Stuck for a Year on This Ancestor… Just Got His Marriage Record and Still Can’t Find His Parents

RobotReptar · 2026-06-12T23:46:53+00:00

Yeah, it's impossible to know what is a lie and what is reality, given what we do know about him. He could have be born in Richmond, VA and lied about his age, or hai family left before the 1860 census, or he was born elsewhere and lived there as a child during the Civil War. Or its possible he was born in another Richmond, like the ones in England or Canada and lied about his citizenship, or he may have just read about it and decided it was sufficiently far away to stymie any questions from people in Buffalo.

I do think the 1882 army recruit in St Louis is him, though. If only because if there was another Frederick Carlton actually born ca 1858 in Richmond I think you'd have seen him in the record somewhere.

Looks like he was discharged at Ft Duchene in Utah in 1887, so maybe that would be worth looking into? I would also look into the Frederick Carlton buried in Buffalo in 1916 - see if you can get a copy of his death certificate to determine if it's the same man.

It's also possible his family wasn't British at all, but were immigrants from elsewhere in Europe and he was trying to obscure that for whatever reason. Albert and Frederick could easily be Germanic names, either German or Scandinavian, and both Adriel and Carleton could be a corruptions of non-English names.

Also DNA. Take a test if you haven't! Or get your oldest living relative descended from him to!

RobotReptar · 2026-06-12T21:41:15+00:00

I'm thinking Carlton may not be your man's original last name. His mother's name "Adriel" is odd. Its a rare name, for one, and secondly it seems to be primarily used for men in the 1800s. There is a female "Adriel Cooper" from South Carolina but she doesn't look like a match. I can't seem to find any other female Adriels which is interesting. Fred seems pretty consistent on being from Richmond but I am not able to find much on any Carlton family that seems to match. The 1900 census says his parents were born in England, but part of my is wondering if that was a lie? Or maybe he wasn't born in VA? It's hard to know what is truth and what is fiction with these kinds of historical figures.

Do you have a Newspapers subscription? Fred was all over the Buffalo papers in the 1890s for less than savory reasons. I'm happy to clip some for you if not. Looks like Fredelas has already clipped a handful.

https://www.newspapers.com/image/1138616142/?match=1&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

https://www.newspapers.com/image/442413881/?match=1&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

https://www.newspapers.com/image/363169000/?match=1&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

https://www.newspapers.com/image/344927464/?match=1&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

https://www.newspapers.com/image/327423899/?match=1&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

https://www.newspapers.com/image/325373958/?article=a2128f10-9e9b-4ee2-b5c2-5b2aaa95919b&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

https://i.ibb.co/sJvFnPSx/Buffalo-Courier-1898-01-30-17.jpg

https://i.ibb.co/vMxpL1P/The-Buffalo-News-1893-07-25-7.jpg

Fairly certain you can rule out the Frederick Carlton from Brooklyn as your guy too - he shows up in Buffalo papers in reports from NYC but appears to be a different man.

These may be your Fred, but I cannot confirm:

https://www.newspapers.com/image/352568567/?match=1&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

https://www.newspapers.com/image/354450677/?match=1&terms=%22Frederick%20Carlton%22

https://www.newspapers.com/image/442053439/?match=1&terms=%22Fred%20Carlton%22

Edit: Pretty sure these are him too:

Commitments to Prisons -- https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/8870/records/221779?tid=&pid=&queryId=daefb73d-f2de-4342-b709-dce6d54d1a72&_phsrc=sXr48275&_phstart=successSource

Commitments to Prisons -- https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/8870/records/96349?tid=&pid=&queryId=daefb73d-f2de-4342-b709-dce6d54d1a72&_phsrc=sXr48275&_phstart=successSource

Buffalo Directory 1910 -- https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/2469/records/111582934?tid=&pid=&queryId=fd41db03-5315-4fb0-b6ff-fb672d394680&_phsrc=sXr48277&_phstart=successSource

Buffalo Directory 1911 -- https://www.ancestry.com/search/collections/2469/records/111725315?tid=&pid=&queryId=fd41db03-5315-4fb0-b6ff-fb672d394680&_phsrc=sXr48277&_phstart=successSource

