This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: Roberts, Burlison, Penick, Smith Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/RgB.2ACE/260.1.1.1.1 Message Board Post: Thank you for your kind reply. I would hypothesize that the "guilty party" would have to be William or William, or Josiah. Naming conventions of the time would lead me to believe an increased possibility that it was one of the William's, since Mary's oldest son, born 1829, was named William, possibly after his father. Pure supposition at this point though. The men named above are the ones who were absent from the 1840 census, yet present in the 1830 census and continued absent through the 1850 census. As Mary was shown as a widow (head of household) in the 1850 census this would support my theory. I would dearly love to find some proof of familial association with one of these for Gale and William, Mary's sons. Gale perhaps had such a relationship (perhaps cousin) with Joel R. Roberts, as Gale's wife Octavia and their children were in Joel's household in Sweetwater, Tennessee during the War of Northern Aggression. They then are reunited after the War and again live in their ! own household. I am sure that somewhere out there, one of the kind persons in this forum has the key to break the code. Thanks again for your hard work! Sincerely, Charles