A while back, I began comparing the different lines of my family tree.  I realized a few siblings from one family had married siblings of another family, and it got me wondering if my family lines had crossed paths in the past.  Were Civil War soldiers fighting for/against each other in the same battles?  Had some ancient lines even lived in the same regions at the same times?  I decided to map it out so I could physically see it … hello Google Earth.

I took the patriarchs of my direct ancestors, and mapped each place they resided in Google Earth.  After I was finished, I was pretty amazed.  It’s pretty cool to see hundreds of years of family history all gradually migrating and eventually merging together. I was stunned that none of the paths crossed in the same area at the same time.  Although many of them are in the same areas at different times.

The Smiths and Ponds have a similar history in the north, gradually sinking south.  They, in fact, both immigrated to opposite sides of New Haven Harbor in Connecticut (Smiths in Milford, the Ponds in Branford).  However, the Smiths moved out of the area just as the Ponds moved in.  The records indicate that the Smiths were in the second wave of immigrants to come to the New Haven Colony.

The Humphreys and Browns landed on opposites sides of the Chesapeake Bay in Virginia, but about 30 years apart.  The Humphreys actually settled just across the James River from the original Jamestown settlement.

In typical American colonist fashion, each family arrived and got their feet planted.  Then they spread to the west and south as the colonies & country grew.  The paths danced around each other somewhat, but never really met.