Semi-Wordless Wednesday: Twenty Years

Ruth Elizabeth Pearsol Doyle

March 18, 1918-January 5, 1991

I wrote a bit more last year.

Tombstone Tuesday

Civil War Sergeant Francis Blair Pearsol
B 13 APR 1832
D 17 FEB 1899
Buried at Lobbs Run Cemetery, West Elizabeth, Pennsylvania

Many, many thanks to the Find A Grave user who found this stone for me. I searched the cemetery for it once this February, but was unable to find it before having to flee an incoming snow storm. I hope to get a marker for this stone to note Sgt Pearsol's service for Pennsylvania in the Civil War.

Francis Blair Pearson was my 2nd great grandfather.

Tombstone Tuesday, without the Tombstone

I don't have a photo of my grandmother's tombstone, and really, I don't want one. I can really only connect tombstones with family who passed before I was born.

My grandmother died 19 years ago today, a week before my 11th birthday.

Ruth Elizabeth Pearsol Doyle
b. March 18, 1918
d. January 5, 1991

Rather than a tombstone photo, her is her senior yearbook photo.

And a photo of her the way I remember her (to be added when I scan the photo, sorry).

Wordless Wednesday - Tombstone research with my son

Wordless Wednesday - Father & Son

Civil War Sgt. Francis Blair Pearsol 1832-1899

Abraham Lincoln Pearsol 1857-1916

Doyles on old maps

I realized there are more useful ways I can use the University of Pittsburgh's historic Pittsburg maps. After all the work I did searching for the Doyles in the 1900 Census and confirming that they lived at 1586 Second Avenue, I could probably find them on a map. Now, if only I could determine where 1586 Second Avenue was. I know it is Hazelwood. 22nd Ward. But the maps don't show house numbers. This is going to take some digging...

http://digital.library.pitt.edu/maps/04v01ind.html

Pursels or Pearsols?

Peter Pearsol, my ever-standing brick wall has opened several doors of late. Unfortunately, behind those doors are more questions. Questions proving to be rather difficult.

I was once told a family story that someone in our Pearsol tree had received a land grant from William Penn. I learned last night that these land grants were not from Penn himself but from his descendants. I encountered this page in the University of Pittsburgh archives explaining the disemination of land once owned by the Penns to settlers of Pennsylvania and veterans of the Revolutionary war. The land that was to become Allegheny County was divided up and granted to many. I scanned the list of men who received and and there he was, Peter Pursel. Not Peter Pearsol but Peter Pursel. He acquired land in 1816 in what is now Oakmont.

The man I know as Peter Pearsol, father of Civil War sergent Francis Blair Pearsol appears in the 1830 Federal Census as Peter Pursel. In Jefferson Township/West Elizabeth, along the banks of Peters Creek. Many Pearsols lived along this creek around the turn of the 19th century. It is unlikely that they are unrelated, but I cannot claim it to be true without proof.

My next task is to visit the cemeteries and churches in this region. Lobb's Run Cemetery, Jefferson Methodist Episcopal Cemetery, Lebanon Presbyterian Cemetery, Clairton Cemetery and Round Hill Cemetery. There are probably others but these are the ones I know of. I have to start somewhere.

Were we Pearsols or were we Pursels? What's the difference? I can think of one. Pearsol is an English name. Pursel is an Irish name. Perhaps we aren't who we thought we were...