Continuing the Search for Peter Smith’s Father
The Smiths who settled into Westmoreland County circa 1650, had to have the resources to move into a wealthy neighborhood that included the families of future rock stars: Washington, Lee, Jefferson, Custis, Madison and Monroe. These families were the predecessors of the great names in American history. One century later, their grandchildren would rock the world. We have already met George Mason IV, the author of the Bill of Rights and a Smith family attorney. He made his plantation home on Peeter Smith’s original purchase at Doegs Neck.
Some families arrived in the Westmoreland neighborhood, on the banks of the Potomac River, with acquired wealth. Others acquired wealth with hard work, shrewd deals and some serious skills. A man could work hard, acquire land, nurse profits from the lucrative tobacco trade and maintain a comfortable estate. This would all be accomplished on the backs of the slaves and indentured servants who would rightfully disagree with the notion that life on a tobacco plantation was a ‘comfortable’ lifestyle. A person could also marry into wealth, and marriages were often arranged as business partnerships between two families.
Those who capitalized on the headright system acquired 50 acres per each person they brought to Virginia. One man gained 8000 acres for transporting 160 people to the New World. The investor had to be able to pay the cost of each immigrant’s journey. The incoming migrants did not necessarily all arrive together on the same ship. Each ship’s manifest (list of passengers) was maintained as a document which recorded the investor’s headright claims. Each of the passengers then had an obligation to pay the investor for the cost of their journey. If the immigrant couldn’t pay in cash in a timely manner, they could become an indentured servant to their benefactor. The investor often became the master in a master/servant relationship. The headright system and indentured servant formalities were thus entwined.
In George Greer’s Early Virginia Immigrants (1623-1666), a Peter Smith is identified in 1651 as an immigrant who came into Virginia with the cost of his transport covered by Thomas Thornbrough. Thomas cashed in a claim for land on March 25, 1651.This could not be our Peter of Yeocomico for obvious reasons related to age. Peter of Yeocomico (d 1741) would have lived to be 100 years of age if he was only 10 as an immigrant in 1651, a highly unlikely life span. Most men were dying in their 40s. Our Peter of Yeocomico was not fathering children until the 1690s. If he was arriving at the age of ten in 1651, he waited a long time to be a father. Also, not the norm at that time. This Peter Smith (arriving in 1651) is believed by many to be the father of Peter Smith of Yeocomico/Westmoreland. But there are problems with that assumption as well, as we shall see. The Thomas Thornbrough patent is mentioned in Cavaliers and Pioneers: Abstracts of Virginia Land Patents and Grants, 1623-1666. Vol. 1 by Nell Marion Nugent. On March 25, 1651, Thornbrough was granted 700 acres of land in Northumberland Co, Virginia. His property was identified as: “Abutting Sly. upon a branch issueing out of Nomeny Riv., Ely. upon a small br. of sd. Riv. towards the land of James Hare.”
Thornbrough’s property was in the Nomeny River neighborhood of Cople Parish, the hood that became the home of Peter Smith of Yeocomico/Westmoreland. This area was incorporated as Westmoreland County in 1653. ‘Nomeny’ is found spelled several ways.
We do not know if this candidate for the role of ‘Peter Senior’ was indentured to Thornbrough or if he found another way to cover the cost of his transport. If he was indentured, we do not know the length of service. I have viewed the ship manifest and I know there were no other Smiths on board the ship that brought ‘Peter Senior’ to the colony. The fact that he traveled solo as a young person could mean any number of things:
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- Either, his parent(s) were already in Virginia or
- He was at ‘the age of majority’ and acted as an adult looking for a new life and opportunity in Virginia, or
- At a time when England was ripped by Civil War he was escaping the turmoil, or
- He was a warrior captured by Cromwell’s forces and exiled to North America, or
- He was a young street urchin, swept up by the Press Gang, and forced into servitude, a victim of human trafficking.
If Peter of Yeocomico’s parents were already in the colonies, we have not yet found them, though we do have our suspects. We will unveil those suspects at the Annual Whose Your Daddy Pageant and Gun Show.
