Retreating and Deleting . . . .

This week, I worked with the ancestry branch that led back to Ezekiel Gile, the subject of last week's post. I intended to find more data that would better document the people, places, and dates on that line. My hope was that I would have a well-documented line of descent from Ezekiel Gile to my generation that I could submit to Sons of the American Revolution or Daughters of the American Revolution. The trouble started when I reached Jacob Gile of Ohio.

My research indicated his birthplace as Ohio. But his parents (Rev. Samuel and Mary Gile), were lifetime New Englanders, living in New Hampshire and Massachusetts all of their lives. Problem. A Google search of Samuel Gile confirmed his parentage, but also indicated that his children died young and never had children of their own (American Quarterly Register, Volume 10, No. 3, pp.217-219). I'd followed the wrong Jacob Gile. I ended up deleting about 100 people, mostly descendants of our noble soldier Ezekiel Gile.

The correct Jacob Gile's ancestry is less than clear. There is good documentation placing him in Ohio, Indiana, and Iowa, but his parentage is iffy. He may be the offspring of Johann Christoff and Nancy GEIL. Johann is from Germany, Nancy from Kentucky; but this information is poorly supported.

No Revolutionary War vet, no copious New England records . . . none of that applies to this tree right now. Learned a lot, though, found a lot of new sources for future reference, learned of the importance of data testing, and have yet another new direction.

6X Great-Grandfather Ezekiel Gile, Revolutionary War Veteran . . .

Earlier this winter, I discovered an ancestor who was a veteran of the Revolutionary War. Meet Ezekiel Gile (1743-1827) of Rockingham, New Hampshire, my sixth generation great-grandfather. I've only just begun research, but thus far it looks as if he served from 1775 to 1778 and was promoted multiple times, finishing the war as a Captain.

Ezekiel Gile's Revolutionary War Record.

I've since learned that he was father to at least seven children with his first wife Gertrude (nee' Davis). She died in 1817, and he married Hannah Pecker sometime thereafter. Perhaps more importantly, I've learned the name of his parents, Daniel and Joanna Gile (nee' Heath).

Needless to say, this was an exciting discovery. For most of my life, I've known only my maternal ancestry, and most of them migrated to the US well after the Civil War. They are relatively new to the US. With this discovery, I can now confirm that at least one branch of my paternal line has been on US soil since 1697.

The data documenting this discovery is solid and came directly from the hint leaves of Ancestry.com. Using New Hampshire Birth Records, Massachussetts Town and Vital Records, and US Sons of the American Revolution Membership Applications documented the ancestor line between Ezekiel and myself, and allowed me to add another 100 people to my tree, many of these are third and fourth cousins. Credit goes to the colonists of New Hampshire for their crack record keeping and preservation. Well done . . . .

Moving forward, I'll look to identify Ezekiel's siblings, further document his ancestry and descendants, and learn more about having the ancestry line between myself and him documented by the Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR). Initial research shows that numerous ancestors are documented through Ezekiel's children, Ruth, David, Rachel, Richard, Tamar, and True. None, however, are documented through his son Samuel, from whom I am descended. Plenty more to research and plenty more to learn.