Blogging As We Go On Benjamin Butler

One individual we've seen in several issues of Casefile Clues is Benjamin Butler. Butler was born about 1819-1820, probably in New York State. Details about him won't be repeated here completely, but he has been located in the 1850, 1870, and 1880 census records and his estate settlement in Missouri has been located.

His estate settlement did not provide any significant information on his heirs. His second wife's obituary (which we haven't mentioned already) provided information on the children he had with her. The child that I believe is my ancestor was probably Benjamin's by his first wife.

We made the case in an earlier issue of Casefile Clues that Benjamin was the father of Ellen Butler Sargent, who married in October of 1870 in Davis County, which is where Benjamin was living in 1870. The case is indirect, but fairly solid.

Research now needs to progress on Benjamin pre-1870. He's been located in 1850 (I'm fairly certain), but not 1860 (his enumerations can be seen here). At present, attempts to locate him in 1860 have been stopped--he's either not enumerated or enumerated in such an odd way that I simply cannot locate him.

Research on Benjamin is being conducted from two main angles:

• trying to locate him in Michigan area records, with the hope that something there will provide more information
• trying to document all his known children with both wives in hopes that something will connect him more concretely to all his children

Compounding the problem is that his daughter Ellen Butler Sargent, my gg-grandmother, cannot be located in any record past the 1880 census.

We'll have brief, "chatty" updates on the blog as events warrant and more detailed updates, with methodology explained more clearly, citations, etc, in a future edition of Casefile Clues. Stay tuned.