If ‘Peter Senior’ arrived as an adult, in 1651 he is not the Peter Smith identified in so many family trees as ‘Peter Smith of Swallowfield, born 1641.’ If he came into Virginia as an age ten child in 1651, he is also not the Peeter who purchased property on the Potomoc River. A Peter Smith, born in 1641, without a financier, would not have been legally granted land until age 21 and that would be no earlier than 1662. If ‘Peter Senior’ arrived in 1651 as an adult and purchased land (i.e. Petomeck Freshes) in the decade following he would have been born in the 1630s or earlier. Or, the purchases could have been made by a third Smith, a father of the ‘Peter Senior’ who arrived in 1651. Or, this collection of Peter Smiths may very well have been completely unrelated to our Peter of Yeocomico and family historians have been on the wrong trail for thirty years.
In their seminal work, Peter Smith of Westmoreland County, Virginia (died 1741) and Some Descendants, authors Richard Bender Abell and Wilmer Lane Smith, firmly believe that land acquisitions made by a Peter (or Peeter) Smith in the decades of 1650 through 1690 are lands also owned by Peter of Yeocomico and his brother James in the first decade of the 18th Century (1700).
To approximate the location of Peter of Yeocomico’s homestead, I studied Westmoreland (post-1653) and Northumberland (pre-1653) deeds and wills. I translated the language and used Google Maps to identify rivers, streams, marshes, hills and churches. I had to make sense out of abbreviations and the various spellings of geographic features. I had to know the variety of names (Native and English) and the various spellings of each name attached to rivers, lakes and marshes over the course of time.
Leafing through deeds replete with references to various trees as property landmarks reminded me of an old Irish joke my father loved to repeat, and because this book is dedicated to the memory of my father, I will share it:
An American couple touring Ireland stopped in Donegal to ask a farmer for directions to Murphy’s Tavern. The wizened old farmer took one drag off his pipe and started by saying, “You go down this road to the right until you come to where the widow O’Connell passed and from there you go north to where the old Sycamore tree once stood. Head easterly till you see a grove of trees and a bit southerly to what once was Sully’s Meadow. Sully died you know. He was a good man.”
A deed dated July 6, 1672, carries the signature of “wit: Peter Smith and James Gaylard.” A Peter Smith was also a witness when Vincent Cox of Yeocomico in Cople Parish sold land to George and Hannah Lamkin. The land is identified as “on the branch of Nominy River, on Francis Clay’s line.” The document further notes that the land was part of an original patent of 665 acres dated September 27, 1667. Cox and Lamkin are distant cousins whose names appear in our family tree. The 1667 and 1672 transactions could be the work of Peter Sr who died in 1691. Age is the determining factor on which I hedge my bet.
A great effort has been made by many to crown as a father of Peter of Yeocomico, this Peter Smith: born in 1641, arrived 1651, died in 1691 and married to Jane Barnes. It would wrap things up in a neat, tidy little leaf on a family tree if it were true. Some people need finality. But, are there other candidates?
The immigrant’s names, year of arrival, the name of the ship, the ship’s captain and often the age of the immigrant were gathered on passenger manifests. Several Peter Smiths arrived in Virginia over the course of the 1600s.
A Peter Smith, age 25, departed from Gravesend, England on July 4, 1635. His birth year c. 1610. He was on board the ship Transport of London, Captain Edward Walker in charge. Walkers and Smiths were neighbors n Westmoreland and intermarried. All passengers aboard the ship signed an affidavit required by Archbishop Laud, indicating that they conformed to the orders and discipline of the Church of England. Of the more than one hundred immigrants on board, a large majority were between the ages of 18 and 30, male and single. There were very few surnames that were shared by passengers indicating that siblings or spouses were not likely to be on board.
This Peter Smith, arriving in 1635 is clearly not our ‘Peter Smith of Yeocomico,’ but may be a father or grandfather to our gentleman. If this Immigrant Peter (arriving in 1635) is the father of Peter of Yeocomico then he was 52 years of age when Peter of Yeocomico was born in 1663, the earliest date of birth posted for Peter of Yeocomico. It could have happened.
