We all know that the last place you look is going to uncover precisely what you’re searching for whether it’s your house key, sunglasses or a record. It feels like I’ve been searching for some elusive information about my grandfather’s brother Abraham for decades. I don’t think it’s been that long, but it has taken years to identify his journeys from Europe to the U.S. and back, and repeating that cycle. Information on his documentation contradicts itself.

He was anywhere from 5’5″ tall to 5’11. His hair was blond or brown. His eyes were brown or gray or blue. Thankfully he seems to have told the truth about his parents’ names and his birthplace, at least on most documents I’ve found. Today I found the exception.

Abraham’s naturalization record gave his birthdate and the names and birthdates of his children. I verified his birthdate when I found his birth record in European archives. I knew where the family lived in Europe – my grandfather was born there, and he arrived in the U.S. in the 20th century. His mother, my great-grandmother, arrived a few years later.

Abraham’s oldest son was born in 1909 in New York, his next child was born in Europe and the youngest of these three was born in N.Y. New York City birth records are privacy protected for 100 years, but the city’s health department has yet to release any records after 1909 for public access. Abraham’s youngest son’s birth record was relatively easy to find – there was only one person by that name born on that date. However, Abraham’s first name, and his wife maiden surname were different than I expected them to be. The clue though was that Abraham’s birthplace was as I expected it to be.

For a long time I thought Abraham and his wife married in Europe. Then I found her arrival in NY with her parents. I never did find their marriage record in the U.S. but it left me wondering when he first arrived. Today I found that arrival record, with odd information that I needed to research in order to believe it was the correct record.

There were two arrival manifests – on one Abraham’s name was crossed out, telling me that he wasn’t on that sailing. The information about Abraham on the two manifests, for ships that left Hamburg only 5 days apart was identical except on the ship he didn’t take, it said he was a student, on the ship he sailed on it said he was a dealer. The place of birth and his last residence were different from what I knew, but they were only about 10 miles away. Because he sailed in 1907, his closest relative in Europe was named as was his destination, a brother named David living in New York. Both names were the same as the names of two of Abraham’s brothers. That added to the confusion. Abraham’s parents were still living, why did he name a brother as his closest relative in Europe and why did he name a town I’d never heard of. I think it’s possible that he and his brother may have been living and working for a short time in a nearby town. The question I was left with had to do with his destination and the address at which David NY was living. I had many documents for David, but with the exception of his 1905 arrival, I didn’t have any other documents earlier than the New York State 1915 census. I went back to that 1905 arrival and discovered that the address David listed as his destination was the same address to which Abraham was headed and identified the person at that address as a brother-in-law. That really confused me – all the sisters who married had had their spouses identified and there was no one I knew by that name.

Using the Steve Morse one-step tools I located the AD-ED for the New York census and went to work to see who was living at that address. There were 24 households in the building. Most of the dwellings had many children and boarders living with them. I’m glad I was looking through the list slowly – I would have missed it. I found David, my 1905 immigrant, living with the person he listed whose name was Americanized. In that household was also David’s future wife.

I know I keep saying to review records again and again. There is a reason behind that.