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Royal News Since the Release of Royal Descents of 900 Immigrants to the American Colonies, Quebec, and the United States. 2nd Edition, by Gary Boyd Roberts. PART ONE

Royal Descents of 900 Immigrants to the American Colonies, Quebec, and the United States. Second Edition

After the new edition of The Royal Descents of 900 Immigrants went to press, HM Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain (see pp. 3, 4, 41, 321, 323, 546, 930, 1058, 1067, 1081, 1723) died 8 September 2022, aged 96. Her eldest son, HRH Prince Charles Philip Arthur George (now 73), previously Prince of Wales, became HM King Charles III of Great Britain (see pp. 209, 380, 655, 832, 930, 932, 1066, 1069, 1723). His second wife, Camila Rosemary (Shand) Parker Bowles, HRH The Duchess of Cornwall (now 75) (see pp. 655, 656, 930, 1066, 1069) became H.M. Camilla, Queen Consort of Great Britain, and King Charles’s elder son, HRH Prince William Arthur Philip Louis, Duke of Cambridge (now 40) (see pp. 25, 380, 864, 931, 932), was designated Prince of Wales by his father. The new Prince of Wales is thus the current heir to the throne, and his son HRH Prince George Alexander Louis (now 9) (see pp. 25, 380, 864, 931, 932) is second in line. 

In addition, a new issue (vol. 92, no. 1, dated January/April 2021, published August 2022) of The American Genealogist (TAG) was received by subscribers in mid-September. Three items are of considerable interest and would have been added to the second edition if this new issue had appeared earlier. 

Rev. Edward Norris of Salem, Mass. (RD900, pp. 491-492) had two wives, now identified as Elizabeth Staunton and Eleanor (Tilley?) (Shepherd) Clement, as shown by Hal Bradley (see RD900, p. xlviii), Lynn Cleaver, and Robert Battle (see RD900, p. xlvi) (TAG 92: 17-27). Thomas Warren, identified in previous works and on pp. 778-779 and 1025 of RD900, apparently died in England about 1645 without issue, as recorded in a complaint in Chancery by John Warren, gent., of Gray’s Inn, London, against John’s uncle Albert Warren, stating that Albert’s brother and John’s uncle Thomas Warren had died about a year and a half previously (and never immigrated to the Colonies). This document was found by Nathan W. Murphy (see RD900, p. lxii) (TAG 92: 72-77). A third article (TAG 92: 1-15, by Clifford L. Stott; see RD900, pp. 1005, 1034) begins a monograph on the royal descent (from Henry III, King of England, d. 1272, and Eleanor of Provence) of brothers John and William Sanborn/Samborne of Hampton, N.H. (Stephen, a third brother, evidently returned to England. The later history of Stephen’s two daughters born in New England is unknown; neither daughter appears in Clarence Almon Torrey’s New England Marriages Prior to 1700). John and William Sanborn can be easily added to p. 625 of RD900. Nicholas Tichborne and Anne White in the 11th generation of the descent to George Yate of Md. left a daughter, Dorothy Tichborne, who married John Samborne, had a son Richard Samborne who married Anne Milborne. Their son, a younger Richard Samborne, married Anne Ba(t)chiler, daughter of Rev. Stephen Batchelder, also of Hampton, N.H., often considered an “ur-father” of northern New England. Only Anne apparently emigrated to New England. The younger Richard and Anne’s son John Sanborn married Mary Tuck, and is an ancestor of President Gerald R. Ford, Jr. Richard and Anne’s younger son, William Samborne, married Mary Moulton and is an ancestor of First Lady Ellen Louise (Axson) WIlson, first wife of President [Thomas] Woodrow Wilson. The descents of Ford and Mrs. Wilson from Nicholas Tichborne and Anne White are outlined below. For sources, see Ancestors of American Presidents or the pertinent volumes of Executive Papers.