The Mormon Church (LDS) offers an online service and allows researchers to dig into the massive LDS genealogical files. I plugged in the following descriptors: “Peter Smith, Swallowfield, Berkshire, England” and I plugged in the years 1620-1650 as parameters for the search. Among the few Peter Smith’s that surfaced was information regarding ‘Peeter Smith.’ This Peeter was born in January of 1627 and baptized at St. Giles church in Reading, Berkshire, England. This ‘Peeter Smith’ would have been 24 years of age in 1651 if he arrived in the company of Thomas Thornborough’s transport. He would have been 30 years of age when ‘Peeter Smith’ purchased 500 acres in the Petomeck freshes; a purchase made possible by his transport of 10 immigrants.
The additional ‘e’ in Peeter found in the Doegs Neck deed may not have been an error or typo. The Peeter born in 1627 may be the same Peeter who purchased land on the Doegs Neck. But, let’s be clear. We have no evidence that Peeter of 1627 lived to adulthood or even left England.
It is an interesting find though. Perhaps the Peeter Smith recorded in the 1657 ‘Petomeck’ deed was spelled correctly and the same man as the ‘Peeter’ born in Berkshire in 1627 and baptized in Reading. Reading is less than five miles north of Swallowfield, the village which many Smiths claim as the homeland of Peter Smith. We do not have the documentation to prove beyond doubt that ‘Peeter Smith’ (1627) is Peter of the Petomeck and the father of Peter of Yeocomico. It fits, but, should not be forced on anyone as truth. It is interesting speculation, a hypothesis with possibilities and I like the possibilities.
The headright was one way to acquire wealth. But one had to have cash on hand to play the headright system in Virginia. A man could acquire wealth via marriage, and this may have explained the rise of the Smith plantations in Virginia. This was a common practice in Europe. An arranged marriage could bring power, property and payola to both parties in a marriage. We find examples in our tree where men married into money and, via a wife’s dowry, acquired a stake in her father’s fortune. There is no indication that either Immigrant Peeter Smith, or Peter of Yeocomico (b 1663) married into great wealth. Evidence indicates that each may have married into well-established families that circulated among the landed gentry of colonial Virginia, but nothing extraordinary. The Peter Smith/Jane Barnes union in England did not appear to be a lucrative arrangement. Peter of Yeocomico may have married Mary Bayley, daughter of Stephen Bailey, a successful man but not excessively wealthy. I know nothing about Peeter’s (b 1627) marital status. I do know he had a father in Berkshire, England named John Smith; not thee Captain John Smith of Jamestown.
Was our Peter of Yeocomico born in Westmoreland or did he come over on the boat? Before we speculate further on his parents and ancestry let’s look at what we don’t know about these early Smiths. We do not have any document recording the birth of Peter Smith of Yeocomico in Westmoreland or in England. There are Peter Smiths born in both locations, but the timing of their births does not necessarily jive with the timelines in our ancestor’s lives. We do not have a Baptismal Record from any of the Cople Parish churches for Peter of Yeocomico. We do not have the will of Peter Sr (of Potomac) at the time of his death in 1691. We do not have an accurate record of Peter of Potomac’s spouse, children or relatives. We do know our Peter of Yeocomico had a brother James and niece Hannah who married a Breel.
I was not content to stop my search at that point. It gnawed at me. So many of the men and women who came into the colonies could be readily traced back to Britain. Why not Peter Smith? I needed another source of information.
A Smith Coat of Arms
A coat of arms was a mark of heraldry in many nations where monarchies and aristocracy ruled the land. It was a symbol of wealth and power doled out with titles of nobility and deeds to property that could only be attained by permission of the crown.
The coat of arms was worn over a suit of armor much like a cape, draped over the shoulders for all to see and read. It was a bit like the wardrobe our Nascar drivers wear today, proclaiming their race team connection, corporate sponsors, love of God, fear of communism and patriotic fervor. Quite honestly, I find the coat of arms a bit troublesome, especially in a strategic sense. Do I really want to rage into battle advertising for all to see that I am not some errant peasant quibbling with a toothpick or garden hoe? I am, in fact, a wealthy knight worthy of slaughter. I might as well carry a large target on my chest. I am afraid I have a bit of George Bernard Shaw’s ‘Chocolate Cream Soldier’ (Arms and the Man) flowing through my veins.