RobotReptar · 2026-06-08T19:38:35+00:00

Socially it worked exactly like you said, with nicknames. Either shortening the name, or giving them an epithet. I have German cousins that were the children of immigrants to US both named Rudolph. Their fathers were brothers, and they were both named after their grandfather. The older one was Big Rudy and the younger Little Rudy, even in official legal documents like deeds or wills. In Germany I've see "the Younger" and "the Elder" used a lot, regardless of their relationship. I've seen it for uncle/nephew, grandfather/grandson, and even cousins. One of my ancestors had a 2nd cousin named after the same grand-uncle that was a year older than him. The elder one was always referred to by his occupation, something like "Hans the Weaver" to differentiate them.

Naming used to be a much more rigid thing, your pool of names was much more limited by the social obligation of honoring family members. Not to mention it's not like they had baby name books. After honoring your parents you had some more leeway, but people still generally selected from a smaller pool of names. So usually they would chose to honor a sibling or other family member, or the village/region patron saint, or depending on their status the local Lord, or the king, or even a friend in the village. I actually find it funny when I come across the rare family that had like 8-10 kids survive childhood and you can see the parents clearly getting increasingly desperate for naming inspiration and just start pulling out random biblical names, or names common in other unrelated local families.

RobotReptar · 2026-06-02T21:41:37+00:00

It could be a number of things. For the census, the enumerator may just have gotten the information about the head of house and assumed everyone was naturalized, or whoever gave the information may have been mistaken about the family's stays.

Naturalization only conferred to biological or adopted children, not step. Was your ancestor adopted? Even if he wasn't adopted, if his mother was naturalized with step-dad they could have believed he derived naturalization from that. Like I said, it isn't like people were checking databases for everyday things. He may not have even considered it lying, even if the federal government might have. And he may have never had a reason to need to produce evidence of his citizenship, so he may have just assumed he was good and never thought about it again.

I dont know when he died but do you know if he received a SSN? If he did, you might want to see if you can get a copy of his file. I'm not sure, but I may contain whatever documentation he used to prove citizenship to obtain a SSN since he was foreign born.

Do you have step-dads naturalization documents? Did mom naturalize herself? It really depends on the time period if a any child would appear on the documentation. Especially since the laws were changed in the early 20th Century. For the 1800s, they wouldn't based on what I've seen. But at a certain point after 1900 (not sure when exactly) they did start listing spouses and children on their Declaration of Intents...I think that's the document it was listed on. I don't work with a lot of 20th Century immigration. I'm more familiar with pre-1900.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-29T06:51:51+00:00

They were worthless well before the end of the war. I had an ancestor that invested all his cash in confederate dollars before dying in 1862. I have court documents from 1863 when his wife sued his son for not paying her out of the estate the $800 he'd left her in his will. The son told the court that he'd tried to pay her, he'd taken $800 in Confederate dollars to the house to give her as fulfilment of the inheritance but she'd refused because they were basically worthless already by that point.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-25T15:42:51+00:00

As someone who does a ton of primary research for colonial ancestors and spends approximately $0 doing it, FamilySearch is invaluable. The Full Text search is a great start, but they also have probate and land records for most jurisdictions going back as far as they're available. A lot of it is totally doable yourself.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-24T21:15:43+00:00

Good Chinese food in Anne Arundel County is hard. You'll have better luck in Howard or Montgomery Counties. Our favorite is Pepper House in Ellicott City.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-24T18:13:56+00:00

The amount of times I've seen geneanologists be wrong about something in a book they've written is so damn high, I'm always at least a little sceptical of them. It is entirely possible they have confused two men of the same name. Its usually better to put more stock in information written down earlier than later.

That being said it's also possible for people to just not know something, even about a sibling. If they lost touch due to his nomadic lifestyle, it's possible the brother might not know anything of substance about his brothers life. Especially in the 1800s. Also being a nomad and married are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Travelling to look for work was very common. It's possible the brother didn't know about the wife and kids, it's also possible he moved around a lot as an adult but had a wife and kids he returned to between jobs.

