October 2020
Many years ago my mother handed me this (what I now call faulty Penington Chart. The only Good thing about receiving this piece of paper was the inspiration it afforded me to find out if the links portrayed were accurate. This then took me on a fantastic journey of learning— better than anything offered to me in grade school and beyond.
The bottom half is the only part I personally have been able to prove with a PAPER trail. That was the easy part since these folks lived in more recent times. The upper part with Sir Isaac Penington is also probably accurate proven by documents in England combed over by professional genealogist. Luckily we can see some of those documents images on the internet. Isaac Penington's family has realms written about them.
The Bad, but important part to all fellow researchers for this particular line of Peningtons is that the family connection to Sir Isaac does NOT exist as drawn. Sir Isaac’s son William did not have a son named Robert who settled on the Sassafras River in Cecil Co MD. That line drawn on the chart a false and untrue link.
Further more, the middle links appear to be inaccurate as well.
Years of research done by more dedicated MD/DE genealogist than I, have compiled mountains of copies containing land deeds and wills of Penington and related families. They have compare notes and theories for over fifty years. Without a good paper trail, it is very hard to place the plethora of William, Robert, John, Edward and Henry Peningtons in MD alone. They have done an amazing job and their standards for researching are to be admired by all fellow searchers and emulated.
The REALLY UGLY part is that in my naivety by sharing this with the Pennington Research Association and on my website was that distant family ‘cousins’ (of the cut and paste variety) were not interested in going on the same educational journey I was taking. They just took the path of least resistance and thought this chart was true and accurate without trying to verify it with any investigation on their own part.
The misinformation taken from the chart has spread like a Covid 19 virus on several genealogical sites distorting future family research. Therefore, I owe a huge apology to those amazing Maryland/Delaware researchers. I admire them for not throwing their hands up in despair.
Let me start at the top of the chart. It appears that:
Sir Isaac the Mayor of London had sons and several daughters (only covering two names that appear on the chart):
I will emphasize again- the link of our family tree on the bottom to Sir Isaac is void! Also there appears to be NO Robert who came directly from England and settled on Sassafras’s Neck in MD. There are Peningtons named Robert in Cecil Co. associated with the Henry who first settled near the Sassafras and Bohemia Rivers in 1660. However, we do not know where this Henry immigrated from in England.
It’s my theory that this chart was drawn up around the date of 1859 for the
family of Captain Samuel Penington residing in Middletown DE. Samuel was a very
wealthy farmer owning a five acre working farm in the middle of the town. There
were three farm stores and a mercantile/home at the corner of Main and Broad
Streets where the now defunct Bank of Delaware was built in the early 1900’s.
These genealogical charts may have been all the rage in the 1800’s for the wealthier families in the area. Not sure who gathered and presented this information to the family, could have been helped by a combination of family bible info and just plain WISHFUL thinking on the family’s part to be connected to this FAMOUS Quaker linage as portrayed on the Chart. Maybe the presenter even got payed more if something ‘wonderful’ could be discovered. I do not think they had the means to go sort it all out in England or the MD archives were open to the public. This was just around the time of the Civil War, so I would think the family might be hunkering down on financial expenses in uncertain times.
In practical aspects, how far could the those living in1850 remember back? Probably the same as us today who showed no interest in our roots until the older relatives are dead and you can’t ask questions. I personally was fortunate to know my two sets of grandparents. But my mother had NO clue who her grandfather was. He was over fifty when she was born and his parents were twenty years long gone before his marriage. He did not even write their names on the marriage license, both boxes were blank.
I surmise that the families back then kept records of births, marriages, and deaths in those huge family bibles that were so popular. I did come into possession of our Penington family bible but the records only started with Capt. Samuel’s family. More likely it was family stories told over and over around the dinning room table that kept the relatives alive in memories . Families did that type of activity, ‘talking’ before we all got sucked into the internet and streaming.
My first road trip on this educational journey was to find the head stone
reported on the Chart to be in Old Drawyers. I parked the car in front of the
beautiful old brick church and started to walk up the left side of the path
reading the headstones and only a few stones from the start of my trail was
BINGO moment one— Samuel Penington was six stones away from the front door.
Later discoveries in the church archives and newspapers put more color to the story. I discovered Samuel (Odessa) was buried next to his first wife Rebecca Meldrum and her family. It appears that his connection to this church are fundamental- since in its written history the bricks for this church “‘being burnt’ on Meldrum farm now owned by Samuel Penington.” I was never able to find the foundations of that kiln. As a potter for 25 years, that was a huge disappointment.
Then I was off to the Forest Cemetery a few miles away where I remembered my
grandmother’s grave was located. Copying all the info on the markers in the
large designated Penington plot, I had fuel for my next stop— the local
newspaper archives.
The Middletown Transcript became my friend at the Odessa Library finding obituaries and the voyage of 20 years reading my hometown newspaper from start to finish. You can learn a lot about your family from the gossip column. All those amazing articles I read in the newspaper put a lot more color into all those grey headstones in the cemetery. I digress…
Capt. Samuel was six years old when his father Samuel died. He must have known his father was buried in front of Old Drawyers church and who his mother was since Capt. Sam’s first born son, Clarence B who died at age eleven is buried in a place of honor next to his grandmother Hannah, Samuel’s second wife and Capt. Samuel’s mother.
