Tuesday, April 4, 2017

Meeting a "New" Cousin and Solving a Family Photo Mystery

One of the best parts of doing genealogy is meeting "new" cousins! I recently had the opportunity to spend a day with my new-found cousin, Terry. who is my 3rd cousin once removed. My 3rd great grandparents, Joachim and Henriette (Bünger) Peters, who I recently traced back to Germany, are our common ancestors.

My cousin, Terry, and I at Clayton Library
Houston - March 2017
We met at Clayton Library in Houston and she brought a pile of photos and documents to share. We had a wonderful time discussing our family and getting to know each other. And, now I have a lot of new information to go through!


One of the photos Terry shared was this "mystery" photo. Terry's father, who is still living, wrote the following note on the back: 

Some Peters went to Oklahoma. One had a cotton gin. Grandpa Peters (Eckard) [who is Joachim's son] had 3 brothers:
  • Bill - Ashton [Sumner County, Kansas]
  • Henry [Oklahoma]
  • Charles [Oklahoma]
This photo is of one of them [either Henry or Charles]

The 4 sons of Charles Peters. Photo in the Stewart family collection
Probably from Beulah (Peters) Brewer's collection.

Charles Peters (1847-1910) is my great, great grandfather. I would LOVE for this mystery photo to be of him and his family! But, the above photo shows his four sons, and I don't believe they look like the two young men in the other photo. [Besides these four sons, Charles also had two daughters who lived to adulthood.]

When I started researching this morning, I believed that Henry Peters and his wife, Hattie, had 2 sons and 3 daughters. But, after several hours of research, I have determined that they had 3 sons and 5 daughters. However, only 2 sons and 4 daughters survived to adulthood. So, I believe this is a photo of Henry, Hattie, and their 6 grown children.


A photo my dad, JRS, posted on FindAGrave shows three of Henry's children, along with one of their spouses, as older adults. From this photo, I believe we can determine that the taller young man in the "mystery" photo is Albert Roy Peters and the shorter man is Edwin Eugene "Ted" Peters. 

Estimated date of early 1910s based on youngest childrens' ages, Cora's 1910 marriage date, and clothing
Here is the "mystery" photo again. I am fairly certain this is the family of Henry J Peters, son of Joachim Peters. The family consists of:
  • Henry J Peters (1852-1931)
  • "Hattie" (Clifton) Peters (1857-1929) 
  • Hugo Peters (1877-1878) died as infant
  • Cora May (Peters) Pickett (1880-1957) married Robert Pickett (1877-1953) [likely seated next to her mother wearing a wedding ring in the photo]
  • Jennie Lynn Peters (1884-1886) died as toddler
  • Albert Roy Peters (1887-1968) never married [taller young man in photo]
  • Pearl Elsie (Peters) King (1893-1955) married Glen H King (1888-1976)
  • Myrtle Lillian Peters (1893-1973) never married
  • Edwin Eugene "Ted" Peters (1895-1966) married Clara Elizabeth King (1898-1984) [shorter young man in photo]
  • Hattie Isabell (Peters) Porter (1897-1978) married Earl Brown Porter (1897-1945)

4 comments:

  1. You are so lucky to have connected with and then met your cousin! Plus now you've got a research buddy for your family tree. Doing the happy dance for you.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks, Marian. And, yes, it's great to have a research buddy/cousin!

      Delete
  2. I connected with my cousin a few years ago - our great grandfathers were brothers. We actually knew each other as kids but as we all got older, the relationship seemed to end.

    Just yesterday he "introduced" me to his niece who is just starting in genealogy and now the two of us are getting acquainted. I'm excited to share information with her.

    Your photos are fantastic!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. How fun, Debi! Isn't it great to have a family member to share the excitement and discoveries with? Especially in the next generation. My niece seems somewhat interested in genealogy, and I hope she really gets excited about it.

      Delete

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