I feel as though I have confirmed Angeline Mitchell’s maiden name as “Higdon/Higden.” I have been trying to identify the children of Thomas C. and Angeline Mitchell for some time, with not much to go on. I had previously found a website that has transcriptions or extractions of Audrain County marriage books with citations and have extracted some Mitchell brides who I am hoping are the daughters of T.C. and Angeline. However, looking for them in the census has turned up very little so far, at least in Missouri.

Lately, I have been using the Missouri State Archives‘ wonderful index and many images of death certificates. I have been searching that for what has seemed like days looking for these few married names to no avail. As a last ditch effort to uncover something, I decided to try searching for the informant on T. C. Mitchell’s death certificate. It was a name I had never heard of before, “Schwendker,” and thought maybe I could learn who this person was and how they knew Thomas.

Using the MO State Archives, I searched for “Schwendker” in the death certificate database for all counties in Missouri, and lo and behold, only 4 came up, in the county that T. C. was living in when he died. The informants name was “L. A. Schwendker” and there were two “L” names in the index. One of them, Lewis A., does not yet have an image you can download, so I picked the other, Laura. Well, Laura’s death certificate says she is the daughter of Thomas Mitchell and Angeline Higden!

I had long suspected that Higdon was Angeline’s maiden name but this has clenched it for me! I felt so proud of myself for using those genealogical “skills” I have been learning about for so long and had them pay off!