Ancestry Magazine

About That Name

I knew my father as Richard Coleman. He met my mother, Helen, in Washington, D.C., around 1946. They married in 1947, and I was born in 1949.

In the mid-1950s, my father became ill with cancer, eventually passing away in Maryland in 1961. As a child, I always wondered where Dad’s family was, especially at the traditional holidays. But my father just wouldn’t talk about it. Nor would he explain why he claimed to have never been in the military whenever someone would ask, yet he kept mementos galore: photos, ribbons, and even actual uniforms.

I had always been convinced that my father was born by a name other than the one that I had grown up knowing. My search for his name, as well as his military service and his reportedly large family, began in 1975, partly to help my mother receive veteran’s benefits, partly to satisfy my curiosity. Over the years, my search was featured in an article in the Washington Post and on a segment of Unsolved Mysteries. Still, no breakthrough.

Several months ago, I was sitting at my computer contemplating what to do next in my search. I just happened to check the new database listing at Ancestry.com when one caught my eye—World War II draft registration cards. More than 20 years ago, I had written for my father’s possible World War II draft registration card, but the Federal Records Center was unable to locate anything. At the time, I chalked it up to my father’s subterfuge.

However, now when I typed in “Richard Coleman” in this database, I received 26 hits. One of them was a Richard Coleman, born 12 September 1895, in Everett, Massachusetts, and living at the time of registration in New York City. That had to be my father—Dad had said his birthday was September 12, but he always said either 1901 or 1902. On a number of records, he gave his birthplace as “Everett” or “Everett, Massachusetts.”

When I looked at the card, it was indeed my father. The signature had his distinctive backward slant, and the address gave a location where I knew he had lived for a number of years. Interestingly, this was the first time that I had come across a record on Richard Coleman that gave his birth date as being in the late 1800s, even though I suspected as much these past 30-some years.

Armed with the new birth year, I switched over to the World War I database. Instead of typing “Richard Coleman” I simply typed in my father’s new birth date—12 September 1895—and the place of birth, Massachusetts. Nothing else. I got 61 hits, one of which was “Coleman Joel DeKorte.” I remember thinking finding someone with my father’s date and place of birth, and his last name as a first name couldn’t be mere coincidence.

I clicked on the card for Coleman Joel DeKorte and looked at the signature. Sure enough, there was his distinctive backward slant. And the “Coleman” part of the signature was dead-on with my father’s handwriting.

My wife suggested I check census records—“see who his parents were.” In a short time, I found my father’s parents, his seven siblings, his first wife, their son and their two daughters, and a number of cousins.

Unfortunately, most of the people who would have known my dad as Coleman Joel DeKorte had passed away, but I did find a number of half-nieces, nephews, and cousins. Within a few days, I spoke by telephone to the widow of my father’s son (my half-brother) who is now in her 80s and living in Michigan. The following Sunday, I received an e-mail from the woman’s daughter—“Hi long lost relative.”

It seems my father and his first wife married in Maine in 1915 and had a very nasty split. My father apparently walked out one day, never to be heard from again. All these years, there was speculation on both sides of the family that Coleman Joel DeKorte/Richard Coleman had changed his name and remarried. But no one had made contact.

Since finding my father’s birth name, I’ve met his family, discovered that he was a policeman in Malden, Massachusetts before he “left,” and learned that my father’s other family had always wondered what happened to Coleman.

While I have not yet been able to determine why Coleman chose the name Richard, I have made a lot of other progress—now I’m slowly working my way through each of my dad’s seven siblings to see who survives. So far, I’ve found a couple of new cousins—grandchildren of my dad’s older brother—and I am on the trail of several others.

– Bob Coleman

Across the Ocean

When I found the Ogard family in the 1910 and 1930 censuses, I wondered why I couldn’t locate them in 1920. Then my knowledge of the Norwegian language kicked in and I thought I should try to spell Ogard as the Norwegians do—Aagaard. Bingo. There they were in the 1920 census. I’m sure they left Norway with the proper spelling but tired of spelling it for other new Americans and settled for the phonetic spelling instead.

 – Carol Stageberg Kuehnel

On a Whim

For 12 years, I looked for a marriage of my maternal great-grandparents. Since they seemingly never moved from Pennsylvania, both being born and raised in the same area, I was entirely frustrated.

One day, while researching my husband’s family, I e-mailed the New Jersey Department of Archives looking for a marriage license for my husband’s parents—people who I knew lived in Camden, New Jersey when my husband was born. On a whim I also placed a query for my great-grandparents, laughingly knowing they never lived in New Jersey and that there absolutely would not be a marriage record for them there.

Imagine my surprise when my husband’s parent’s marriage license was not found, but my great-grandparents’ marriage license was—and in Camden. So now I know: never assume anything.

– Sharon Manbeck Freeman

Life After Death Penalty

Browsing the local genealogy library, I noticed an interesting title—Summer Soldiers: A Survey of Revolutionary War Courts Martial. My genealogy genes took over, and I quickly perused the index hoping to find a renegade in my family history. As luck would have it, my great-great-grandfather Wyman Parker, a sergeant in the Connecticut line, was listed.

Wyman, said the record, had been court-martialed for taking his men out to find food—a direct violation of an order by his superior officer. Wyman was found guilty, as were a number of other men in his company. According to the citation, “Seven of the 11 men were pardoned at the very last minute. But, in a separate court-martial, Sergeant Wyman Parker and Sergeant Jerold Bunce were sentenced to death for ‘not discussing with their officers an intended mutiny when they knew a plan was laying.’”

Wyman was sentenced to death? I dug further and found that Wyman Parker actually came through the war and fathered my great-grandfather in 1793. Wyman served an honorable six years in a regiment commanded by Colonel Webb. He also became a steward to General Nathanial Greene. He fought in the battles of Flatbush and White Plains in New York, Guilford Courthouse in North Carolina, and Camden in South Carolina. He survived the war. And he survived the court-martial death sentence.

What else did I learn from my detective work? You can’t just stop with the research of others—even if it is published.

– Orin Parker