Dear HC: Thank you for correcting my obvious error, Cass County (formerly Van Buren County) Missouri! It's good to have a proof reader. While in Salt Lake City, our guest speaker, John Kitzmiller, reviewed some important genealogy basics. One interesting point he made was to look for naming patterns. He suggesting drawing quick "drop-down" charts and then circling names that are the same. I tried it and was surprised to find an obvious pattern between your Creed ancestor and my Fulton family. A "drop-down" chart is simply a quick sketch of the family tree. Something like this... _________Father/Mother__________ | | | | | | | | Child1 Child2 Child3 Child4 and so forth. Here's what I found when I tried it. I can't really draw it here -- Arthur and Naomi (Jones) Fulton were the parents of 12 children. I found an interesting link between Child #1 and Child #7. Child #1, Nancy Fulton, married Thornton Jefferson Creed in 1822. Child #7, Darthulla Fulton, married her cousin Raleigh Jefferson Fulton in 1836. (Raleigh is the son of Arthur's brother, William Fulton.) Raleigh and Darthulla named their first (and only) child, Jefferson Creed Fulton. I suspect that Nancy and Darthulla were very close and that this baby boy was named in honor of Thornton Jefferson Creed. So tell me, what can you tell me about the Creed family? I'm particularly interested in any descendants who were living in Barry County, Missouri, in 1860. My gr-gr-grandfather enlisted in the Missouri State Guard at Barry County and I'm trying to figure out how he came to be in that area at that particular time. Patrice (Fulton) Stark Lone Tree, Colorado