Twins

I'm skipping ahead so today's prompt is going to be TWINS

I'm going to start off with the 1860 Rusk County, Texas, census for Beat No. 6. Post office is Minden. For the first set of  NALL TWINS I have come across in my research.

The first family listed on the image below is the family of Thomas J Nawls (NALL). My 4x great grandfather. The second family listed in my 3x great grandfather, John Middleton Nawls (NALL), living in the same household is his sister Margaret SCROGGINS' family. If you look where I've indicated, the two children of J M and Mary are 6 month old twins. In my post about John Middleton's Civil War service, I touched on the illness and poverty that came to this area during the beginning of the war. I believe that illness and poverty could have been what led to the death of baby S. NALL shortly after this census. Baby S. Nall died by 1865 when the family of  three (Mary, David, and my ancestor John Thomas) are on the indignant soldier's families list.

1860 Beat 6, Rusk County, Texas 

The surviving children of John Middleton and Mary Jane GARNER NALL were:

1. David Harrison (TWIN) 1859
2. John Thomas 1861
3. Sarah 1866
4. Pervelley Ophelia 1869
5. Charles Elexander 1871
6. James Wesley 1874
7. Linnie 1880

As far as I have found, none of the above children had TWINS. And to preserve my sanity, from here I am going to focus only on my ancestor John Thomas NALL's descendants and from there the descendants of his son, my ancestor, Benjamin Rufus NALL.

John Thomas NALL married Optha Ophelia RICH and they had 10 children. They were:

1. Emma Nall 1883
2. James C 1885
3. Minerva Frances 1889
4. Elsie Mae 1892
5. Charles 1894
6. James Arch 1895
7. Mary Ethel 1898
8. Roy 1900
9. Mollie Marzel 1903
10. Benjamin Rufus 1908

Benjamin Rufus NALL married(2) Willie Belle FOSTER. They had seven children, two of which were TWINS

1. Charles Bryant Nall (my ancestor)
2. Female 
3. Male
4. Male
5. Male (TWIN)
6. Wilma Jean (TWIN) died at birth.
7. Rufus Leon Nall died in farming accident.

Their third child would marry and have four children, one girl and three boys. One of these boys would marry and have three children, two of which were TWIN  girls.  

Their fourth child had six children, two of which were TWIN girls. Another one of their daughters would go on to marry and have eight children, two of which were also TWIN girls. Their son would marry and have four children, two girls and two boys. One of those girls would marry and go on to also have TWIN girls.

Not counting the TWINS born to John Middleton NALL and Mary Jane GARNER. There has been five sets of TWINS born in four generations.

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Until next time,
Becky

To Them Were Born Ten Children

Its been a while since I've blogged along with Amy Johnson Crow using her 52 Ancestors prompts. I'm  having a few set backs after my hysterectomy and that has given me a little (a lot) of sit down time. This morning, when I opened my email from her, I saw that this week's prompt is Ten.



A few months ago while recouping from surgery, I came across an excellent resource for old Texas Newspapers from Texas Tech University. It is part of their digital repository of the Southwest Collection/Special Collections Library. In the past I had often turned to The Portal To Texas History for newspaper collections, as well as Newspapers.com  but was always disappointed in the lack of information I could find on my Texas family. This new resource though, has provided so many articles about my RUTHERFORD, JONES, NALL and FOSTER ancestors that lived in the Foard and Knox County areas.



Today I want to share with you the obituary of my 2nd great grandfather, John Thomas Nall. It can be found in the July 18, 1946 publication of The Knox County Herald. As you may notice, the heading of the article gives his middle initial as F but as you read the obituary you'll see that's a typo. It has been my experience that there are often small errors in newspaper articles, but they are great to use along with other records. A few other errors in this obituary are Ophelia's maiden name -- it's actually RICH. According to their marriage certificate they were married Aug 1882 not March 1884.



Another error is her death date. According to her Death Certificate, Ophelia died from cancer of the nose and face on 27 January 1935, not 1937. My great grandfather, Benjamin Rufus was the informant.





John's obituary states that he and Ophelia had ten children. I believe this statement is free from errors. Using census records, that is the amount of children I have attributed to them as well.

In 1900 this family was living in Rockwall, Texas. Ophelia is reported as having given birth to 7 children with only 6 surviving. There were only 5 children listed in the home because the eldest, Emey, had recently married a Mr. Preston Zachary. Also living in the home is Ophelia's younger brother Orville. The deceased child is said to be Charlie Nall b 1894. I'm not certain where that information came from, but I think it was from genealogy information my great Aunt Dean gave us one year at a family reunion years ago.






In 1910 the family was back living in Collin County. Ophelia is the mother of 10 only 7 are still living. New additions to the family are Roy, Mollie and my ancestor, Benjamin. Emey is still alive and well living with her family in Rockwall. James can no longer be found. Minerva is now married to Mr. Robert Ross and living in Collin County as well. Else is also living in Collin County and is now married to Mr. John Anderton. James A is now going by Archie and Ethel can no longer be found.

I have searched all the different ways I could come up with for obituaries for Ophelia and these three children and can't find any article mentioning their deaths or any death record at all for the children. John's obituary says that four children preceded him in death. The fourth child is  Roy Nall who died from complications associated with surgery and typhoid fever in Oct 1926. He was only 26 years old and was the father of two young children.



If anyone has any information on these missing children, I'd love to hear from you.

Until next time,
Becky