The Peter Smith family coat of arms, pictured to the left, is identified by some authorities as belonging to Peter Smith Sr born in Swallowfield, Berkshire, England. He died on June 29, 1691 in Northumberland, Virginia. What constitutes an authority in this Age of the Internet, is a question this senior citizen can’t answer. I tend to be old school but view the world best when besot with farce. Family historians, David Smith and thee Maxtone Grahams verify that this coat of arms is legit. Whereas, I know that Maxtone Graham was heavily involved in writing script for the The Simpsons, I must accept everything Maxtone reports as valid and reputable. Right?
This coat of arms is unique to colonial Virginia and a variation on coats found in Britain. Let’s look closely at this image and reference online literature to better understand the message conveyed in this coat of arms. Remember, a coat of arms tells a family story, albeit brief. The coat often conveys a family ancestry, a clan link and family history. There may be clues in this singular image that provide a much needed “Aha!” moment, like the ‘Aha’ moment provided by Blind Billy Dawson just moments ago when Billy proved he could hit the side of a barn and took out the picture window that has framed my view of the river below.
When I zoom in on the coat of arms, the heads of two unicorns jump out at me in the shield. The use of the unicorn is historically associated with clans of Scotland and Yorkshire. The mythical unicorn seems an odd choice for a national symbol but leave it to the Scots with their love of myth and legend to impose such a title on the critter. The use of the unicorn began in the 12th century when William the First rode into battle with the unicorn emblazoned upon his armor. It had a chilling effect.
“WTF!” his wife exclaimed as William rose up one morning and donned the apparel for a day of battle. “What have they got you wearing? A damn unicorn? WHY? You will be the laughingstock. You fool. You’ll be coming home dead tonight I suppose. I might as well prepare for your wake!”
“It was Nike’s idea.” William said proudly. “Phil Knight thinks it will be just what we Scots need to tackle the English.”
“You tell Phil Knight to piss up my skirt. You should talk to Under Armour. I think that is exactly where they should stuff that coat of arms…. under your armor.”
William ignored the advice of his wife and proudly rode into battle. Ironically, as the man gained legendary status, especially in the years after his death, he became known as William the Lion. Today, the flag of England incorporates both the unicorn and the red lion as a symbol of the united land. United that is until someone in London thought Brexit was a profound idea.
The Museum of History in Edinburgh reports that:
“In Celtic mythology, the Unicorn of Scotland symbolized innocence and purity, healing powers, joy and even life itself, and was also seen as a symbol of masculinity and power. During the reign of King James III (1466 – 1488), gold coins were introduced that featured a Unicorn, and at the time of King James VI of Scotland’s succeeding of Elizabeth I of England, and the resulting effective union of the two countries, the Scottish Royal Arms featured two unicorns as shield supporters. In a gesture of unity, King James replaced the one on the left with an English lion.”
For whatever reason, Peter Smith’s coat of arms did not comport to the English standard. Eschewing the lion, Peter reverted to the original Celtic version and ensconced his shield with two unicorns. The Scots use of the unicorn carried over the Irish Sea to Eire as well. And this lends itself to one notion that the Smyths of Berkshire and Wiltshire were of Celtic stock who had migrated over the centuries from Scotland to Ireland and then into the hills of Wales and Wiltshire. We will follow that trail a bit later.
Also, in the shield we find a banner flowing from upper right to lower left, or vice versa if you are Japanese or Arabic. In heraldic terms the banner is referred to as a ‘bend’. Displayed in this ‘bend’ are three acorns. Again, Peter has taken liberty with a coat of arms that previously existed in Britain. The three acorns replaced three lozenges found on a Smyth coat of arms in England. A lozenge was an elongated diamond that could simply be decorative or could in fact refer to a cherished woman in the family tree. In any case Peter displayed three acorns.
Why three acorns rather than the three lozenges found on earlier coats? Some suggest, the acorns promised a sense of renewal: ‘Mighty oaks from little acorns grow.’ As this coat of arms was not found in Britain and is specifically designed by our Peter Smith, it is seen by some as symbolic of a new Smith line in the colony, a break from Britain, a break from the past, a fresh start. Others go so far as to ascribe a name for each acorn, presuming that Peter had three sons fathered in his new digs. I can’t buy that as much as I would like to. After a few more years of digging through the roots and another dram of Lagavulin, I may adopt the idea as my own. Let’s see. Peter, James and Nicholas. They were three brothers in the will of a Nicholas Smith (d 1727).