11. Anne White = Nicholas TIchborne

12. Dorothy Tichborne = John Samborne

13. Richard Samborne = Anne Milborne

14. Richard Samborne = Anne Bachiler/Batchelder of N.H.

15. John Sanborn of N.H. = Mary Tuck

16. John Sanborn, Jr. = Judith Coffin

17. Judith Sanborn = Ebenezer Gove

18. Edward Gove = Bethiah Clark

19. Nathaniel Gove = Susanna Stickney

20. Abigail Gove = William Chase

21. Polly Chase = Samuel Ayer

22. John Varnum Ayer = Elida Vanderburgh Manney

23. George Manney Ayer = Amy Gridley Butler

24. Adele Augusta Ayer = Levi Addison Gardner

25. Dorothy Ayer Gardner = (1) Leslie Lynch King; (2) Gerald Rudolf Ford

26. Leslie Lynch King, Jr., whose name was changed to Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr., 1913-2006, 38th U.S. President = Elizabeth Ann “Betty” (Bloomer) Warren


15. William Sanborn of N.H. (brother of John) = Mary Moulton

16. William Sanborn, Jr. = Mary Marston

17. John Sanborn = Ruth Robie

18. Jeremiah Sanborn = Lydia Dearborn

19. Mary Sanborn = Abraham Perkins

20. Meribah Perkins = Nathan Hoyt

21. Nathan Hoyt, Jr. = Margaret Bliss

22. Margaret Jane Hoyt = Samuel Edward Axson

23. Ellen Louise Axson = [Thomas] Woodrow Wilson, 1856-1924, 28th U.S. President

Among other recent journals, Connecticut Ancestry 65 (2022-23): 3 covers probable RD immigrant Henry Gregory, identifying his previously unknown wife as Margaret Turner.

As the books were arriving from the printer in late October, Alexander Bannerman, editor of Executive Papers: A Publication of The Hereditary Order of the Families of the Presidents and First Ladies of America, during further investigation into the ancestry of Theodore Roosevelt, found an online monograph by Willem Frijhoff, “Govert Loockermans (1617?-1671?) and His Relatives: How an adolescent from Turnhout worked his way up in the New World” (revised 7 Jan. 2016), translated from Dutch, on https://www.newnetherlandinstitute.org. Fridhoff’s arguments convinced Bannerman that Maria Duncanson, a third new RD immigrant, was indeed also a daughter of James Duncanson and Helen Livingston (RD900, p. 248). Maria married (1) Jan MacFasse, also a Scot, and (2) Pieter Janse Loockermans. Their daughter, Anna Loockermans, is ancestor #155 of Theodore Roosevelt, as follows:

10. Maria Duncanson of N.Y. (see RD900, 2nd ed., p. 248, and Executive Papers 7 [2010]: 77)

      = (1) Jan MacFasse; (2) Pieter Janse Loockermans

11. Anna Loockermans = Adam Winne

12. Catelyntje (Catherine) Winne = Christoffel Yates

13. Johannes G. Yates = Rebecca Waldron

14. Angeltje (Angelina) Yates = Cornelius Van Schaack, Jr.

14. Maria Van Schaack = James J(acobus) Roosevelt

15. Cornelius Van Schaick Roosevelt = Margaret Barnhill

16. Theodore Roosevelt = Martha Bulloch

17. Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., 26th U.S. President, 1858-1919

       = (1) Alice Hathaway Lee; (2) Edith Kermit Carow

In response to this last new discovery, Bannerman has prepared “The Identity of Maria, Second Wife of Peter Jacobse Loockermans of Albany, New York,” to appear in Executive Papers 20 (2023). Another new immigrant brought to my attention by Bannerman is Abel Browne of Maryland, whose wife is unknown, son of Robert and Sarah (____) Browne of Bermuda, nephew of Nathaniel Browne of Connecticut, and grandson of Percy Browne and Anne Rich (see RD900, 2nd ed., pp. 653, 656 and Maryland Genealogical Society Bulletin 46 [2005]: 1-13). Bannerman has also traced lines for First Ladies Mamie Eisenhower and Nancy Reagan from Mrs. Elizabeth Stoughton Scudder Chamberlain of Massachusetts, for whom both editions of RD900 suggest a speculative royal descent (Executive Papers 12 [2015]: 70).

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