Following a Wells Family Tombstone Trail in Genesee County, New York
One of the realities of genealogy is that not every discovery leads to your own family.
Sometimes the real value lies in following the clue far enough to determine that it belongs to someone else.
This week’s Monday’s Diggings began with a search for WELLS family records in Genesee County, New York. Since my Wells family spent time in New York before migrating west, I’m always interested in records that mention the surname.
That search led me to Tombstone Inscriptions from the Abandoned Cemeteries and Farm Burials of Genesee County, compiled by LaVerne C. Cooley in 1952 and available digitally through the FamilySearch Digital Library.
A quick check of the surname index revealed several Wells entries.
Transit Road Cemetery
The first Wells entries were found in the Transit Road Cemetery:
- Ebenezer Wells, died 3 September 1852, aged 69 years
- Rachael Wells, wife of E. Wells, died 6 January 1832, aged 50 years
- Seymour Wells, died 28 October 1860, aged 47 years
- Harriet S. Wells, wife of Seymour Wells, died 4 October 1878, aged 59 years
- Ellen E. Wells, daughter of Seymour and Harriet Wells, died 24 February 1848, aged 5 years
At first glance, this looked like a likely family group. The names and relationships suggested a straightforward cluster:
Ebenezer Wells and wife Rachel
their son Seymour Wells
his wife Harriet
and daughter Ellen
But was this my Wells family?
Testing the Hypothesis
Rather than speculate, I turned to FamilySearch.
There I found Ebenezer Wells (FamilySearch ID: LYPZ-6BG), whose family aligns closely with the Transit Road Cemetery entries.
The FamilySearch tree identifies:
- Ebenezer Wells
- wife Rachel Seymour Wells
- son Seymour Wells
- Seymour’s wife Harriet Shelden
- daughter Ellen E. Wells
The tombstone transcription and FamilySearch tree align remarkably well. The death dates for Ebenezer, Rachel, Seymour, and Harriet match the tombstone book.
The only discrepancy is Ellen, whose death date is given differently in FamilySearch.
That was enough to establish that these individuals represent a documented Wells family—but not mine.
A Second Wells Entry
Another Wells entry appeared in the Brick House Cemetery:
- Freddie Wells, son of F. H. and S. A. Wells, died 2 September 1864, aged 3 years, 11 months, 22 days
This appears to be an entirely separate Wells family.
Why This Still Matters
It would be easy to dismiss this as a dead end.
But negative findings are part of genealogy, too.
The surname alone made these entries worth exploring. A few minutes of follow-up research helped place the people in an identified family and kept me from incorrectly attaching them to my own Wells line.
That’s productive digging.
Sometimes Monday’s Diggings uncovers an exciting breakthrough.
Sometimes it helps eliminate a possibility.
Both move the research forward.