Disproven existence notice - Guillaume William Witt - pre-1700: Or Merge? [closed]

Question

A profile for Guillaume William Witt-4074 was created about a year ago without sources and has not been edited despite a profile note. "Guillaume Witt originated with the Manakin Huguenot Society about 1922 but has now been disproven by the Society" (see William Witt-12 profile for copy of the email). Ancestry trees list him in over 22,000 trees with variations on his birth location and his wife. This issue is a companion to the profile for his mythical wife Daux-1 (now a disproven_existence profile).

My question is whether the profile should be merged into William Witt-12 or categorized as disproven_existence to help prevent future duplicates? Thank you for any help. Holly Witt

Comments

I believe this profile is ready to become part of the disproven_existence project. I have messaged the project. Let me know if anything appears to be missing.

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I'm confused by this. Clearly there was a William/Guillaume Witt that was Huguenot since his name appears on the Huguenot Manakin website: https://www.huguenotmanakin.org/huguenot-ancestors

Why would it be merged since the Huguenot Guillaume Witt did exist? And this William Witt has issue: https://www.huguenotmanakin.org/copy-of-old-registered-lineages

What am I missing here?

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We do not create fictional profiles on WikiTree, but when a fictional parallel to a real person exists, we sometimes retain the fictional person under "Disrpoven Existence" in order to clarify what is believed to be true and what is not.  In this case, those who have researched the topic have found no evidence that William Witt of Virginia was a Huguenot.  The site you linked to contains no sources.  There are many people who believe William was a Huguenot, but reliable documentation for this has not been found.  See the discussion on his profile under Research Notes and also Guillaume's profile.  

Nothing is ever "finished" on WikiTree.  If reliable evidence can be found making William a Huguenot, the appropriate changes can be made.  It's all a matter of research and documentation.

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Wanda, the link to the Manakin Huguenot Society are the names of ancestors whom people based their membership on in the past, NOT a list of documented Huguenots.  The Huguenot Society studied the original sources claiming Guillaume William Witt was born in France and a Huguenot and found them invalid, so a person can no longer use those sources to claim membership. 

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I find it odd that they have disproven this person since they haven't updated their website. In other words, I actually presume that people can still join with William Witt.

I would like to know why the Witt family was put on their list anyway. There must have been some documentation in the first place. Did this person live in the Huguenot village? Is there a possibility that the name was Anglicized and they don't know what the original was?

Remember that the Huguenots that came to Virginia first escaped to England (some to Ireland). When they got to England and how they got there varies greatly. Huguenots began to leave France in ~1550. During their stay in England many of them had their names Anglized there, and some of the Huguenots that came on the boats to Virginia had just gotten to England. Still there were Huguenots that escaped to the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland... and some of them got to England and then came to Virginia.

So the fact that William Witt wasn't born in France doesn't mean he wasn't a Huguenot.

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William Witt is a real person with real facts.  There is no evidence that he was a Huguenot.  We really want to have only documented facts for real people.  

Guillaume Witt, Huguenot, is a different profile.  None of the information associated with Guillaume Witt has documents. We have looked for documentation ands not found any.  Therefore he has been Labelled "Disproven Existence.":  

We chose to keep the two profiles because there is material about "Guillaume Witt", Huguenot, out on the internet which we did not want to get mixed up with William Witt, the real person.  Perhaps that was a mistake.  The alternative woudl be to merge the two profiles together and treat the fictional Guillaume Witt, Huguenot, material under Research Notes.  It should not be included under Biography because there is no documentation for it.

But how we deal with the information is secondary.   Getting it is primary.   There are certainly people who are attached to the idea of Huguenot ancestry, but no reliable documentation has yet been found for it.  The only way to really resolve the issue is to find the documentation.

Answer 1

Since the Huguenot Society has itself addressed this issue, it would seem to me appropriate for Disproven Existence.  The text for this profile -- and also his nonexistent wife, Daux-1 -- should include links to the profiles of real people he has been connected to in the past.

The best reason we keep Disproven Existence profiles is educational, so that people who had believed this was a profile of an ancestor learn why the person is not believed to have existed -- and who the real people involved might be.

Comments

Thank you Jack.

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Thank you, Jack, for this explanation. Is there a central repository, such as a URL, to observe profiles of alleged people whose existence has been disproven?

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The template which announces a person as "Disproven Existence" at the top of the profile, automatically enters the person in the Disproven Existence Category at the bottom of the profile.  Click on the Category and you should have a complete list of current Disproven Existence profiles.

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Thank you, Jack, for your reply.