Elias Converse Descendants
A work in progress

One recent change to the site is the addition of the ancestry and some descendants of George W. Converse of Amboy Township, Hillsdale County, Michigan and his descendants. Several of us thought for some time that he was the son of Elias and Sarah (Barrows) Converse, and did considerable research on his descendants. Since his family had close ties with the decendants of Royal and Phebe (Jollly) Converse, it seems appropriate to add the results of our data gathering.

Other changes include 1) substantial additions to the descendants of Nehemiah and Lucy Converse, the results of census searches by Lou Randall; 2) the addition of some Oakland County records for Nehemiah Bunyea and his family; 3).the addition of the ancestry of Sarah (Sally) Barrows, wife of Elias Converse; 4) the addition of the lineages of Betty Converse Hayward and Jim Campbell, both descendants of Royal and Phebe (Jolly) Converse. Both Betty and Jim made contact with Karl as a result of his web pages on Ancestry.com and Genealogy.com.

The descendants of Elias Converse listed on this site represent the research results of several dedicated Converse family researchers, distant cousins, many of whom have met each other only over the Internet.By and large, the descendants of Royal N. Converse and his wife, Phoebe Jolly, result from the efforts of John Eldrige and Karl Hillig, Many the descendants of Lucy Converse and her husband, Nehemiah Bunyea, are the result of research by David Mudge. Lou Randall has made substantial additions to this work. The descendants of Elias Converse and his wives, Anna Fredenburg and Harriet Fields are the combined work of Jane Converse Blanchard, Lou Randall and Hal Whitmore. Most of the scant records of the descendants of Sally Converse and George Vredenburg are the result of research on the Vredenburg family by Larry Vredenburg, with additions by Lou Randall and Sue Johnpeter. The starting point for the descendants of the other siblings was a handwritten chart prepared by Frank Converse in the 1930's which was among Lou's papers, and we have extended and confirmed this from census data and Internet research.

I am gradually verifying births, deaths, marriages, etc. taken from C. A. Allen's Converse genealogy from the orginal records, where this is possible.All the records from Bridport, VT and Thompson, CT. have been checked and visits to cemteries in New York state have verified the online cemetery databases. The Massachusetts data has been verified from the pricipal secondary sources and I'll see what original data still exists this spring and verify the records from Killingsly, CT. These early records from the1600's, 1700's and early 1800's serve to emphasize the almost complete lack of such vital records in New York State and Michigan from 1800 to 1850. This makes the family documents such as the 1892 manuscript that Don Armstrong's mother has and the photocopy of the Converse bible records which Jane Ann Blanchard has (original still not located) especially valuable.Hang on to these, folks, and copy them. They may be the only documentation that exists.

The starting point for almost any effort in tracing the Converse family is the two volume genealogy The Converse Family and Allied Families,compiled by Charles Allen Converse in 1905. (This carries our branch of the family only through the birth of Elias Converse and the births of his children.) The complete text of this genealogy, and transcripts of vital records from Bridport, VT and Thompson and Killingly CT, can be found on Mary Ann Kaynor's Converse Connections web pages.

Please email corrections and/or additions to Hal Whitmore
Compiler: Hal Whitmore

This page was created by John Cardinal's Second Site v1.4.7. Site updated on 3 Feb 2004 at 3:08:22 PM from BASIC; 1249 people