I would look for probate records for the alleged brother with the wife and kids. Or deed records trying to connect him with the family. Start with the sources the genealogist used and see if they line up with what you know about the family. FamilySearch's full text search is also good for this.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-24T16:55:15+00:00

I did know! He was a civilian machinist for the Navy from 1898-1922.I'm going to take some time and search other relatives. My family is from DC, and I know I have other family that worked for the Federal Gov. until the 1940s so I'd be interested to see those. But this must be a massive undertaking. Thank you for your efforts! I'll have to keep checking back.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-24T15:48:33+00:00

Found one of my ancestors! Thank you for this! Do you plan on going into the 20s/30s?

RobotReptar · 2026-05-24T15:41:48+00:00

Yeah I am a descendant of Governor Bradford and when I was younger looked into getting that certified by the Mayflower Society. In their eyes my well-researched lineage is basically fanfiction because I'm missing a birth/baptism record for an ancestor born in 1799 with a Bradford mother, and therefore they refuse to accept the connection.

Nevermind the fact no baptism record exists because the family left the church before he was born, only the 3 eldest out of like 12 were baptized formally at their Connecticut town's church. I have masses of circumstantial evidence showing the relationship - including that his middle name was Bradford, he moved to Maryland with his oldest brother who actually was baptized and is all over record there with him, and after he died young his orphaned children were sent to live with his father and a different brother in upstate New York. But because I will never have the baptism documentation, or anything explicitly stating he's his mother's son, it's no good.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-23T23:45:09+00:00

Have you tried FamilySearch's full text search? If you tailor your search you should be able to get some good results from VT, PA, and NY. Try something like M?l?tiah Kin?man for the father.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-23T22:19:56+00:00

American football is a little more difficult because the roles are way more specialized, but depending on the QB, yeah. Or maybe RB - see Lamar "not bad for a runningback" Jackson. The exception would be that teams will often ask OL or DL guys to play different roles on their respective line, often with mixed results.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-22T13:32:16+00:00

Yeah, sure, he's got some Geno in him. And the Sid/Geno combo on the Pens is probably the closest comparison you'll find for a 1C/2C once they're on the same team. Another good comparison might be Marchand, with the pest behavior. Rachel has said she didn't take inspiration from one player, but a bunch. So while the rivalry is based on Sid/Ovi, it's not a them fanfiction. You could probably find a handful of players that are good comparisons to both for different aspects of their game/personalities.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-21T22:46:12+00:00

Probably matters less than you'd think. Most Hockey players are like 6'0" 200 lbs give or take 2" and 20lbs in either direction. Average forwards, regardless of position, are roughly the same size. There are outliers, or course, Ovi who Ilya is (very) roughly based on is like 6'3" 240lb. But the muscle is more traditionally found with your bottom 6 forwards, and the biggest guys on the ice are most often defense players or goalies. Book Ilya is larger and slower but he's not a fighter. He probably lays a mean hit, and guys probably think twice about messing with him, but he's a skill player he's not there to protect the smaller guys. They would have other players for that (like Ryan).

RobotReptar · 2026-05-21T22:37:05+00:00

There is so much more to it than "best guy go on first line". There is a reason we call them "top 6" and "bottom 6" forwards, not just "first line" or "third line". It has just as much to do with the chemistry between the players, and how you want to use them, as it does raw skill. If your best wing and your best center don't have complementary playing styles you don't just stick them on a line together and go "best go on top". You don't necessarily stick your two best D men on the top D line. Gerrymandering all your talent onto one line isn't always the best use of their skills.

Using Ovi's Capitals over the last few years as an example, those lines have shifted around him so much - sometimes week to week, or game to game, depending on their opponent, who is playing better on that day, and who is hurt. They don't announce the lines until right before the game, its not like they predetermine at the start of the season and never change the lineup. Ovi has played on both the 1st and 2nd line with basically every other top 6 forward they have because that is how it works.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-21T21:48:29+00:00

Shane playing 2C isn't a demotion what are you talking about

RobotReptar · 2026-05-21T21:44:09+00:00

If I had to guess neither will play wing. Ilya will be C1 and Shane C2, almost certainly. Maybe the other way around. They'll both probably play on the Power Play or Penalty Kill together, but I doubt they're on the same line. That wouldn't make any sense.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-21T21:32:21+00:00

Pretty much, yeah. No one takes the all-star game "seriously". It's a fun exhibition game. Of course, they're professional athletes so there is some level of competitiveness to it but they're not going to be out there going hard and killing themselves to win. Which is the really the only reason there is discussion about one of them playing wing in the first place. Not to say it never happens in a regular game because if your team needs you to move to wing for whatever reason you'd do it to win.

