Adopted War Babe - Part 7

     After I got the rejection letters, I let things lie for a bit.  I was pretty discouraged.  My angel, Annita, told me about then, that she thought she had done all she could and that I should maybe get a couple of extra Ancestry tests to keep in case I might find someone who seemed to be the child of one of the suspected men, or at least a close relative of someone I suspected. She again told me that she was almost positive that I needed to look at those two families and all the kids and their kids and their kids.
    So, I started writing things down.  You see, I hadn't really written anything down, maybe a few names here and there, certainly the names of the two families she was so sure about. I had been watching (binge watching) the shows Long Lost Family, Long Lost Loves, and also Finding Your Roots. I had previously watched Who Do You Think You Are? even before I decided to pursue my genealogy. I had seen one of the genealogists take each name and put them on a blue or pink sticky note and attach them to a large wall so as to be able to move them around. I liked that.  Most all of the shows were wonderful, soft squishy happy ending shows...of course, who wants to watch a show where you are rejected by your birth family or never found any relatives?  I KNEW because of my own experience with my Birth Mother, and through reading some of the heartbreaking stories on DNA Detectives that it was possible to either NOT find anyone, or that they would want nothing to do with me when found.  I was ok with that, I am pretty easy going.  But I think I said earlier, what is wrong with just ONE more person on this Earth that cares about you just because you are blood?  I just don't get it.
     So here is what one of the 7 or so pages that I wrote down looks like.  I didn't have a large wall that I could stick hundreds of stickies to! I wrote down EVERY high match I had on EVERY DNA site and what I might know about them, their kids, their parents, etc.

     You can see (can't you?) that I wrote down even the Centmorgans that were matched with me.  I was trying desperately to make some sense of everything I saw.  Again, I got dizzy and cross-eyed trying to find a connection to someone, anyone. I sadly put it aside.  This was IMPOSSIBLE!  I reached out to my angel again, feeling like I was certainly a number one pest.  Please please help me again, I just can't make sense of this.  She looked several times asked more questions and we didn't come up with much else.  She was just so sure about Thomas or Henry Tackett families. I tried a few more times, days apart to just no avail. 

     Meanwhile, Sandra's mother had passed, the one who matched me the highest. She had been mourning and trying to get all the arrangements together and get her mom's affairs in order.  She emailed me with some pictures of who someone (I don't remember who it was, sister? uncle? not sure) that was thought could be my father.  He was Reverend Richard Tackett. I had looked at him and looked at him, but according to the National Personnel Center, he was not in the military at the time.  So could they have gotten it wrong? Did he reenlist and they didn't have it recorded?  Someone on DNA Detectives told me that many of the military records of that time were destroyed in a fire... somewhere. So I tried to find names of Richard's children to try and contact them.  No luck, at least not that I could find.  Here is what she sent me: 

       My angel did find some folks that were children of someone we had looked at, honestly, I got them so mixed up I just went with it.  She had found three of them on Facebook and so I messaged all three of them.  Each day eagerly checking Facebook Messenger to see if they had even picked up my message.  They all three eventually did open the message, but nothing ever came of that.  SIGH.  NOW WHAT??

     I started hearing from some of the folks I had messaged on the several DNA sites.  One was someone from Ancestry, I matched her husband Paul at the 3rd cousin level.  They had tested his Dad and I did NOT match his dad, so, although his mom had passed.  I looked at her husbands tree (thank goodness he had one) and his mother's mom was Claudia Tackett, and her dad was Claude Tackett!  Ok, I think I may be on to something. That would make his mom my 2nd cousin, her mom as my first cousin? and her grandfather as my......? I get so confused!  Again, I say, I think of myself as pretty smart, I have a BS degree in Education, and a Masters degree in Education. I should be able to keep relatives straight, shouldn't I?  Well, I couldn't!!!!!  I have mad skills in some things... genealogy, not so much. :( 

     

     So I kept emailing the folks that I had heard from.  Sandra sent me some more pictures and I kept looking at my notes.  I am looking back at emails and I see that on one of them I said: "I looked at William Russell Tackett and he is the right age but if he didn’t have children then not sure who to test.  I also looked at Goldie Tackett White as maybe one of her sons could be my BF.  Maybe test one of her sons children?  Sometimes this DNA stuff just has my eyeballs swimming!  Haha. 

Do you have any suggestions for me?

Here is what she sent back: Russ Tackett had kids. He was my 1st cousin. He is dead. And Goldie White was my aunt. She had 9 kids and raised them in Columbus Ohio.

 I asked Sandy if I could see her family tree, she said she didn't have one. DANG.  However, she did say she would do a DNA test for Ancestry.  So I sent her one.  We had some snafus with registering it but it is on its way.  Maybe now I could find out something more. If her mom was my Great Aunt I guess she would show up as my.... great cousin?  Humm, well unless her Mom was showing up as a first cousin once removed, then she would be my.... Heck, I just could not begin to make sense of this.   No one would give me any kids that I could test!  I am pulling my hair out by now.  (can any one reading this relate to me about now?) 

    Enter another angel, Patrick.  He didn't KNOW he was an angel, but he was.  He had appeared as a 2nd cousin match on Ancestry on December 20, 2017.  I messaged him with this message:  Hi Patrick,

My name is Pam. I see that we possibly share grandparents! You show as a second cousin to me. I would love to see exactly where we are related if you would like to.
Sincerely,
Pam Stephens

He actually messaged me back on the SAME DAY!!  First word was "fascinating"!  My heart skipped a beat. He says he doesn't have a membership but gave me names of his parents, grandparents, great grandparents, just a list of names. I saw one that I knew quite well, James Thomas Tackett!  I think he was a great great grandpa to me!! I then proceeded to give him a brief paragraph about being adopted. 

     Again, he says "fascinating"!!  (Did I ever tell you I love you, Patrick??!!)  He proceeds to tell me about his pawpaw and men that he thinks were in the military in his family.  Then, he says, "From your picture, my Mom says you remind her of her cousin, Vicki.

Be still my heart!!! and he gives me his mom's name and says she is on Facebook.  So begins what I hope to be the final  chapter of my quest. I will write more later about the things I think I have found out, and the person that WE think was my birth father, William Russell Tackett.