Thursday, September 20, 2012

A Discrepancy of Dates of Thomas Putman’s Death

Thomas A Putman, privately held by Diana Fancher, Toronto, Canada.

Every summer I send off for several death certificates from the State of Arkansas. I started with my great-grandparents, then my 2nd great-grandparents, and now I have moved up to my 3rd great-grandparents as many of them didn’t die until after the time from which the State of Arkansas started requiring death certificates be filed. This summer, I ordered the death certificates of my 2nd great-grandmother Rosalie Putman Lasiter and her parents, Thomas Adolphus Putman and Martha Ann Ward Putman.

Thomas Adolphus Putnam's Death Certificate, obtained by Ginger R. Smith, from the Arkansas Department of Health, Vital Records Section, Little Rock, Arkansas, 27 August 2012

I saw some interesting information on the death certificate of my 3rd great-grandfather, Thomas Adolphus Putman who died in 1918. His headstone lists his date of death as 21 November 1918. His obituary, which was published in the Southwest American newspaper in Fort Smith, Arkansas on 22 November 1918, says he also died 21 November 1918.
Here is a snippet of his obituary from the Southwest American newspaper (Fort Smith, Arkansas), 22 November, 1918, copied from microfilm at the Fort Smith Public Library.


However, Thomas Adolphus Putman’s  death certificate lists his date of death as 27 November 1918, a whole six days later than what the obituary said! Normally I would just write this off as a mistake or with the rationale that he died on the 21st, but his family waited a week before filing the death certificate on the 27th. This was often the case for families who lived in rural areas.
A physician testified that he had attended to Thomas from the 26th of November to the 27th of November when he last saw him alive. Death occurred at 8 pm. Although this information was filled in on the death certificate, no physician actually signed it. The cause of death was “paralysis” which usually meant he had a stroke, probably due to old age.




I’ve never really fretted over this next item that much because it’s pretty common to reside in one area and die in another, especially while visiting family or friends or working someplace else. But something about it just isn’t sitting well with me. Thomas Putman lived on Park Avenue in Fort Smith, Sebastian County, Arkansas when he died (see obituary). In fact, this land (he had 220 acres at the time) remained in the family up until the 60s or 70s I believe. And my great-grandmother, Louise Lasiter, lived down the street from this tract of land. Thomas’ death certificate says he died in Bloomer, Arkansas which is not too far from Fort Smith, just outside the city limits, about 20 miles away.  At that time, Fort Smith had about 30,000 people and Bloomer (population less than 1000 today) had maybe 20 families, if that, living there. So I’m not sure what Thomas would have been doing in Bloomer when his wife and children were living in Fort Smith. And I certainly don’t think there would have been any hospitals or doctors around in Bloomer, he would have gone back to Fort Smith to seek medical attention unless the town doctor came to the house he was staying in in Bloomer and tended to him there.
Other red flags about this death certificate include the name of Thomas’ father. My genealogy paper trail has Thomas’ father as Berry Barton Putman from Georgia. This is backed up with census reports listing a son by the name of Adolphus in Berry’s household. His death certificate says his father was William Putnam, also from Georgia.


The informant was also someone unknown to the family. It was a woman by the name of Georgia Card. I have not started looking for her yet. Thomas and Martha Putman had 4 daughters. One daughter named Rosalie, married James Lasiter and they had one son. Rosalie lived with her parents off and on when her son was young and they eventually moved a block down the road from Thomas and Martha. The oldest daughter, Nona Putman, never married and she lived in the home with Thomas and Martha until they died. Another daughter Annie married Aubrey Rhyne and they lived in the house after Thomas’ death with her mother Martha for a while and then I believe they eventually built a house on the same block. The youngest daughter, Pearl married Mr. Edward Fancher and they too remained on the block and eventually took ownership of the house and land where they stayed until the 70s when they sold the land. I guess if he really did die in Bloomer, maybe while visiting some family, then this Georgia Card might have been a distant relative.
Another discrepancy between the obituary and the death certificate lies within Thomas’ date of birth. His obituary says he was 73 years old when he died which would put his date of birth in 1845. His death certificate says he was 80 years old which would put his date of birth around 1838. The genealogy paper trail I have on him has his date of birth as April 26 1845 (headstone and county history book). The birth year of 1845 is supported by both the census reports with him living in the household of his father Berry Barton Putman and living as an adult.
When I presented these discrepancies on my Facebook page I got some feedback from fellow genealogist Michele Simmons Lewis of the Ask A Genealogist Blog who suggested that since the death certificate was not signed by the physician (and a date of removal/ burial was also not provided) that maybe the form was filled out by the physician’s assistant and he made the mistake on the date of death. So far, even with the obituary, headstone, death certificate, death index and census reports, it looks as if I need more evidence to confidently conclude that 1) the Thomas A Putman of the obituary of 22 November 1918 is the same man as the Thomas Adolphus Putnam of the death certificate of 27 Nov 1918 and 2) my 3rd great-grandfather Thomas Adolphus Putman died on the 21st of November 1918. It also looks as if I need to find out who this informant, Georgia Card is before I go any further. 
Here is the matrix I created to keep track of the information I gathered and where it came from. I can use it to get a glance of what sources had what information.

