We have learned much about our Knight line, and much about the process of genealogy, from Laura Knight Jadczyk. Her website Once a Knight is Enough, Knight Genealogy reflects over two decades of research of her Knight line, back to our shared ancestry in the Knights of Colonial Virginia.
As we climb our tree back through Colonial America, things get murky. Records are sparse. Families were large, and, they, well, they ran out of given names. Jr. was attached to a young adult male to distinguish him from his uncle, so Jr. does not share his given name with his father. The given name of a deceased child was given to a sibling born later. Records were lost, or destroyed—though not as often as we pretend. And they moved a lot.
The life of a relative in that era may now only be reflected in a single reference, in a original record that has not been microfiched, and digitally scanned—it is not on-line.
Laura demonstrates the benefit—no, the necessity—of looking at every record for a surname of interest, and the records of their Allied families, to make headway in Colonial America.
After our recent focus on the Irish lines of our Watne branch—Porter, Gallagher, Walker, Hannah, Virtue—it is time to tackle our direct paternal line, Spratlin(g). As with our Knight line, we are headed back to Colonial Virginia.
Step one, don’t forget what Laura taught us.
If you are researching your Spratlin(g) line in Colonial Virginia, join in. We need the help!