Hi Cousins, For those of you who have had enough of Joe Will Dougherty, just delete this message. For some, it may be old news, but for me, I think I have finally figured out why this was such a tangled mess. It all started with the Howard County Cemetery Book. The New Hope Cemetery, pg 439 shows the following two names on the same headstone: Joe Will b 1-5-1882 d 9-22-1908 "Gone but not forgotten" Daisy b 11-21-1884 d 6-2-1897 w Joe Will "Beloved in life, lamented in death" We had already debunked Daisy as being the wife of Joe Will with the following obituary: >From "The Higbee News" dated 4 June 1897--Died, near Myres, on the 2nd, Daisy, the 12-year-old daughter of Robert Dougherty. Since Daisy died in 1897, at the age of 12, she never showed up on any census records. The question was, why was Daisy, the 12 year old daughter of Robert Dougherty, on the same headstone with Joe Will Dougherty, the son of John David Dougherty? The answer is.....she isn't. It's a double stone all right, but on very close examination of the photograph of the headstone, with a magnifying glass, it reveals that the stone DOES NOT SAY JOE WILL. It simply says, J. W. Dougherty. J. W. Dougherty is James W. Dougherty, Daisy's brother, who is shown to have been born in January of 1882 on the 1900 census records. This matches the birth date given on the headstone. Now as to the death date. The following notice was in the Higbee News: >From "The Higbee News" dated 25 Sep 1908--Robert Dougherty of near Myers received a message from Topeka, Kas, Tuesday informing him of the dangerous illness of his son, Richard. Mr. Dougherty left on the first train and in a few hours a second message came saying that the young man was dead. We have not been able to learn the cause of his death. Young Dougherty enlisted in the army a year or more ago, and the news of his sickness and death, we learn, is the first his parents had heard from him. The editor of the paper, gave the name of the son as Richard. There is no evidence that a "Richard" ever existed as a son of Robert Dougherty. However, the death date of the headstone for J. W. Dougherty, does coincide with the death of the son of Robert in the above mentioned article. In short, the editor screwed up the kid's name! The notice above is actually the death notice for James W. Dougherty, the son of Robert, and the same man buried on the double headstone with his sister, Daisy. It makes sense that if he were single, he could have been buried beside his sister and the cost of another headstone could be saved, by simply engraving his information on her stone. Of course, the way to prove this, would be to send off for the death certificate from the state of Kansas for James W. Dougherty, or to contact the Department of the Army for his service record. Either would prove his date of death, and put, once and for all, this question of Joe Will being buried at New Hope, to rest. So at this point, I still have Joe Will, born about 1875, and vanishing off the face of the earth. Even his own siblings didn't know if he was alive or dead in 1922..............From "the Higbee News" Friday, 18 Aug 1922, Vol 36, No 18--ORDER OF PUBLICATION--Amanda J. Dougherty, James A. Dougherty, Annie Stetson, Arthur Dougherty, Rosie Fuller, Charlie Dougherty, Pearl McMullen, John C. Dougherty, Elizabeth Gardner and Hawkins Dougherty---Plaintiffs, vs. Joseph Dougherty, if living, and if not living, the unknown heirs, devisees, of Joseph Dougherty, deceased---Defendants. To those of you who own the Howard County Cemetery Book, by Boggs and Coutts, you might want to make the correction on pg. 439, and perhaps stop others who might read the book later from making this error go on forever. It was a simple mistake, and one that would be easy for anyone to make, but boy, did it send me on endless hours of research and frustration trying to put the pieces together. Kathy Bowlin