If you have any suggestions about the data I have presented here, please do not hesitate to leave a comment below or email me at ginger.reney [at] gmail.com. Also, please check back often for updates to this post. I intend to follow up on who this Georgia Card was and why Thomas was in Bloomer when he died. I also need to find out if Thomas still owned the farm in Bloomer and if so, was he in Bloomer to check up on it or was he visiting relatives? When I looked back at my genie software to see where his siblings might have settled, I realized that I did not have any information on them. It would be prudent of me to track their whereabouts as well to see if any of them stayed behind in Bloomer or were maybe tending to Thomas' farm in his absence. 

Thursday, September 6, 2012

The North Carolina State Archives offers new Correspondence Portal

I just received the following news from the North Carolina State Archives' online blog History For All the People:


Online Correspondence is here!  The State Archives of North Carolina is excited to announce a new web portal for correspondence.  Online Correspondence will allow persons residing outside of North Carolina to request a search for a record and pay the search and handling fee using the Online Correspondence portal.  Persons residing outside of North Carolina will still have the option of sending a check, a money order or credit card information through the USPS but the Online Correspondence portal will give the additional option of paying electronically.

http://correspondence.archives.ncdcr.gov

But wait – there’s more!

The Online Correspondence portal will also have a feature that will allow residents and non-residents to pay their invoice electronically too!  Researchers will receive an invoice with instructions on how to find and use the online payment option.

http://correspondence.archives.ncdcr.gov/invoice.asp

And that’s not all!

North Carolina residents will now find a new option on the North Carolina online request form.  North Carolina residents can now opt-in to receive an electronic invoice.  If the researcher selects the electronic invoice option they will receive the invoice via email instead of a paper copy sent by USPS.  This service should save time for the customer and reduce operational costs for the Archives!

http://req.archives.ncdcr.gov/

We hope these new features will help us serve you faster and more efficiently.  Try them out and give us your feedback!

I personally have not yet used the website to request materials but I am excited by this new feature to pay for our materials online. I think it will streamline the process and free up the Archives staff for other things, like, oh, say, fulfilling our requests! 

If you are out of State you can check out the new Online Correspondence Portal. This website has records broken down into seventeen categories, including the following:

  • Civil War
  • Deed Books
  • Land Grants
  • World War I
  • Selective Service
  • Cemetery Records
  • Bible Records
  • Private Collections
  • Court Minutes
  • Death Certificate
  • Estate Records
  • Maps
  • Marriage Bonds
  • Marriage Licenses
  • Revolutionary War
  • War of 1812
  • Will Records

When you find the record type you want to order, you can fill in the form with your ancestor's name, county, and any other pertinent information you think will help the Archivist find the record. All search fees start at $20.00 for Out of State residents. All requests can then be added to your cart.

If you are a North Carolina State Resident, you can use the standard records request by email form posted here. The form does not specify what the charge is to North Carolina Residents. My guess is the charge is accrued for copies only. It is on my "To-Do" list to try this out sometime.

What about you? Have you ever requested materials from the North Carolina State Archives online? If so, please tell us about it in the comments below.


The quoted portion of this post was reprinted from the following source:

Christopher Meeks, "New Services Available for Correspondence Requests," History For All the People, 6 September 2012, (http://ncarchives.wordpress.com/2012/09/06/new-services-available-for-correspondence-requests/ : accessed 6 September 2012).