William the Conqueror
Henry Sutliff
Ralph or Joyce Franke wrote:
> William and all,
>
> Several years ago I was sent a GEDCOM on Elder John WHITE, b abt 1600, son
> of Robert WHITE and Bridget ALLGAR. This shows a descent for John from
> William the Conqueror. I have recently seen someone write that there is no
> proof that John is the son of Robert or some other comment. On the GEDCOM
> there are sources. I don't know how reliable they are, and the person who
> sent it to me did not do the research. Elder John WHITE was the immigrant in
> this case, b Shalford, Essex England d 1683, Hartford CT.
>
As a descendant of Robert White and Bridget Allgar via their daughter Elizabeth
who married William Goodwin, I will try to tackle this query. Please forgive me
for any lack of tact or diplomacy in my response.
I would guess from your other queries about books about William the Conqueror,
that you may be basing your descent from the Conqueror on this. Please don't.
You will find a good article in NEHGR 55:22 (Jan. 1901) on the immediate family
of Robert White of Shalford and Messing. It discusses the documented children
and the problem with the lack of baptism record for John. It also compares the
signatures of the marriage of John in Essex with a signature from New England.
This is a good basic article about this family.
Now as to the problems with the White ancestry and its purported descent from
royalty. When you first examine the pedigree you will find that these Whites
supposedly emigrated from Somerset to Hampshire to Essex. That ought to raise at
the very least a yellow flag of caution as this tends to relate a White family
of some status to an Essex White family of much lesser status. So essentially if
there is any weak link in this descent and it is severed at any point, then the
Royal Descent is lost. One does not even need to tackle the White problem to do
so.
In the July 1985 NEHGR in an article titled "Edward Raynsford of Boston: English
Ancestry and American Descendants" by James A . Rasmussen (p. 228), the author
makes the following statement: "The claim made by Mr. Allaben for a royal line
through Edward Raynsford's mother Mary Kirton and her maternal great-grandmother
Margaret (White) Kirton, daughter of Sir Robert White of South Warnsborne,
Hampshire does not appear to be substantiated as no evidence is found that Sir
Robert White's mother was Alice Hungerford."
As this Sir Robert White is supposed to be the same Sir Robert White alleged
ancestor in these interenet genealogies to Robert White of Shalford and Messing,
Essex, the Royal Descent is lost. It is an uncomfortable position to disprove
this descent, but truth and accuracy are really important to me and I trust to
you.
Regards,
Henry Sutliff
P.S. The Allaben reference pertains to a 1934 article in The Journal of American
History (23:89-94) which published research without documentation on the
ancestry of its late editor Frank Allaben.
Ralph or Joyce Franke
This is just the sort of answer I was hoping for! I have always been just a
little skeptical of this information on the GEDCOM, so someone who will
check it out for me is great! As for my basing my ancestry to William on
this one line, I was delighted to get another GEDCOM last year which
purported to show a descent from William, also! So, now if someone can tell
me about that one, which I mentioned in the earlier msg, I hope to have a
PROVEN line to William! ;)))
Thanks for the various references, too. I will print them out so when I go
next to the Arizona State Capitol Genealogical Library, I can look at them.
Among their fine collection is a complete set of the NEHGR from the very
beginning! I have always been impressed with that!
Several years ago I bought a copy, used, of the Royal Ancestry of (I forget
the exact name now) some American colonists and entered what I thought was a
correct ancestry of my Roger BILLINGS. When I found out this line was in
error, I removed it from my PAF, using PAFSPLIT, and saved it just in case
it might prove useful later. I also got rid of that book! I didn't want
something that was wrong in MY bookshelves! At the time I didn't see any
familiar names in my lineage. Probably a mistake, as I now have more names,
but it's gone! I'm sure there are other books that are more correct! If you
have one New England Puritan ancestor, you have a bunch! And I do!
Again, thanks for tackling this ancestor for me!
Joyce
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