I'm Drowning in Daniel Atchley's

I am an EXTREMELY organized person or I always thought I was. I have gone through wills, Revolutionary War Pension applications, deeds, land grants, tax lists, assorted state and county rosters, census files, guardian papers and every other "official" paper I could find. I'm ignoring the mounds of family histories, since it's the mistakes in most of those that I'm trying to correct - as they pertain to OUR line. I'm only looking at FACTS. I've done a TIMELINE to show which Daniel (and sometimes Joshua, Thomas, Nathaniel, Benjamin, Jesse and David) was around in a certain year. That didn't clear things up for me, so I drew a PICTURE. I drew all those states that had Daniel Atchley's (and sometimes Daniel ASHLEY's, AND the other names that keep reappearing) and wrote the names, dates and counties into the little picture to try and figure out who was where and when. My very confusing picture now has New York, Vermont, Connecticut [I think I'm going to drop all those, as most pertain to Daniel ASHLEY and I think I've concluded that he's not "my" group], Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia, Kentucky [not sure about those guys], Tennessee, Arkansas and Missouri. This has NOT cleared the picture up for me yet.

I think I know the problem, though. The early records of East Tennessee are sparse. I have land grants in east Tennessee for Joshua/Josiah, Thomas and Daniel, but this Daniel, which I believe is mine, died about 1825, per the deed transactions I've followed, so I don't have a pension application for him. He was in Sevier County TN and that courthouse was burned in the 1850's, along with all the early data. I believe the land received in a grant by THAT Daniel was passed on to the Daniel Atchley that I KNOW is a sibling to my Arkansas Atchley's, so the normal ASSUMPTION would be to ASSUME that the Daniels are father and son.

I have a few other loose ends. Mary Russell (of Jefferson County TN) is married to an Atchley per her father's will. Is that the SAME Mary Russell that a grandson of Daniel and Mary Russell Atchley discusses in his 1874 autobiographical sketch? I haven't found a marriage record with Daniel, or a record showing her living with a child. She never applied for a Widow's Pension, so she might have died before 1832 also. I have the will of Thomas Atchley (1775) listing his children. I'm still missing a real link between these folks. I've been going through Atchley's in my sleep this past week. I'm going to take a little break on them and run to Kentucky for a quick mini-reunion with some LIVE relatives.

One of my cousins is turning 80. She's not my oldest cousin either. Her sister is older than her. It should be fun. I think my daughter is driving over too, so it will be extra special. She'll be spending spring vacation in Canada, so a couple of days in Kentucky will be nice.

Maybe I'll have a "Daniel Atchley epiphany" over the next few days.... All suggestions or donation of pertinent documents gladly accepted.