Brumley Family Branches

My Brick Walls in Genealogy have always haunted me for decades. I searched for answers to fill in the missing gaps about family members I am directly or indirectly related to. These are the people you always hope someday there will be a “break in a very cold case”. You do your work and connect people, places, and things together the best way you can hoping that someone will write you an email asking a question about one of your brick walls. Since 1983 I have been looking into some of my people, so it is time to visit these escapees again!

My second great-grandfather Willis Brumley (1824-1899) was married to four women. I have been looking for decades for information and burial sites on all four of them. His first wife was Mary (Polly) Johns (1826-1861). They were married on February 25, 1844, in Gasconade County, Missouri. They had four children, William (Bill) (1847-1917), Nancy Ann (Aunt Coon) (1850-1935), Amanda Elizabeth (Mandy) (1855-1919), and John Brumley (1860-1941). Going by the last child born and his next marriage I have determined that Mary died about 1861. I do not know her death date or where she is buried. Willis and Mary lived around Mount Sterling, Missouri. A brick wall since 1983.

Willis married a second time to Sarah Jane Shockley on June 12, 1864, Gasconade County, Missouri. As far as I can tell there were no children born to this union. I know nothing about her except her name and marriage date. My brick wall since 1983.

Willis married for the third time to Nancy J Vaughn on September 26, 1868, in Osage County, Missouri. She had been married before to Charles P Lowery (1831-1863) and Elias Lewis (1845-?). It wasn’t until the U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index was published that I discovered that she was the mother of my great grandfather (Isaack Walter Brumley 1875-1940) was born in Nebraska. Willis, I believe, was working on the railroad at the time and she may have gone with him to Nebraska and died there, I have no proof of this fact. They also had a daughter Alice Florence Brumley (1869-1938), she was born in Missouri. I have no burial site or date and since she is my biological second great grandmother, I would love to learn more information on her, another brick wall.

Willis married for the fourth time on February 22, 1874, in Osage County, Missouri to Delana Foster Harris. As far as my research has taken me, I have found no children born to this union. They both were getting on in years. She had been married before to Charles Harris and a Emmitt person. She had at least one son by Emmitt because he is listed on the 1880 Missouri Census as James F Emmitt’s stepson to Willis. I would be interested in learning who these ladies were and their whereabouts as to their final resting place.

There have been many other missing puzzle pieces in my genealogy, but I have learned if one is patient enough something will be discovered. I have received emails from others looking into the same family that has completed the line or questions we both have had over the years.

I have taken trips to meet with relatives over the years that helped me piece together a relative I never knew existed. There are numerous ways to research your brick wall and to gather all your information. I have been incredibly lucky to find some people and then struggle to find others over the decades. I must remind myself of the one reason I got involved with family genealogy in the first place. It was a picture in my grandparents’ belongings after their deaths that my mother did not recognize as a relative.

Questions in family genealogy happen every day. Someone is always wondering what happened to a relative that just seemed to vanish. Most people give up the fight to look for them in the initial stages of family genealogy. It is the one person who always wants to know more that will be the one to unlock the vault of someone’s life story. I say don’t give up no matter how long it takes. It will become a wonderful journey filled with highs and lows, but you will be able to step back in time and walk in their shoes to discover what their life was about and how they lived through it. You will also become the person that when someone asks about a relative, you will automatically be referred to the family genealogy person in your family. Now get out there and start digging!