Where to separate Henry Adams from the forged Ap Adams genealogy?

Question

The profile for English Immigrant Henry Adams (1583-1646) has a section on his disproven ancient ancestry, but he is still connected as an ancestor of John Reginald Ap Adam (Ap_Adam-18) and Elizabeth Gournay (De_Gournai-2). 

There is evidence for John Adams and Agnes Stone as Henry's parents, but every other profile going back to John Ap Adam seems to rely heavily on Ancestry Trees (which I can't see, I don't have a membership). Which ancestors of John Adams's are legitimate, and which are falsified? Where should those ancestors separate from the false Ap Adam genealogy? Where does the Ap Adam line of descendancy genuinely end? 

(I've tagged this Global Reunion as well, because Henry Adams is 39 steps removed from AJ by one count, and is probably connected in more ways than the one I've found, and we want to avoid false connections.)

Comments

http://www.archive.org/stream/ancestryofhenrya00fair/ancestryofhenrya00fair_djvu.txt

Please read this before we cut any more limbs off.

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As far as genealogical evidence goes, in light of the fact that this pedigree has since been demolished, its only value is the telling point that permission was refused to see the original document, reinforcing the conclusion that the entire Henry Adams ancestry is a fake.   It appears that some "gentleman" in England decided to falsify his own ancestry, and tacked Henry Adams onto his own family tree (as an imaginary brother) to make those dumb Americans accept the forgery.

Answer 1

From The Complete Peerage, 2nd revised edition, by G.E. Cokayne & Vicary Gibbs, vol 1, p. 181, the line of John ap Adam (Ap-Adam-18) ends with his great grandson John ap Adam (Ap_Adam-30) who is mentioned with his wife Margaret (surname unknown) in 1414-1415.  This John died without any issue 20 November 1424, making John Huntley, the son of his sister Elizabeth his heir.

There is no mention of Clara Powell or two sons William and Roger, as is mentioned in the Wikitree profile, so it would seem that they are either false or members of a different line that has been tacked on to the ap Adam line.

PS - someone is going to have to tell me how to link profiles to these answers - I never seem to get it right.

Comments

Ref: Lewis Keeler Leonard and Melvena Burris Leonard, Seven Hundred Ancestors (Privately published, 1975),Page: 1.

Ref: Andrew N. Adams, A Genealogical History of Henry Adams of Braintree, Massachusetts and His Descendants; Also John Adams of Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1632-1897 (Rutland, VT: Tuttle,1898 [Reprinted Newburyport, MA: Parker River Researchers, 1984].

Ref; New England Historical and Genealogical Register (Boston, MA: New England Historical and Genealogical Society),Vol. 7, pp. 39-40 (Jan 1853) "Pedigree of the Adams Family"

Answer 2

It's not proven or dis-proven. Truth is a hard thing to come by when looking into the past so far. We can only rely on what we read, information we gather and make our own conclusions. As one article read"a lot of records, deeds and wills are in private archives or destroyed and only some are public. This truth at Wiki seems to be a concensus of many people who have pooled the truth, that they/we Believe,  into these profiles. Thanks.

Comments

Not sure if this applies here (I'll look at the lineage soon), but wikitree policy is: if a person's parents are speculative, unbacked by evidence, then they should be de-linked but a wikilink to the alleged parents (with an explanation) should be inserted into the text of the biography.

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Okay, I've delinked Roger Adams (1392-1445)  http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Adams-340 from his alleged parents, adding links to the alleged parents into Roger's profile, together with two sources.

Please understand that I don't know if Roger's descent to the immigrant Henry Adams is correct.  There are sources out there, but not readily accessible online.

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Al,

Actually, the connection to the Ap Adams line was disproven in 1927 by J.G. Bartlett in his Henry Adams of Somersetshire, England & Braintree, Massachusetts. A digital version of this book is available to subscribers of Ancestry.com. You may be able to find a print copy near you through OpenLibrary.org.

On page 21, Bartlett demonstrates how the line of Ap Adams died out in 1424.

Later on, he describes his analysis of parish and probate records, which confirms that the lineage went like this (unless otherwise noted events took place in Barton St. David, Somersetshire):

1. Unknown Adams b abt 1475. Two sons-- Robert (who had no issue) and John:

2. John Adams b abt 1500-1505; m possibly Alys who was widow Alys Adams in 1542/3. 

3. Henry Adams b abt 1531 Barton David; died without a will after 1586; son John granted administration of his estate. May have married the Rose Adams who was buried 20 Sept. 1598.