At the very bottom of the coat, beneath the shield, we find the motto preferred by Peter Smith. This motto is unique to his family alone and obviously conveys a message. Why did he choose these words in particular and why did he arrange the Latin in the manner he designed? If you can’t make the words out in the poor resolution that I offer it reads: “Esto tibi ipsi fidilis,” which in Latin translates as: “I need a bathroom.”
Editor’s note: Really? I think you need to take a break. You are trying to add humor to a very educational piece and I think you weaken your presence as an imminent scholar in these matters.
Author’s response:
Editor’s note: Doc had no response. He ran off instead to the bathroom, clutching his groin and mumbling, “The tamsulosin isn’t working.” I am afraid too much coffee does him in. First it clots his brain and secondly it makes him delusional. He thinks he is writing comedy for Letterman or Seinfeld. I don’t know. Send help. Please.
Author: Okay. I am back. Feeling much better. ‘Esto tibi ipsi fidilis’ when plugged into Google Translator comes out as “They will be faithful.” If we were to rearrange the four words and show it as, ‘Tibi ipsi esto fidelis” it translates as the famous, “To thine own self, be true,” as found in the work of Socrates and later, William Shakespeare (Hamlet, Act I scene 3).
In Hamlet, Polonius chides his son and gives him some sage advice as he embarks for France. One wonders if Peter Sr or his father received similarly sage advice when departing Britain for the New World adventure. I will expand on this motto once we examine the crest of this coat of arms. When I use the term crest, I don’t mean to confuse it with the crest a knight wore on his helmet when suited up in armor. In heraldic events like a grand jousting tournament knights strut their stuff and wear their crest of clan colors on their bascinet (helmet) along with the handkerchief of a fair maiden stuffed in their underwear or wrapped around their metal plated arms. That crest is a bit like the comb of a randy rooster.
To the top of the Smith coat we find an armored forearm rising, bent and clenching a broken sword, not an empty bottle of Guiness. A red rose (House of Lancaster) and floral badge wrapped around the hilt of the broken sword suggests a lost battle or forlorn struggle. The rose, like the unicorn, is of Scottish origin. One cannot imagine a proud knight riding into a fierce battle with a coat of arms or family flag of any kind depicting a broken sword. That just shouts, “I can’t hurt you. I am an emasculated toy boy, stripped of my might, worthless to this cause without a good sword. This will be the last time I use a product made in China!”
A brave knight would most certainly want to ride into battle giving the illusion, at least, that his sword was designed by the Vikings and forged by Normans of 5160 High Carbon Steel with Dual Tempered HRc 60 48-50 at the core.
So, the story, I believe, being told in this Peter Smith coat of arms is one of poetic symbolism. I prefer to think of this coat as a metaphor for the life experience of this man, his family and his fellow cavaliers. It doesn’t take my incredible training and expertise as a former custodian and Sunday school teacher to understand what Peter is conveying to all of us. This coat of arms, not found in Britain, was designed in Virginia where heraldry was dying out, but the aristocracy remained strong. It was designed by a man surrounded by peers, who like him, had been defeated despite a noble effort.
The motto, the roses wrapped around a broken sword and the acorns all suggest a sad tale. This coat of arms reveals a story of betrayal and despair. That the sword is broken suggests that a family was rendered powerless in battle or by rule of law, or both. This coat of arms evolved from the turmoil of the British Civil War and decades of Oliver Cromwell’s rule and it might suggest that the Smiths were victims, like so many in Virginia (c 1650) who had been loyal to the king. Such an interpretation is enhanced by the motto itself: “They shall remain faithful,” The words alone absolutely nail the attitude of those who fought on behalf of the king, faithful to the end. They remained faithful even as the Roundheads of Cromwell and Parliament gained the upper hand and annihilated the opposition. Presumably, Peter Smith Sr was on the losing side! His coat of arms now conveyed a political commentary befitting a Smith. And then, one night during a peaceful sleep my brain processed this little bit:
“Esto tibi ipsi fidilis” the words were whispered somewhere in Wernicke’s area of my brain. “Esto tibi ipsi fidilis. They will be faithful. Tibi ipsi esto fidelis. To thine own self be true.” The words repeated like a mantra in my brain. It was stuck, repeating itself like some inane lyric in the Sting song, Message in a Bottle. You may remember the song. “Sending out an SOS. Sending out an SOS. Sending out…” Yep, that song. It ended the song after about three more minutes of repetitive lyrical garbage. “Sending out an SOS.”
