MEDLIN CONNECTION WITH MAGNA CARTA SIGNERS

Question

RE:  JILL SUZANNE DEESE

I have checked my daughter's name with all signers of the Magna Carta and all but William Malet and William Mowbray (de Mowbray) are related through the Medlin line of South Carolina.

I would like to get the Magna Carta Tag attached to her Wikitree profile. How do I get the tag and check for accuracy?

Comments

Hi! So if I look at the list of gateway ancestors I don't see anyone with the surname "Medlin".  It helps if you post a relationship to the specific ancestor so we know who this is and we can help research the line.

I will note if the immigrant ancestor isn't in this list, they generally are not related to a MCA surety baron for various reasons and usually they end up being disconnected during this process.

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Kirk Hess has given you sound advice.

I am afraid it is not possible to be descended from all the Magna Carta Surety Barons, or even all but 2. 8 had no known descendants beyond the 4th generation.

I am also afraid that you cannot rely on all the information on WikiTree. Some is dubious or poorly-sourced.

There is a list of Gateway Ancestors at https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Category:Gateway_Ancestors. So what you need to do is establish how firm the evidence is for your daughter's descent from one of these. The scope of the Magna Carta Project stops at Gateway Ancestors - it does not extend to later profiles. Nor does it badge later profiles, or validate WikiTree members as descended from Surety Barons.

There are some stickers that can be used on profiles not managed by the Project at https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Magna_Carta_Stickers. But it would be sensible to use them only if you are confident that it is appropriate. And that, I am afraid, means research.

Or your daughter's profile can simply have words to the effect that she is shown by WikiTree as descended from a number of Magna Carta Surety Barons.

Answer 1

You asked : "I would like to get the Magna Carta Tag attached to her Wikitree profile. How do I get the tag and check for accuracy?"

Which Magna Carta tag ?  If you are referring to the member badge getting that requires joining and participating in the project.  There are participation requirements and pre-requisites for badged membership.  If you are referring to the Magna Carta G2G tag you can add that yourself.  By doing that you can follow G2G discussions related to the Magna Carta Project.  If you are looking for something to post on her profile to signify that she has (prospective) Magna Carta ancestry there are a few stickers that can be used as was pointed out by Michael in his response.

Checking for accuracy of a particular lineage however is a totally different matter, one that involves a great deal of time spent in research to "prove" each and every parent-child relationship along the trail between you (if that is your interest) and a Magna Carta surety baron.  It is not for the faint of heart and it can take years of research to find the proof that is required.  A task that can be very time consuming and challenging.  A task unfortunately that the Magna Carta project is not equipped to do on an undeveloped, and unproved personal lineage that goes through a questionable gateway ancestor.  If you can prove a direct relationship to a Magna Carta Gateway Ancestor that has a recognized Magna Carta lineage as documented in Douglas Richardson's book, ''Magna Carta Ancestry'' then half your work is done.  That would be a good thing because what is required to prove a line can be a challenging task even for a very experienced genealogist.  Don't be discouraged though because it's not impossible to find new Magna Carta lineages. It does occasionally happen but it can take a lot of personal research and time to "prove" or disprove those prospective lines.

Good luck and happy searching.

Answer 2

I have done a little delving. I see the WikiTree relationship finder is showing Willis Medlin, Medlin-170 as descended from, for example, Surety Baron John de Lacy. The line shown goes through a series of people with the last names Whitley, Wheatley and other variants of the name. Virtually all those Whitley etc profiles have no good source, and if you look at another effectively unsourced profile in the alleged line, Mary (Fiennes) Wheatley, Fiennes-107, you will see that there is no evidence for her husband having married anyone with the last name Fiennes - this is described as an internet fantasy. So a succession of generations are, at best, questionable. If you are finding connections through people with the last name Whitley etc, or through Mary (Fiennes) Wheatley, then I am afraid they are definitely not to be trusted.

I am sorry if this disheartens you. But you may still be able to establish a descent from a recognised Gateway descendant of a Surety Baron.

Comments

I'm going to disconnect her - Thomas Fiennes, 9th Baron Dacre's father Sir Thomas Fiennes d. when he was 13 and his only sister Anne m. John Mantell, who was hanged along with his brother-in-law on 29 June 1541. The note has been there for a few months about the problems with her parentage.

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Thank you, Kirk.

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If you encounter fictional people in these lines, the fiction should be identified and they should be moved to the Disproven Existence Project and disconnected so that others don't have false ancestors!

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Thanks, Jack. Kirk can comment further, but as I read it, this is not a case of disproven existence. It appears that the husband of Mary "Fiennes", Fiennes-107 had a wife called Mary. What appears to be the fantasy is that her LNAB was Fiennes, and she has been detached from her Fiennes parents: the evidence suggests the LNAB should be Unknown.

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I don't think this particular profile qualifies as 'disproven existence'? I only disproved her parents, she seems to have existed

The note in the profile says that there's no citation for her maiden name so I'll see about changing it.

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Thanks again, Kirk.

Answer 3

Jack is right...this whole tree seems like a total fabrication & needs to be managed by the Disproven Existence project.

If you look at these two G2Gs:

• Edward III Project: Gateway Ancestors - do you have one?
• Was Dorothy Wheatley Bliss really dau of Frank of Maiden Newton? Or John of Daventry?

The basic work is there finding various errors and fabrications - if you go through the Genealogy of the Wheatley Family 1902, pp. 10-13, there's all sorts of problems:

• A manor at Tingsboro, which Helen tried to find and couldn't. I think this was an attempt to reverse engineer Tyngsborogh, Massachussets as a place in Somserset.
• A Nathaniel Wheatleigh who was Sheriff in 1616, who I cannot find.
• A couple of sons attending Oxford who don't appear in the Alumni records
• A couple of priests whose parishes don't seem to exist.
• References to the Somerset visitation and this family doesn't have a entry the 16th and 17th century visitations.

I"m going to copy and paste this into a new G2G and tag it for the project to work on. Thanks!