Researching your ancestors with the Daughters of the American Revolution

By Susan Doak

SW Nebraska Genealogy Society

McCOOK, Nebraska -- There are two organizations, the Sons and/or Daughters of the American Revolution, whose membership consists entirely of direct descendants of Revolutionary soldiers. Becoming a member requires tracing your ancestors back to prove the lineage. Although that sounds difficult, in this day and age most of the genealogy work necessary has been done for you; you just have to be able to find it!

When I checked the SAR site, it did not appear to be as open to public searches as the DAR site so I will deal solely with: www.dar.org . One note, if you have a father or grandfather that belonged to the SAR and you have his membership number, you may be able to access records from their site.

The DAR website offers a lot of information to the public on descendants even if you have no knowledge of anyone having been a member of their organization. My mother, Rhoby (Davison) Coady, could become a member either through her maternal grandmother, Jessie Fremont (Hurd) Goding or her maternal grandfather, Rufus Goding but I was unaware of that fact until I visited the DAR site.

Once you access the website, choose the Genealogy tab. For a site search of a surname, select Genealogy Online, DAR Genealogical Research Systems and then select Descendants Database Search. This will pull up a page that has a fill in the blanks area. To get the broadest results, put your ancestors surname in the Last Name box. Leave the rest of the boxes empty until you get down to the Group By box. Select that box and change it to: No Grouping. The final request is how you want the results sorted. I select: Sort by Husband's Last Name.

Once entered, this will pull up a list of all descendants registered with the DAR for that last name. The husband's or member's surname will be displayed alphabetically on the left. Remember, the website will automatically include all known spellings of the surname you selected so don't be surprised to find, as an example, that Goding is derived from Gooding or Hurd from Heard. Scroll through the names until you find one of your ancestors. Look to the right side of the page and write down the Member number and the Ancestor number associated with that name. Click on the square icon on left next to their name and the site will pull up the entire list of your direct relatives that lead to your Revolutionary War participant. Each generation will have birth, death, and marriage dates. In addition, at the bottom of that page, the Sailor or Soldier service record will be listed in detail.

Don't be discouraged. Try every surname you have for your family following both your father and mother's line, including maiden names for grandparents, great-grandparents, etc. Resort to aunts, uncles, or cousins only if you have a good handle on what constitutes your direct descendant otherwise, hours of research may have no value to you. Even if you know, as I do, that one family line did not immigrate to the USA until after the Revolutionary war, don't forget that one of their wives or husbands may be the relative that leads to your ties to our first patriots.

To cross reference your results, go back to the DAR Genealogical Research Systems page, and enter both the Ancestor# and Member# that you jotted down in the appropriate boxes and take a look at the additional information. For a fee, some records can be ordered online. Happy hunting!