4. John Adams, b abt 1555; buried 22 Mar 1603/4; will dated 19 Mar 1603/4; m Agnes, possibly Stone who was bur 15 Jan 1615/6. He had two sons and some daughters; he was estranged from his oldest son, John, and tried to control how his inheritance would go to the grandchildren, not the son. His second son was Henry Adams the emigrant. [John Schmeeckle: there is no son Jeremiah mentioned who could be brother of Henry.]

5. Henry Adams b abt 1583; named (unsuccessfully) executor of his father's will in 1604. m. 19 Oct 1609 Edith Squire. Records of baptisms of three children in Barton David (1612) and Kingweston (1622 and 1629)

The 1927 genealogy appears to be the best researched and documented history of the immigrant's ancestry, unless something more recent has added further details.

Because Henry did not emigrate until 1638, he is not yet documented by Robert Charles Anderson's Great Migration series, which currently only goes to 1635 or 6.

I therefore recommend following the lineage provided in the 1927 Bartlett book until better information can be located.

 

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Jillaine, what evidence is there that Henry Adams of Barton David and Kingweston was the same as Henry Adams of Braintree, Massachusetts?  It appears that Bartlett (1927) simply accepted on faith the groundless 1853 NEHGR "parents" of Henry Adams.  Maybe I'm wrong...

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Three of Henry's known children were baptized in Barton St. David and Kingweston. There is a marriage record of Henry Adams to Edith Squire in Charlton Mackrell (next to Barton/Kingweston) on 19 Oct 1609. Two of her sisters also married and emigrated to Massachusetts and future records indicate relations between Squire and Adams families. Their son Jonathan remained working on the farm of his Squire grandfather until about 1651. There are letters of attorney that describe a sibling relationship between this Jonathan and other of Henry's children. There are court docs in Massachusetts that also describe sibling relationships of Henry's children. And then there's Henry's 1646 will, which names his younger children-- the oldest probably having received their share at marriage.  All these, combined, support the link to the Barton St. David family.

The only reference Bartlett made to the 1853 genealogy was soundly refuting the Ap Adams claim.

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Thank you Jillaine, that seems conclusive.  I've edited the direct ancestry of Henry Adams to conform to Bartlett, who has clearly done his homework.

Answer 3

So far, I've been unable to find any mention of original source documentation linking Henry Adams of Braintree, Mass. to anyone in England.  Furthermore, I can't find any reference to original source documentation for the name of Henry's wife.  It seems that everything that has been written about his ancestry is derived from the false 1853 article in NEHGR, which was amplified by a 1927 genealogy by J. Gardner Bartlett,  Henry Adams of Somersetshire, England and Braintree, Mass.

The bogus 1853 NEHGR article is here: https://archive.org/stream/newenglandhisto12unkngoog#page/n40/mode/2up

From the chart in this article, it appears that the article's author, William Downing Bruce was descended from a George Adams, to whom he attached Henry Adams of Braintree as an imaginary brother, falsifying the American Adams ancestry as well as the earlier generations of his own ancestry. 

Wikipedia's article on Henry Adams is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Adams_%28Braintree%29#cite_note-3

The wikipedia article gives credence to the supposition that Henry Adams was the brother of Jeremiah Adams of Hartford, Connecticut, who came from Essex (as President John Quincy Adams supposed to be the origin of Henry), not Somerset.

Regarding Henry's wife, there is no evidence in Massachusetts for her given name, let alone her surname.  Andrew N. Adams's The Genealogical History of Henry Adams of Braintree, Mass., and his Descendants (1898)  states "The name of his wife is not known, nor where or when she died."  See http://www.henryadamsofbraintree.com/

I propose that, unless somebody can come up with some credible evidence for the origin, parents, and wife of Henry Adams, that they all be de-linked, with an explanation added to the text.

 

 

Comments

So at this point we need to find Rogers Parents and Henry's parents. If the line truely ended with John and (Clara)? I'll take your advice and dig a little deeper into Welsh history(1300) and also Henry.

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Al, I'm afraid it's not that simple.  The earlier Henry Adams (b. 1531) was allegedly the son of John and Alice Adams of Barton St. David (per Bartlett, who makes it clear that he is making logical speculations with an almost total lack of evidence).  Unfortunately, this John Adams got mixed up on wikitree with a different John Adams who died in 1577 in a different county, leaving a will -- see http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Adams-258

I delinked Henry from this bogus father, and created a profile for Henry's father John.  I'm afraid there's not much left of the ancestry of Henry Adams of Braintree.  If you can find additional well-sourced information, you're welcome to add it.

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John, see

http://www.wikitree.com/g2g/37164/what-will-it-take-to-clean-up-the-profile-of-henry-adams

For additional probs that still need resolving. Can you help there, too?

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(we think a bad merge was done at some point, merging two different Henry Adams families)

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I'll  sort it out, but maybe not until this weekend.  A lot of pots on the stove, have to give each one a stir...