LindaDick.com

Welcome to our family's ancestry!

As of today the primary focus is on the Case-Daugherty family - beginning with William Washington Case's story and following the pre-civil war family, along the path from the hills and hollers into today's world. Why start with him? Well, first there's this lovely picture of him in uniform that kept drawing me back into the past. I'm a visual person so that seemed a logical starting point to begin this ancestral dig. Family lore offered that he was the family Civil War hero posing for the portrait which later hung in 'the state house'. Seemed logical that records and archives of so prominent a man should be quick to verify, right? And so it began...

Someone - perhaps a professional - could have warned me to expect drama, tragedy, secrets, lies, heroes, bizarre coincidences, patriots, pioneers and heartbreak. I think even professionals, though, would have been surprised by the discovery of our unknown new cousin Diane in New Zealand!

For some time I've been sitting at the foot of a brick wall with a big sign on it that says 'Butler Case was born in 1821 and he had to have a father...DIDN'T HE?' I have these visions of multiple BCF's (Butler Case Fathers) just one generation away but right now they're slippery, shadowy no-links. It is of no consolation that other BCF hunters also seem stuck here. And yes, I am fully aware that some brick walls never give out their secrets.

Your comments, corrections, ideas and critiques are certainly welcome... brother Jeff has been working on the Thompson-Bee side and sometime in the future that information will be added as well as expanding the Daugherty-Barrickman family. Just so you know, this website will probably never be 'done'. Such is the way of this stuff. Primary sources include Ancestry.com, Fold3.com, FindAGrave.com, National Archives and of course WestVirginiaArchives.org. West Virginia has a very robust site, compared to other states. There are probably 30 more trusted sites if not more. One of the best sources has been my mentor Penny Cox Brown, one of our many distant cousins who shared her thirty years of research with me early on.

If you come across any of my family trees in Ancestry.com don't trust them because they are corrupted by those dang green leaf hints that are often useless. My plan is to delete those family trees and re-enter with only 3-sourced information. You CAN trust this website info - it's all 3-sourced and/or family documented. Big hard lesson right there!

Linda lrae2007@gmail.com