This book is about the influence of coincidence and serendipity on genealogical research, the chance combination of events over which the researcher has no control but which nevertheless guides him to a fortuitous discovery.

Matthew Henry was born about 1817 at Flower Hill near Newton Limavady, County Derry, Ireland. He immigrated to the United States in 1836, and married Catherine Nations in 1844, settling near Kingston, Adams Co., Illinois. In 1868 they moved to Wapello Co., Iowa and he died in 1887 at Martingsburg, Iowa.

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