Truphenia Gertrude Shockley, I had the name at last. Truphenia is an unusual name and one that was a bit confusing at first.

But let me back-up and tell you the story. I got an email about Harry Frazer with no evidence he was one of mine. And this is a genealogy story.

So on my wife’s side I have a bunch of Frazers living in the Maryland and Delaware and I’ve filled in a few collateral members of this extended clan where it wasn’t too much work.

I did have much on the one Harry Frazer in my tree so I thought I would look at him. He was one of those distant collateral relatives so I figured I’d find a little more on him. I had the tree on Ancestry so I figured I just do a search and see if anything interesting came up.

The first promising record I found was a marriage. The name was transcribed as Freephenia Gertrude Shockley. I thought I’d better have a look as that is a very unusual first name.

The record was handwritten. I thought the first letter might have been a T but I wasn’t completely sure and I was a bit unsure about several other letters.

She married Harry Wellington Frazer. And the first letter in her name did not look like the F is Frazer so maybe it was a T.

I found her in the census as T. Gertrude Frazer so maybe I was right about the T. But the rest of that first name was still a mystery.

The census records also indicated she had a son, David Harris Frazer. Although he was born in 1896, I found a delayed Delaware birth record dated in 1942. This record seemed to solve the mystery of his mother’s name. It was printed and clearly said she was Truphenia Gertrude Shockley.

So her married name would be Truphenia Gertrude Shockley Frazer. Her husband would be Harry Frazer. And her son and maybe her grandson could go by Harry Frazer. Certainly I did not find a good answer to the genealogical question but know quite a bit more than I did a week ago about this family.

So if you want to know more about this family, I’d be glad to share what I know. Or if you just want to comment on the name Truphenia or anything else that seems relevant, please do.