Roots

How did I come to be here?

I know more about my mother’s family than my father’s family, so I’ll start there. My mother was Alice, the only child of Robert Lloyd Spiers and Sarah Lois Morris. Her father was the son of Robert Charles Spiers and Mary Alice Inman, my great-grandparents. I have a portrait of them. Before film and photographic paper were invented, they had a daguerreotype made. Years later but still long ago, it was photographed and printed on heavy stock that was then hand-painted to create a large portrait.  Robert lived from 1855 to 1906. His wife, Mary Alice, lived from 1860 to 1892. I would like to have known them. Both of them were born before the Civil War. The Civil War and slavery seem like ancient history, and yet my mother’s grandparents were born before the Civil War.

Mary Alice was the child of Francis William Inman and Mary Ann Louisa Mangum, my great-great-grandparents. Remember Mary Ann because I’m going to come back to her.

Francis William Inman, who lived from 1818 to 1873, was the son of Isham Inman and Nancy King. Isham was the son of Isiam Inman and Nancy Gibbons. Isiam was the child of John Inman and Sarah Anne Dawson, my g-g-g-g-g-grandparents.

Stay with me. Sarah Dawson was the daughter of Martin Dawson, and Martin was the son of Henry Dawson and Martha Martin. Henry was the son of William Dawson, who was born in England in 1599 and came to Virginia on the ship Discovery in 1621. I’ve seen the ship’s manifest. It brought cargo and about 20 passengers to the New World.

Now, it has nothing to do with me, but just as a side note, the captain of the Discovery was a man named Thomas Jones. On his previous voyage to the New World in 1620 he was captain of the Mayflower. Prior to that he was captain of the Falcon and, apparently, he was also a pirate. From the book The Mayflower And Her Log by Azel Ames:

He was under arrest for piracy, but the Earl of Warwick procured his release so that he could captain the MayFlower.

(Coincidentally, my amigo CyberDave has commented that the Earl of Warwick was an ancestor on his mother’s side of the family. His sister’s middle name is Warwick – a family tradition.)

I said I would come back to Mary Ann Louisa Mangum, my great-great-grandmother. Her great-grandmother was Rebecca Cotton who lived from 1756 to 1828. Tracing Rebecca’s ancestors finds her family name derived from De Cotentin. William De Cotentin lived in Normandy, France, from 1042 to 1105. Further back, there was an ancestor named Evon Ivan Cellomontensis, who lived in Normandy from 1026 to 1059. Evon lived in a village called Cotentin. His son adopted the last name De Cotentin (meaning “of Cotentin”). When some of his descendants moved to England, their family name changed to Cotten and then to Cotton.

Tracing Evon’s ancestors back another 12 generations, the family name changed several times and the last ancestor I found was named Waudbert De Lommois, who was born in France in 695 and died in 762. Supposedly.

If all that is true, it seems I’m from northern France by way of England. At least, a little part of me is. I find that mildly interesting but I take it with a large grain of salt. I think the important point here is that if 22 year old William Dawson hadn’t boarded the Discovery in 1621 and sailed to the New World, the present day could very well have found me singing God Save the Queen, drinking lukewarm beer, and – oh Lord – watching soccer on the telly.