Notable People In Our Family Tree

This series is for my children. My family history research has never been about finding connections to famous ancestors. I fell in love with genealogy while sitting with my grandmother, listening to her tell stories about her parents. For me, this has always been about knowing who the people who came before me were, and honoring all the paths that they took in life. I have never been much concerned with whether my ancestors were born wealthy or became famous. The relatives that interest me the most tend to be the ones with humble origins who made interesting decisions when challenged by a particular moment in history. I share their stories with my kids all the time.

Last summer, we visited Salt Lake City and the Family History Library. My kids, whose eyes typically glaze over when I try to engage them in family history, were suddenly dazzled by the multimedia displays connecting them to notable ancestors. My 8-year old daughter asked me to take photos of her in front of some of the more illustrious family lines illuminated on large screens. I looked at the long list of famous people FamilySearch suggests I'm related to and was puzzled. These connections were largely unfamiliar to me. Am I really related to 10+ American presidents? I do not have any of these individuals sourced and confirmed in my tree. The glee with which my kids greeted the possibility, however, made me think a little about famous relatives. Is it so wrong if a notable relative is the one that initially attracts someone to genealogy? If my children get excited about being related to a president, might it guide them to an interest in our less celebrated ancestors?

After that trip, I tried to track down some of the notables the FamilySearch database had suggested are my kin. When I could make the connections, they were typically pretty distant, down lines of my tree that go beyond what I feel can be proven and sourced. I have not added all these individuals to my tree because I'm not completely comfortable with those relationships yet, but clearly FamilySearch users think they're a match. I did find many "famous" ancestors, on both mine and my husband's sides of the tree, that are reasonably well proven, and so I also made a list of those people for my kids. Most of them are fairly distant relations, or in-laws of those distant relations, so I'm not entirely sure I see a lot of value in the connection. My kids find it interesting, though. I'm going to share a bunch of those names here in hopes that those larger-than-life stories provide a gateway to curiosity about all the other, fascinating stories contained in our tree. I will begin with my side of the tree.

The Early Americans

Ethan Allen, Revolutionary War Hero, 3rd cousin 8x removed

"Ethan Allen was a farmer, businessman, land speculator, philosopher, writer, lay theologian, American Revolutionary War patriot, and politician. He is best known as one of the founders of Vermont and for the capture of Fort Ticonderoga early in the Revolutionary War." (Wikipedia) Allen was also the leader of an attack on Montreal which led to him being captured and imprisoned on a British Naval ship. He was known far and wide as one of the most dedicated American patriots during the Revolutionary War era, and remains an oft-referenced hero in the state of Vermont. Yes, the furniture store is named after the man.

This connection is on our Smith line. Our common ancestors are Henry Burt, Jr. (b. 1595, Harberton, Devon, England; d. 1662, Springfield, Massachusetts) and Eulalia Marche (b. 1601, Sherford, Devon, England; d. 1690, Springfield, Massachusetts). They were Ethan Allen's 2nd great-grandparents and they're my 10th great-grandparents. Henry and Eulalia's daughter Elizabeth Burt married Samuel Wright, Jr. The Wrights married into my Smith line in the mid-1700s.

Ethan Allen

John Jay, American Founding Father, father-in-law of 2nd cousin 6x removed

"John Jay was an American statesman, patriot, diplomat, Founding Father, abolitionist, negotiator, and signatory of the Treaty of Paris of 1783. He served as the second governor of New York and the first chief justice of the United States." (Wikipedia) Fans of the musical Hamilton will also remember the mention of John Jay in the song Non-Stop. In 1788, Jay joined forces with Alexander Hamilton and James Madison to write a series of articles encouraging New York state convention members to ratify the proposed Constitution. Jay wrote five of these articles, which became known as The Federalist Papers. I should also note that despite his work on behalf of abolition, John Jay was in fact, a slave owner, a paradox that is confusing and infuriating. We cannot discuss the good Jay did for our country without also acknowledging his abhorrent decision to enslave human beings. He is not the only slave-owning Founding Father in our tree (see also Richard Stockton), unfortunately. 

We are connected to John Jay via our Rutherfurd line, which begins with my great-grandfather George Rutherfurd's adoptive father, Malcolm Rutherfurd. Mary Rutherfurd Clarkson (1786-1838) married Peter Augustus Jay, the son of John Jay, in 1813. Mary was the great-granddaughter of John Rutherfurd and Elizabeth Cairncross of Edgerston, Scotland. They are my 7th great-grandparents.

