in which
they lived, and the influences on them that caused them to do what they did and
think what they thought. When we think
of our family history as just a bunch of names with a few dates thrown in, we
lose most of the interesting parts.
===============================================
AN
EXAMPLE OF INTERESTING HISTORY IN EARLY MASSACHUSETTS INVOLVING A GRAVES FAMILY
William
H. (“Bill”) Graves of Santa Barbara, California, descended from genealogy 208
(Bela Curtis Graves and Dorothy Wallace of VT, NY, OH & IL), recently sent
a link to a well-written and authoritative book about Shays’s Rebellion. The book is Shays’s Rebellion, The
American Revolution’s Final Battle , by Leonard L. Richards, 2003, as found
at http://books.google.com.
During the bitter winter of 1786-87, Daniel
Shays, a modest farmer and Revolutionary War veteran, and his compatriot Luke
Day led an unsuccessful armed rebellion against the state of Massachusetts.
Their desperate struggle was fueled by the injustice of a regressive tax system
and a conservative state government that seemed no better than British colonial
rule. But despite the immediate failure of this local call-to-arms in the
Massachusetts countryside, the event fundamentally altered the course of
American history. Shays and his army of four thousand rebels so shocked the
young nation's governing elite--even drawing the retired General George
Washington back into the service of his country--that ultimately the Articles
of Confederation were discarded in favor of a new constitution, the very document
that has guided the nation for more than two hundred years, and brought closure
to the American Revolution.
“In Whately (Massachusetts), two families were central. Of the seventy-six men who rebelled against the state, fifty-five were connected with the Graves and Smith families. In most cases, the connection was through women members of the two families. While only nine men named Graves and five named Smith bore arms, marching with them were eighteen men who had married their sisters or aunts and thirteen men who were the sons of such marriages. Typical was the extended family of Oliver Graves.” (from page 104) Many of these men fled to Vermont in the aftermath of Shays’s Rebellion.
The
information in the Thomas Graves of Hartford, CT book and in genealogy 168 for
Oliver Graves is: “Deacon Oliver Graves (106) was
born 6 Aug. 1725 and died 30 Aug. 1810.
He married Rebecca Smith of Hatfield, daughter of John Smith, on 24 Jan.
1754. She was born 4 May 1732 and died
25 Feb. 1825. They lived at Whately,
Mass. He was a member of the first
provincial congress and a Selectman of Whately. He was in the French War in 1757, in the expedition to Canada, in
Lieut. Billings' Co.” Adding selected
information to the genealogy about the role of Oliver Graves and his family in
Shays’s Rebellion and the creation of the new American nation would be
interesting.
===============================================
DOCUMENTS
AVAILABLE ABOUT SOME DESCENDANTS OF DEACON GEORGE GRAVE OF HARTFORD, CT
(GENEALOGY 65)
Judy
Cecchini of Middletown, CT has come into possession of documents of the family
of Rev. Joseph Graves and his daughter Olive Graves who formerly lived in
Middletown. This Joseph Graves was born
in 1738 in Middletown, and is a descendant of the John Grave (son of Deacon
George Grave) whose house is preserved in Madison, CT. Judy bought these from relatives of the
people who used to live in the Joseph Graves house. The documents consist of ledgers, a memoir book of Olive Graves,
an autograph book full of notes from relatives, etc.
If
interested, contact Judy directly at cetoni@aol.com. She can provide more information.
===============================================
ABOUT THIS BULLETIN:
This
bulletin is written and edited by Kenneth V. Graves,
ken.graves@gravesfa.org. Ken Graves was
also editor of the Graves Family Newsletter (no longer published). This bulletin will contain announcements and
news of special interest to Graves descendants with Internet access. It will not contain queries, genealogies,
photos, and the kind of in-depth articles that used to appear in the Graves
Family Newsletter.
TO
SUBMIT MATERIAL TO THIS BULLETIN:
Send
any material you would like to have included in this bulletin to
ken.graves@gravesfa.org. The editor
reserves the right to accept, edit or reject any material submitted.
TO
JOIN THE GRAVES FAMILY ASSOCIATION:
If
you do not already belong to the GFA, you can join by sending $20 per year to
Graves Family Association, 20 Binney Circle, Wrentham, MA 02093 (more details
on GFA website). Payment may also be
sent electronically via PayPal by going to www.paypal.com
and sending payment to gfa@gravesfa.org.
Benefits include access to the “members only” section of the website,
membership directory, and help with learning more about your Graves/Greaves
family. The purpose of the GFA is to
bring together as many descendants as possible to work toward learning more about
the Graves/Greaves families, to help other descendants, and to instill pride in
our ancestry.
COPYRIGHTS:
Although
the contents of this bulletin are copyrighted by the Graves Family Association
and Kenneth V. Graves, you are hereby granted rights, unless otherwise
specified, to re-distribute articles to other parties for non-commercial
purposes only. Do not re-distribute the
newsletter in its entirety.
TO
SUBSCRIBE OR UNSUBSCRIBE TO THIS BULLETIN:
To
subscribe to this bulletin, send an e-mail message to
ken.graves@gravesfa.org. Please include
your full name. Your postal mailing
address and information on your Graves/Greaves ancestry would also be
appreciated, although not essential.
To
remove your name from this subscription list, send an e-mail message to
ken.graves@gravesfa.org asking to be removed.