“Esto tibi ipsi fidilis. They will be faithful. Tibi ipsi esto fidelis. To thine own self be true.”
I awoke with a start and reached for my notebook. I jotted it down for posterity. It made sense to me. Peter Smith had been faithful to the King until there was no king to whom he could remain faithful and then it was every man for himself, “Tibi is esto fidelis,” to thine own self be true.
There is a second coat of arms attributed to a son of Peter Smith of Yeocomico, Thomas Smith. Thomas was the man who worked closely with George Mason IV on religious freedom issues in the Bill of Rights. The Thomas Smith coat of arms is described in the work of Jim and Charles Bolton in their seminal effort titled: Bolton’s American Armory (2009). The Thomas Smith coat was also found in the law library of his son, William Smith, one of the seven sons who moved to South Carolina. The coat of Thomas Smith is described as follows:
“Arg on a bend between 2 unicorns’ heads erased az [armed or] 3 fusels in bend of the last, a trefoil slipped for diff. Crest: an armored arm embowed holding a broken sword. Motto: Nil desperandum.”
An arg (short for argent) on a bend can be defined as a chevron on a banner. “3 fusels” refers to three pistols. Thomas had replaced the acorns of the previous century with three pistols. As he had lived through the Revolutionary War, it is quite likely he was conveying a message espoused in recent decades by Zhou Enlai and Mao Tse Tung: “Power grows out of the barrel of a gun.” Or in the words of Steven Tyler, Aerosmith, “Janie’s got a gun.” The motto is intriguing to me: ‘Nil desperandum,’ (Keep up your courage. Persevere and all will go well). Or, in more blue-collar terminology: ‘Don’t let the bastards grind you down.’ I like that. Not sure why Thomas went with that motto, but as the man leading the Baptist congregation in their battle for religious freedom, it just might have been the mantra that got him through some tough times.
My study of the coat of arms engaged both hemispheres of my addled brain, left and right spheres devoured all incoming data and images. A hypothesis emerged that could prove interesting. Are there actually three Peter Smiths that are in the family tree in the 1600s, grandfather, father and Peter of Yeocomico? One could suggest that Grandfather (Peeter, b. 1627) or Peter (b 1610) suffered through the British Civil War and came to Virginia in 1651, purchased lands in the Potomac ‘freshes’ and had Peter Smith Jr as a son. That Peter began acquiring properties in the 1670s and fathered Peter of Yeocomico (b 1680 or later).
In this scenario, Peter Smith II would have been conceived soon after the Battle of Dunbar and born less than a month before the Battle of Worcester. Was his father, Peeter, a Royalist, sympathetic to the efforts of the Scot force and Lancashires that attacked Cromwell’s positions in and about Worcester in 1651? Was Peeter one of the warriors taken prisoner and shipped to Virginia in 1651? The manifest for the ship that carried Peeter in 1651 was loaded with many young men between the ages of 18 and 28.
There is a Smythe coat of arms in England that bears the motto “Regi Semper Fidelis” – Always (faithful) True to the King. It projects the image of a stag as its crest and three Tudor roses on the shield. The Stag is known to be the emblem of an early Irish Chieftaincy.
As I edited the above paragraphs a few thoughts occurred to me about the design of the Smith Coat of Arms and how it might help in the creation of a Smith tree that more accurately represents our family in the 17th Century (1600s).
The Smiths in Virginia may have evolved from those families in Britain that also possessed unicorns in their coat of arms or similar mottos. Among the families known to have adopted the unicorn on their coat of arms were the Cunninghams of Scotland. It would be quite ironic if the Smiths and Cunninghams were kin. The ancestors of Matilda Montgomery engaged in 400 years of bloody awful warfare with the Cunninghams as a hated rival for power in the Scottish hills.
