I have often felt drawn to my mother-in-law’s family.  Because I had hit a bit of a wall on the line I was working on I decided to look at the descendency view of the family tree and see if I could find a different line to explore.  The one I settled on was a bit tangled.  For example, two women were born on the same day, in the same town, to the same parents; however, they were married to different people with different children.  

Obviously there was an error in the records I had found.  As I tried to untangle things, I admit that I made more than one mistake. Sometimes it felt like I created a bigger problem than the one I started with! However, I persisted in my research, which led me to conclude that that our ancestor (Nathaniel) had two wives. I believed that his first wife, named Mary, had died and he had remarried another woman whose name was also Mary.

Through record hints on Family Search, I was able to find the first Mary and one child.  I was then able to find three more children.  Two of them had died just days apart.  This record hint had listed many deaths over several years in the town where this family lived.   I felt good about the information I had found and put my work away. 

Later that evening a thought came into my mind.  If the children were mentioned in this record hint perhaps their mother was also.  As I opened up the record hint and scrolled through it, I found Mary and her two children all listed, one beneath the other; something I had not noticed before.  Mary died less than a month after her children.  I wept as I thought of this poor family and their great loss.

 I am so excited for the temples to reopen so that this little family can be sealed.  Along with the blessings for this family, it is a great personal blessing for me.  I had been wondering about my limited part in the gathering of Israel, but in His tender mercy the Lord showed me that He was aware of my desires and guided my thoughts and actions.

Jacque Fryer – Scheduling, Granite Family History Center