Category Archives: Mayflower

Catholic Mayflower Descendants

Mayflower,
Cover of the summer issue of Mayflower Descendant. Photo: Cimetière Saint-Jean, St. Barthélemy, burial location of Louis Charles Lambert and his wife Jeanne Augustine.

Our summer issue of the Mayflower Descendant includes an article by myself and Michael Leclerc entitled “The Family of Louis and Lydia (Fosdick) Lambert Ma(s)cillier of Boston, Virginia, and Guadeloupe: The First Known Catholic Mayflower Descendants in Massachusetts.” When we first announced our digitization project of the parish records of the Archdiocese of Boston in 2016, I was interested to find such descendants. I wrote about the first person I found in the records with colonial New England ancestry, Caroline (Plimpton) Francoeur (1759-1827)—however, she had no Mayflower ancestry. I only needed to go eighteen pages further in the parish records to find the baptism of the eldest child of Louis Lambert Ma(s)cillier and his wife Lydia Fosdick, who was an eighth generation-descendant (two times over) of Mayflower passengers William and Mary Brewster.1

Throughout the colonial period, no official Catholic congregations were allowed in Massachusetts. Local laws forbade any Catholic priest even to enter the colony. The 1780 Massachusetts Constitution established religious freedom in the new state, and the first public Catholic Mass was held in Boston in 1788. The below baptism of Mary Catherine Elizabeth Lambert in 1796 (who died suddenly in the following year), and that of her sister Amelia Mathilda in 1798, represent the earliest known Catholic Mayflower descendants in Massachusetts. I cannot qualify this beyond the Bay State, as there were early Mayflower descendants in England, Netherlands, and elsewhere in North America. I state in the article that if any readers can find earlier examples in Massachusetts (or elsewhere), I will happily publish an update. Continue reading Catholic Mayflower Descendants →

A Murdaugh Mayflower Mystery

Mayflower, ,

Statue of WIlliam Bradford next to photo of Alex MurdaughThis post is a collaboration between myself and Vita-Brevis contributor Jeff Record , as we were both watching Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal on Netflix, as well as news coverage of the recent murder trial of Alex Murdaugh . Jeff alerted me to a possible Mayflower descent for the family, and similar to my post on Jeffrey Dahmer and Other Infamous Mayflower Descendants , we sought to verify the proposed lineage.

Jeff found a lineage of Alex Murdaugh’s mother Elizabeth “Libby” (Alexander) Murdaugh (b. 1939) on FamilySearch (this profile, which had repeated the hoax of her death, has since been deleted , but we will summarize the sources below, and the profiles of her parents remain). Jeff found Libby’s great-great-grandparents: Stephen/Stevens and Nancy (Ripley) Simmons were a couple that married at Swansea, Massachusetts in 1810 and moved to Charleston, South Carolina, with purported descents to the Alden, Bradford, Brewster, Mullins, and Warren families on the Mayflower! Continue reading A Murdaugh Mayflower Mystery →

James Dean: Of Winslows and Wishful Thinking

Famous Figures, Mayflower,

Photo of James DeanFew cinematic icons have endured in our collective consciousness as well as James Dean. Nearly seventy years after his death, his short and quixotic life has caused many to study not only his life and legacy, but also the possibilities of his ancestry. Indeed, with over fourteen hundred James Dean family trees on Ancestry.com, it seems that interest in this proverbial 1950s bad boy isn’t going away anytime soon.1

For me, there’s still an unabated curiosity revolving around the possibility of Dean having Mayflower ancestry. A quick look at several biographies and a myriad of trees reveals all the “old names” (Dean included) that might lead back to our cousins at Plymouth Rock. Yet nowhere among them could I find anything definitive, beyond the most tepid of answers or the vaguest research. I kept expecting someone to say that Dean had descended from the irascible Doty or the pious Brewster, or perhaps simply confirm that all possible Mayflower connections had been unequivocally disproved. Thus far, I’ve only found one researcher who was willing to make a definitive statement: “no such descent has been found.” That conclusion was drawn in a mid-1990s article by author Richard E. Brenneman.2

Continue reading James Dean: Of Winslows and Wishful Thinking →

Jeffrey Dahmer and Other Infamous Mayflower Descendants

Mayflower,

A friend relayed to me this episode: an older individual was leaving a research facility when security, per policy, asked to inspect their bag. The individual declared to my friend working at the reception desk: “I find it insulting that security asked to check my bag, because I’m a Mayflower descendant!”