John Jay

Lewis Morris, American Founding Father, father-in-law of 1st cousin 7x removed

"Lewis Morris was an American Founding Father, landowner, and developer from Morrisania, New York, presently part of Bronx County. He signed the U.S. Declaration of Independence as a delegate to the Continental Congress from New York." (Wikipedia) We have two other signers in our tree, Richard Stockton and Dr. Benjamin Rush. Upon being warned of how dangerous it would be to sign the Declaration of Independence, Morris famously replied, "Damn the consequences. Give me the pen." There were, in fact, a lot of consequences. The Morris family lost much of their wealth and property during the war, and struggled to rebuild after America's victory.

Lewis' daughter, Helena Morris, married John Rutherfurd, my 1st cousin 7x removed. Rutherfurd was a lawyer in New York City who was elected to the New Jersey General Assembly in 1788 and then to the United States Senate in 1791. The Rutherfurds, originally from Edgerston, Scotland, are my maternal grandmother's line. As with John Jay, the common ancestors here are John Rutherfurd and Elizabeth Cairncross, my 7th great-grandparents, and the grandparents of John Rutherfurd, who married Helena Morris.

Lewis Morris

These connections are both distant and, in the case of Jay and Morris, on an adoptive line and involve in-laws, and are thus not biological relationships. I've never set much store in them, but they may be interesting to my children.

FamilySearch also says we're related, on my side of the tree, to American Presidents George Washington, James Polk, John Adams, Millard Fillmore, William Howard Taft, Richard Nixon, William McKinley, Franklin D. Roosevelt, James Buchanan, Franklin Pierce, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. I can find no substantiation of any of this.

I have not yet written much about my husband's family tree, which is fascinating and includes a great cast of characters, including many interesting early Americans. My husband's paternal line is English, and many of his ancestors arrived in America in the early-to-mid 1600s. They were often the founders of New England towns and held leadership roles in local governance. Here is one standout ancestor from that time.

Philip Sherman, Founding Father of Rhode Island, my husband's 10th great-grandfather

"Philip Sherman (1611–1687) was a prominent leader and founding settler of Portsmouth in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. Coming from Dedham, Essex in southeastern England, he and several of his siblings and cousins settled in New England. His first residence was in Roxbury in the Massachusetts Bay Colony where he lived for a few years, but he became interested in the teachings of the dissident ministers John Wheelwright and Anne Hutchinson, and at the conclusion of the Antinomian Controversy he was disarmed and forced to leave the colony. He went with many followers of Hutchinson to establish the town of Portsmouth on Aquidneck Island, later called Rhode Island. He became the first secretary of the colony there, and served in many other roles in the town government. Sherman became a Quaker after settling in the Rhode Island colony, and died at an advanced age, leaving a large progeny." (Wikipedia) Wheelwright and Hutchinson were devotees of Puritanical minister John Cotton, and their beliefs, which came to be known as Antinomian or Anabaptist, argued that one's spiritual condition had no bearing upon one's outward behavior. The established religious conventions of the time centered around the Holy Spirit, and the idea that an individual's salvation is demonstrated by righteous behavior and the good they do for others. Philip Sherman was dedicated to the Antinomian beliefs, which led to his ostracization and the co-founding of Rhode Island.

The Shermans married into my husband's Wheeler line in the mid-1700s. Many of Philip's descendants were, by that point, back in Massachusetts, specifically in Berlin, where my father-in-law was born a couple centuries later.

Among the many descendants of Philip Sherman and his wife Sarah Odding are former United States Presidents George H. W. Bush (9th cousin 1x removed of my husband) and George W. Bush (9th cousin 2x removed of my husband). Other descendants include James S. Sherman, US Vice President in the administration of President William Howard Taft (6th cousin 3x removed of my husband), Susan B. Anthony (5th cousin 4x removed of my husband), Janis Joplin (9th cousin of my husband), Sir Winston Churchill (8th cousin 1x removed of my husband), Mamie Eisenhower, Taylor Swift and possibly even Marilyn Monroe. This is a very interesting line that is peppered with well known names.

The Philip Sherman House in Portsmouth, Rhode Island

In future posts, I'll share notable names from other moments in American, British, and Scottish history. We will see if my kids find any of this compelling.