Was our immigrant ancestor an aristocrat, a middling yeoman or a peasant youth plucked off the streets by the Press Gang and shipped to the New World to rid England of another destitute punk rocker? Was he a Royalist fleeing the heavy hand of Oliver Cromwell? The timing was right for that escape. Many Brits, loyal to King Charles I, fled the island after the King gave his head for his country. Peter may have been seeking refuge in Virginia indentured to Thornbrough.
Peter of Yeocomico may have migrated from New England. That did happen from time to time as folks residing in the northern colony tired of cold winter weather, politics or religion. One such ancestor was of Mayflower fame, our first cousin Isaac Allerton (1627-1702). The son of Isaac Allerton and Fear Brewster, Isaac was born in Plymouth and died a wealthy man, a neighbor of Peter Smith in Westmoreland County, Va. Isaac established a southern plantation replete with slaves, tobacco, wharves and warehouses. Peter may have done the same.
Questions filled a legal pad as I pursued Peter Smith. “Where is Columbo when you need a good detective?” I mumbled to our dog, whose one mission in life is to be endlessly petted.
The Smith’s first neighborhood on the banks of the Potomac between Kinsale and Currioman was a veritable ‘Who’s Who’ of renegade Royalists lathered up and ready to protect their new digs. It is conceivable that Peter Sr or Senior’s father had been a part of one or more rebellions. There were other Smiths in Virginia who have been identified as being involved in the rebellion including Robert, William, Walter and John Smith (not Captain).
Author’s Note: Where Does our Research Go Next? I am hungry and suggest we pause here and head down to Clancy’s Stone Lion Inn in Custer, Wisconsin for a pint of Guinness, a Redbreast Whiskey and one of their fine corn beef briskets. It is as Irish as one can get in Central Wisconsin. Clancy played Rugby and Ice Hockey as a youngster and his mug and frame reveal the scars he earned as a warrior. I am going to guess the crease across his face was earned in a friendly game of hurling. Clancy personifies what I believe my great grandfather, John Benedict Hughes, possessed in terms of appearance and character.
The walls of Clancy’s pub are lined with pictures of mates and trophies earned on the pitch. His gait indicates that he took a few hits for the cause and his eyes twinkle when he recalls a moment from back in the day when men were men and women wore skirts. When the brisket is gone, and the Guinness has done its’ job, we will tackle a bit of his wife’s bread pudding, soaked in Jameson. We will savor every bite and it will put me over the top for driving home. Someone will have to ferry me home. The more we drink at Clancy’s the better prepared I will be for sorting through the archives and determining which man is buying and selling various properties. Sorting through the archives becomes entertaining; like unraveling Christmas tree lights on a frigid night, while perched on the uppermost wrung of a wooden ladder that should have become firewood long ago. A recent hip replacement prohibits me from climbing the ladder this year, so I will throw another log in the fireplace and pretend I am disappointed that I am not out there freezing my arse off.
Editor’s note: Doc doesn’t really drink all that much. He pretends to drink. Within these pages he poses as an Irish rogue. He wants to appear as though he is a gregarious, Guinness snorting Irish storyteller. Truth be told, he can handle a half pint of beer, at most. A half pint is all it takes, and he is full up for the evening. He enjoys a dram of Scotch now and then, a Jameson, Bushmill or Tullamore Dew, but not often. He really is a closet teetotaler.
Author’s response: You are messing with my brand.
Editor: Drink some more of the warm milk and laxative I made for you and let’s get back to writing family history.
Author’s response: What have you there?
Editor: This just arrived in the mail, Doc. You may want to check our life insurance policy before you go to this one.
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YOU ARE INVITED
What? Wilbur Rancidbatch Brewery announces the arrival of our latest homebrew: ‘The Second Coming’. I just put the final touches on a rhubarb-bacon beer that I think you all are going to love.
When: This Saturday or Sunday. Don’t know just yet. Depends.
Where: At my place. Follow the horse droppings.
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Author: Hmm. Should be interesting. We dodged the last one, his Watermelon Kale….
Editor: Oh My God. You’re going, aren’t you? You remember what happened the last time we went? Blind Billy insisted he could hit a clay pigeon with the Ruger over/under shotgun…
Author: Yes. Well, we all survived, somehow. And Wilbur did name his 14th child after our dog….