Aware that one’s ancestry has very little to do with one’s potential to commit a crime, my friend wanted to know if there were any Mayflower descendants with a well-known criminal record who they could have brought up in response. Indeed, there are plenty! Continue reading Jeffrey Dahmer and Other Infamous Mayflower Descendants →

Let it snow!

Mayflower,

Painting of Pilgrims walking through snow to attend church by George Henry BoughtonAn occasional project I have worked on is compiling a list of “near- Mayflower” families. These are families who were not on the 1620 voyage themselves, but most or all of whose present-day descendants share Mayflower ancestry. There are easy cases at the first or second generation like Robert Cushman (whose only surviving child Thomas married passenger Mary Allerton), Thomas Little (who married Ann Warren, daughter of passenger Richard Warren), and my ancestor Christian Penn (spouse of passengers Francis Eaton and Francis Billington). Others are more complicated. Continue reading Let it snow! →

All these lines

Family Stories, Genealogical Writing, Mayflower, , , ,

Every time when I look in the mirror/All these lines on my face getting clearer. ~ Aerosmith, 1973

Like a thief in the night, old age has claimed me. I’m not sure when that ignoble laird decided to vandalize me, but it’s certain I wasn’t paying very close attention. I expect it happened in the usual way, though I never expected to be harpooned by fishy-sounding Beta-blockers or riddled with Star Wars-like statins. And while I can’t see “the sunset” just yet, I can tell you that some of those evening stars have indeed arrived. Continue reading All these lines →

Blended wives

American History, Family Stories, Genealogical Writing, Mayflower, , ,
“Two ladies and an officer seated at tea,” 1715. Courtesy of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London

After reading Alicia Crane Williams’ recent post on Nathaniel Glover of Dorchester, I was reminded of a Glover ancestor of my own, Uriah Glover of Long Island, New York. Looking back through my notes and revisiting “all things Uriah,” I recalled that Uriah’s first wife Sarah Hopkins was an alleged descendant of that old tempest himself, Mayflower passenger Stephen Hopkins.

Since I’m always on the hunt for any elusive Mayflower line, I had to check it out. Unfortunately, I recalled that this possible connection had already been long since debunked, and my chances of picking up another line to Plymouth Rock were (yet again) quickly dashed against said rock.[1] Continue reading Blended wives →

Freelove and Giggles

American History, Genealogical Writing, Mayflower, , , ,
See a larger version below.

The American Genealogist (TAG) has frequently published amusing short items found in the records, often as “filler” for the lower half of a page. Following up on my post about the Geer and Christophers families of Connecticut, the last TAG article by Norman Ingham, which was followed by comments by David L. Greene, had the an item concerning “Mercy Giggles” and Freelove Frink.” I was interested to know what became of these two eighteenth-century Connecticut ladies. Continue reading Freelove and Giggles →

Not all is changed

American History, Genealogical Writing, Mayflower, , ,
The Samoset House in Plymouth, from Atlas of Plymouth County, Massachusetts, 1879.

A few years ago, PBS began airing the BBC travel documentary series Great American Railway Journeys, with host Michael Portillo, a British journalist, broadcaster, and former government official. Mr. Portillo traveled across the United States and Canada, mostly by train, his journeys informed by the 1879 Appleton’s Railway Guide to the United States and Canada, originally published in two volumes and usually referred to simply as Appleton’s Guide.[1] Continue reading Not all is changed →

Things that scream DNA!

American History, Genealogical Writing, Mayflower, Research Methods, Technology, , , ,

An occasional series in The American Genealogist (TAG) is called “Enigmas,” which often concern clues or possible kinships that are not entirely proven, with varying levels of uncertainty. A recent comment on my post about Christopher Christophers recalled me to one such enigma – Hannah, wife of Daniel2 Geer (ca. 1673-1749) of Preston, Connecticut. Continue reading Things that scream DNA! →