HUDSON

As promised - a chart of the search for the Hudson source...The bold information is known to relate to "our" Hudson line.  The others are an attempt to filter out the ones not related. 

After, finding people were attempting, without stated cause, to connect this William Hudson (bca1827 and died ca 1887) who fathered Louis Hudson (who fathered Jesse Hudson, who fathered Curtis,,,,) to a Culpepper Co., Va man named Abner Hudson through his son William O. Hudson, I knew something more needed to be done. 

Local records in Alabama where the son of Abner Hudson, William O Hudson, lived showed that William O Hudson had died in Alabama in the late 1860's.  

My husband had his DNA added to the Ancestry files, so there is something for matches to build upon. We have attempted to completely add all the information on known cousins and other relatives.  It would be so helpful if the HUDSON DNA PROJECTS were more accessible (such as so many others are and allow for some science in the building of probable trees).

I had membership in one Hudson family association in the late 1980's and they were less than helpful (more elistist and paranoid). They served more as gatekeepers of information and if a family did not fit into one of their narrow family tree units, they were not important. They allowed no first hand examinations of the data or more random searches for far-flung familial connections (clues such as names, places, and other tidbits have helped make similar connections for other lines; thinking outside the box and in unexpected places can bear fruit).

I suspect, however, that they were preserving some perceived  notions related to status. So, related to the DNA, these Hudson groups have  continued that trend and have largely removed the evidence from all but those who sign up with them. THEY reserved the right to determine if there was a connection in their membership files and never allowed any to examine the data.  

Any HUDSON who wishes to help follow the trail may be interested in this. 

I have an emerging theory. Theory: William Hudson was born in about 1827 in either VA or England, he may have worked as a merchant or on a ship (I have found several fitting his general age range) making crossings as passenger (a merchant or servant) and one as a mechanic. They fit the known timeline. They fit a geographical proximity (some of these record a New Orleans port). In June 1850 a Wm Hudson is recorded there and then on the census in Nov a Wm Hudson b. 1827 in Va is recorded. 

This theory may explain why his daughter in 1910 and 1920 said her father was born "at sea", they explain why Wm on one census said he was born in England and on others VA (the Wm on the ships was a US citizen traveling from Liverpool on several ships). It explains, possibly, why his son Louis Hudson named a son, Herbert Chauncy Hudson because in 1869 a Wm Hudson, 40 served as a mechanic on the steamship "Henry Chauncy".  Did he entertain his children with tales of his days at sea? His last passage on the Henry Chancy?