Genealogy: Have you researched yours? Are you related to anyone notable?

My wife is related to Jesse James!!!

 

An uncle in my line
General William Lenoir
William Lenoir (1751-1839) was an American Revolutionary War officer and prominent statesman in late 18th-century and early 19th-century North Carolina. Both the City of Lenoir, North Carolina, and Lenoir County, North Carolina, are named for him. Additionally, Lenoir City, Tennessee, is jointly named for him and for his son, William Ballard Lenoir.

Family and Early Years
Lenoir was born the youngest of ten in a French Huguenot family in Brunswick County, Virginia, but the family moved to eastern North Carolina when he was nine years old. Lenoir had no formal education, but could read and write Latin, Greek, and French. His first occupation was that of teacher and schoolmaster, before he became a surveyor. While surveying in western North Carolina, Lenoir decided to permanently settle there. He brought with him his wife, Ann Ballard, and a baby daughter, when he arrived in March 1775. The Lenoirs had nine children in all.

Revolutionary War
Historian Samuel Ashe called Lenoir an "active and zealous and efficient supporter of the cause of independence." He served with distinction in the American Revolutionary War, in particular taking part in the Battle of Kings Mountain as a Captain in the militia. He received minor wounds at that battle. Otherwise, his military service consisted mostly of skirmishes with Loyalists and Cherokee Indians. He last saw action at Pyle's massacre, at which his horse was said to be the only American Patriot casualty.


Richard Bennett served as governor of Virginia (1652–1655), in the House of Burgesses (1629), and served two stints on the governor's Council (1642–1652; 1658–1675). Born into an English merchant family, he came to Virginia around 1628 to run his uncle's estate and set about acquiring thousands of acres of his own as well as importing Puritan settlers who helped provide him an important political base. In 1646, he led a force of Puritans to assist the exiled governor of Maryland and helped start a Puritan migration to the colony. Is an uncle in my line.

Major James Lide Coker (1837-1918) - Harvard educated industrialist and humanitarian; Civil War veteran; former SC State Representative. Founded Coker College is a distant cousin.

Just a few.

 

I'm related to Daniel Boone, and Paul Revere. According to my cousin (who participated in the DNA testing for our line) I am also descended from Niall of the Nine Hostages. Along with about half of the UK!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niall_of_the_Nine_Hostages

 

I have been working on our family tree all my life. We have connections on our tree to all 44 Presidents, Robert E Lee, Thomas Payne, Bill Hickok, John Wayne, and Isabell and Ferdinand. The generations increase geometrically as you go back, and the tree never ends.

 

SN has shared his family tree(s) with me and it is impressive.

I really don't know of anybody famous in my line, unless it was my great-grandfather, who was reputed to be the strongest man in the state of Tennessee in the late 1800s.

My great-grandmother married my g-grandpa Jim. Many years later, her mother married Jim's brother. So my gg-grandma Elizabeth was not only his mother-in-law, but also his sister-in-law.

My wife Janice claims kinship to the Plantagenet kings (Richard the Lion-Hearted, etc); Henry Hudson the explorer, Lady Diana Spencer, and Nathan Futrell, who, at age 8, was the youngest drummer boy in the Revolutionary war.

There are also a couple of old drunks in my line---but never mind.

 

One of my kids is interested in such things and had me submit my DNA to www.familytreedna.com They found several cousins we didn't know we had.

We had more photos of their side than they did. We didn't know the people in the photos.

 

I figure that I'm somehow related to Noah and Adam. I'd guess they are kind of notable.

 

This book http://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/loguen/loguen.html
is about a cousin of mine a black slave run away. His Father a white slave owner was an uncle in my line. The man who owned him and of which he ran away from (Mannasseth) was my gggg-grandfather. He seems to have been a hard man according to the book a heavy drinker and very mean to the slaves he owned in that state of drunkness. However his grandson became a baptist pastor in Vicksburg MS during the civil war.

While the slavery issue was a tragic part of our history and one that we should not be proud of this book gave me insight into my grandmothers family.

 

I have a French Count, a Revolutionary War ancestor who served at Valley Forge, another Revolutionary War ancestor who served in the Army of Virginia, my grandmother's family was driven to Oklahoma on the Trail of Tears, a gg grandfather who died during the Civil War....we're still working on our family ancestry. It is said, however, that we are related to Loretta Lynn....haven't done that branch yet.

 

very interesting. Also, I use to have a girlfriend that was related to Jesse James. Her last name was Read.
But I am related to a bunch of nobodies lol

 

Scotch from my father's side, Ulster Scotch Irish from Mom's side; no one notable that I'm aware of, there were several law enforcement officials, and, a long line of whiskey makers throughout E KY. My surname comes from three Scottish brothers who entered into KY through the Cumberland Gap in 1803.

 

I was born in Middlesboro. Wouldn't be surprised if we are related!

 

My family does not have any RENOWNED folk but good solid God fearing, hard working folk who did amazing things to endow their children with a better life, better oportunities etc....like emigrating to the Antipodes from a hard poor life in Prussia and took up axe and plough to carve a new life in Australia on my mother's side, and on dad's side left Scotland for New Zealand and anecdotely ploughed the first furrow on the Canterbury Plains.

I am very proud of my folks and feel humble at their bravery of boldly going on a long long and dangerous sea voyage to the ends of the earth, for not their benefit but for their descendants.

 

I was on Genforum and directed to it from a cousin I didn't know I had.

 

On my father's maternal side: Roger Williams founder of Rhode Island and Providence Plantation.... and a notable Baptist.

On my father's paternal side: 19th Century outlaws named Loomis of the Brookfield and Nine Mile Swamp fame.

 

On my fathers paternal side:

MARTIN, ABRAHAM (dit “l’Écossais” or “Maître Abraham”), pilot; b. 1589 in France; d. 8 Sept. 1664 at Quebec.
Martin arrived in New France with his wife, Marguerite Langlois, her sister Françoise and brother-in-law Pierre Desportes (the parents of Hélène Desportes) about 1620. Martin may have been of Scottish descent or he might have used the sobriquet if he had been enrolled in military service or had been a member of an illegal organization: such names were used to avoid detection by officials looking for deserted soldiers or in case the records of an illegal organization were seized. It is also possible that he acquired the name because he had made several voyages to Scotland as a young man. There is some question as to whether Martin was really an official pilot or not, although he was referred to as “king’s pilot” in his own day. However, he did fish well down into the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
It is presumed that the Plains (or Heights) of Abraham are named after Martin. It is picturesquely said that the “Côte d’Abraham” was the path that Martin used to descend to the St. Charles River to water his animals. His property amounted to 32 acres in all, 12 received from the Compagnie de la Nouvelle-France in 1635 and 20 as a gift from Sieur Adrien Du Chesne, ship’s surgeon to Pierre Legardeur de Repentigny in 1645. This land was sold by the Martin family to the Ursulines in 1667. It is possible that this is the same Martin who was employed by Jean de Biencourt and Du Gua de Monts as navigator on the coast of Acadia, although he would have been very young at that time. When David Kirke captured Quebec in 1629 and left his brother Lewis as governor until 1632, Martin and his family stayed on