This same church Old Drawyers is connected historically to the offshoot of the
Forest Presbyterian Church that Capt. Samuel was a founding Trustee August 24,
1851. His name is carved on one dedication stones inside the church. In Capt.
Sam’s obituary there is a mentioned of his parents and his sister names.
Next stop was the archives to find the next link for Robert on the Chart. Robert Penington, MD Will Bk. 6:231-4 10 June 1800, recorded a detail description of Robert’s heirs. The confirming link was the mention of Margaret B. daughter of Samuel. She was the only child by his first wife Rebecca born 1799. That was my second BINGO moment. Other Documents later discovered refer to this Robert as ‘Robert of Wm.’
Next it was of to St Stephens Churchyard to find a grave marker for Robert of Wm. Here’s where the chart has BAD information.
There is NO such headstone in St Stephens Churchyard. There were several Peningtons stones associated with Hyland Biddle Penington’s side of the family. The St Stephens Church records does not contain any recorded burials of the Robert, William, William, Robert (of Wm) shown on the middle of the Chart. You might want to think the stones were destroyed like I have found in other cemeteries but the church records usually don’t forget to record burials, even on a rainy day.
Those amazing Penington researchers, I mentioned before, knew right away this Chart was FLAWED in the middle and therefore not a direct link back to Sir Isaac. I have come to the same conclusion. It just took me longer with on and of interest in researching.
Did my family fall victim to wanting to be related to someone famous? Everyone wants to related to some one famous like Charlemagne or Alfred the Great. However, even if the chart has inaccurate information, it should not stop me from trying to find the next link. After all, Robert of Wm probably had parents just like the rest of us. They are going to be harder to find. Like most people who like puzzles, it that one piece you keep looking for in the hopes of making the picture of the family’s linage whole.
There are many theories as to the parents of this Robert of Wm. b 1740. If the chart would suggest it’s two Williams in a row, there are a couple of possibilities. One possible candidate could be the William born 1717 to William Penington who married in the year 1713 to Mary Atkey. The timing and locations seems appropriate but with very little in land transfers to link to my Robert of Wm, it may never be a firm paper proven connection.
Robert of Wm land records start in 1789 for a re-survey of land named Coster’s Harbour, Good Luck, Wheelers Warren. Then he dies eleven years later in 1800. Samuel is executor of his will. Samuel marries Rebecca Meldrum and resides in Odessa DE in the1800’s. Then dies 23 years later in DE.
I am left with more research to do but fear that there are no more written records to find especially since those MD/DE researchers haven’t uncover them by now. Maybe some forgotten trunk in some forgotten attic has a bible or family letters that still will see the light of day. However, I am not hopeful.
You might ask why write this narrative. In a way it’s an apology for any miss information that is out there on the web generated by this Chart. And, it’s an update for my family who still think they are related to Sir Isaac.
The best part of this chart was the journey it has taken me on and any future learning experiences I have in front of me. I would have loved to had this family information while I was in those boring history classes so I could have related how events caused my family to make decisions. Why did Samuel move to Odessa? Did he not want to live on his mother’s farm? She was there four more years as a widow. Was the Meldrum farm he married into bigger and better? Did he meet his wife through friends, family or church? Did his mother not like Rebecca? Oh, those dinner conversations might be rich with details.
The REALLY UGLY part of this experience is the ‘virus’ that has infected lineages all over the internet with poorly non-sourced links that will never be cleaned up. When I started out I tried to have two paper proofs for every link. That was an admirable goal but impossible. When Ancestry.com came online everyone seemed to think it was all verified information. I always took the links especially those with NO sources with a gain of salt and used them as mere suggestions for further research.
I rest my case to my family about this infamous Chart….Buyer be very wary. There is no direct family link to Sir Isaac Penington. Sorry. There are better things to learn about this family……
Like the unreadable stone in the Forest Penington plot which marks the grave
of my grandmother Addie Penington’s older sister Mary Geneva who died at age 14.
Mary's obituary from the Middletown Transcript speaks of a young girl of many
virtues and beloved by all who knew her. She died of peritonitis caused by a
bruise resulting from a fall on the ice during the winter. She lies at rest in
the Forest Cemetery between her mother and grandmother for whom she was named.
My Grandmother never told me about losing her older sister and how that may have
impacted her life. I guess I was too young or the pain was still too real.
There were three clipped articles about Mary’s death saved in the box of photos I inherited along with a letter to Capt. Samuel from Mary’s father Franklin writing about the grief the family was experiencing having this beloved child so ill and there was nothing the doctors could do. What a profound loss. Those were the only obituary clippings my grandmother ever saved. Speaks volumes.
Grandmother took the time to label every picture in the box of family photos. Those images really added more colors to the stories I read in the gossip column. Thank you Grandmother Addie Penington Voshell for that amazing gift.
I alway thought if I could travel in a time machine, most might want to visit
George Washington or Mr Lincoln; however, I would choose to visit my two
Grandmothers and ask the questions I now know I need to ask them. Where would
you go in a time machine? Which ancestor intrigues you the most?