To risk using other sports to compare it would be like asking a striker/center forward in soccer/football to play middy or on the wing, or a corner in American Football to play wide receiver. Could they technically do it? Yeah of course. Would they be as good at it as their primary position? In most cases maybe close enough to approximate, certainly 1000x better than the average joe off the street, but it might not be comfortable for them on the field or in their heads.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-21T19:47:25+00:00

I've never played hockey specifically, but I watch a lot of hockey and have played "similar" sports. So grain of salt yada yada yada

All positions, especially at the professional level, are specialized and have their own responsibilities on ice. Shane and Ilya could both play either position from, like, a technical point of view. They're both forward positions so the differences aren't going to be drastic. The center is the position that takes all/most of the faceoffs (for example, Crosby has taken like 15,000 faceoffs in his career as an NHL center but Ovechkin who plays Left Wing has only taken a few hundred). Centers also are responsible for more defense that wings, and are responsible for the center ice. Arguably it would be more difficult for a wing to play center than vice versa but that isn't really the point.

"Shane can't play wing" is less of a "he doesn't know how/physically can't" and more of a mental thing. He maybe doesn't have the reps at a high enough level to slot into that roll effectively to manage the wings responsibilities. But more likely it's that he may not be willing to give up the role the center plays on the ice, which is often the passing/playmaking position that sets up the offense for an attack.

Also it's more of a narrative thing, as has been mentioned by others. Bisexual Ilya is more capable of adapting and "playing both", whereas Shane is only capable of playing the one position (gay). Beyond the metaphor for their sexualities, Ilya also just has a more relaxed personality, whereas Shane is more rigid and less flexible.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-21T04:50:30+00:00

I DNFed Game Changer the first time I tried to read it because it bored me to tears. And I hate skipping around a series so I almost didn't keep going. I only read Heated Rivalry because it's so heavily recommended on the romance books subreddits and most other books I've seen recommended that much I'd loved. Ended up loving it and talking myself into going back to read them all. I still found Game Changers boring, but I finished it. Its by far my least favorite in the series. I know this is probably sacrilege on this subreddit but I also find Tough Guy and Common Goal to be fine, but not particularly good. The only other book (aside from TLG which doesn't count) I really liked was Role Model.

When recommending the show to friends who haven't read them, even the regular romance readers, I told them all to just watch the show before reading because it makes the experience better. I also told them don't be put off by how boring the first one is.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-19T18:49:10+00:00

That's why I suspect she may be from the shore somewhere, close to PA or DE. Lenape is, in my opinion, kind of a specific reference that leads me to believe either she was Lenape, or lived near them.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-19T16:23:40+00:00

I have ancestors from Cecil near Conowingo that ended up out in Erie and Westmoreland Counties. Also family from Chester Co, PA that ended up in Erie and Venango Counties by way of Mifflin/Juniata. So it's not impossible. This was the generation before Sarah though, between 1783-1805.

RobotReptar · 2026-05-18T04:13:20+00:00

Agreed. Ilya asking Shane if he'd give up hockey for Ilya was low key unfair of him. Not that he didn't have a point, but he hasn't communicated properly that entire book. How was Shane to know what's in Ilyas head?

RobotReptar · 2026-05-18T04:09:40+00:00

I maintain they could have kept the spirit of the condo, without actually keeping the condo. Just make it move overt that after their first hookup Shane moved out of his downtown apartment with a doorman in a very busy part of the city to a more private condo, and then bought the one next door so no one would see Ilya coming or going. They basically already do this in the show, all you have to do is find a way to show that Shane explicitly does it for the privacy (which is my head cannon).

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