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Archiver > GENEALOGY-DNA > 2011-03 > 1300419515


From: "Diana Gale Matthiesen" <>
Subject: Re: [DNA] NPE rate
Date: Thu, 17 Mar 2011 23:38:35 -0400
References: <554.46446.qm@web39605.mail.mud.yahoo.com> <1D105552-A06E-45AA-B090-393837358E99@gmail.com> <7F0DC31C-230E-424C-8DAE-622CCDB88613@verizon.net> <D9B04ECA-77F0-4625-BD27-4EAD1C9D6139@gmail.com><201103180226.p2I2Qi2F019210@mail.rootsweb.com>
In-Reply-To: <201103180226.p2I2Qi2F019210@mail.rootsweb.com>


IMO, stepchildren are not NPEs. Certainly, they're not GNPEs. Good
paper genealogy will uncover them, for example, when children born
before the couple's marriage date appear in the census with the
husband's surname. They were either his children from a prior
marriage or hers, so the genealogist is alerted to search for the
prior marriage and census records. Back then, stepchildren often
changed their surname back to their biological name when they came of
age. Nowadays, stepchildren who've adopted their stepfather's surname
are unlikely to revert to their biological name because of the legal
hassle entailed in a name change.

Diana

> From: Marianne Granoff
> Sent: Thursday, March 17, 2011 10:27 PM
>
> Most of the NPEs I have found doing traditional genealogy result
> from
> an older man dying and leaving his second or third wife and her very
> young child/children without the means to survive. The wife
> remarries quickly (often to someone older who is also a widower) and
> the first husband's very young child/children take on the second
> husband's surname.
<snip>

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