Francis Poythress "came to Virginia about 1633, and patented lands on James river, in that part of Charles City county now known as Prince George. He was burgess for Charles City county in 1645 and 1647, and for Northumberland county in 1649. He had the rank of captain. [Francis] married, and had a daughter who married Thomas Rolfe and a son Francis."[1]
The Francis Poythress who is a Jamestowne Qualifying Ancestor was Burgess for Charles City County and then Northumberland County.[2]
Unsourced
Information presented in this profile needs better sources. The dates and locations appear to be primarily supported by Ancestry sources: An Ancestry link is not a source & the sources from Ancestry that are cited are not considered reliable.[3]
Conflated
Many profiles for France Poythress were merged. Some of the information appears to be for people other than the Francis Poythress born 12 July 1609 in Newent, Gloucestershire, England and died in Virginia in circa 1651. (From information in datafields as of 1 March 2019.)
For example, the text for this profile notes that he immigrated to Virginia in 1639, yet records for a Francis Poythress in Virginia exist prior to that (see Facts, below), which fits better with an imported bit of information that he immigrated in 1633.
The following sections - Imported Information and Facts - are intended to present information not supported by a reliable source and facts that are, whether or not they belong to a particular Francis Poythress. The next step will be to attempt to find reliable sources for imported information, moving the information to the Facts section when supported by a reliable source; then the task will be to sort what facts go with which Francis (it is supposed that the Francis Poythress who was Burgess for Charles City County in the 1640s left a string of descendants named Francis Poythress; it is likely that Poythress siblings of every generation also left descendants named Francis Poythress).
Imported Information
There are various dates and places for Frances' birth (ranging from 1610 and 1614 in Virginia to 1614 in England. He arrived in Virginia in 1639. Frances died 1661 in Charles City, VA, USA.[citation needed]
1661, Charles City, Charles, Virginia, United States[7]
A comment citing a Rootsweb link that can no longer be accessed[8] noted that research by R. Bolling Batte implies that the Francis Poythress who married Rebecca died in England after December 1688 (based on a Dec. 1688 court case mentioning that "Poythress shortly afterward went to England and died".
Facts
Baptism:
"b. 1609 Newent, Gloucestershire. Baptismal record from St. Mary's Parish, Newent, Bishop's Transcripts book for year 1609: 'ffrancis poythres the sonne of John Poythres was baptised the 12. day of July'. -Source: researcher John M. Poythress"[9][10]
In Virginia:
A Francis Poythress was in Charles City County, Virginia by 16 July 1637, when "Francis Poythers" received a patent for land there that was "bounded on the West by Bayle’s Creek; and bounded on the East by the land of Captain Woodliffe."[11]
A Francis Poythress was Burgess for Charles City County, 1644-1645:[11][2]
Gale Research, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, 1500s-1900s (Ancestry Online publication, 2009). Original data: Filby, P. William, ed.. Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, 1500s-1900s. Farmington Hills, MI, USA: Gale Research, 2009.
Yates Publishing, U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900 (Ancestry Online publication, 2004).
Wikipedia: Jane Rolfe. Source citations for her parents:
Snow, Megan (May 2003). "Thomas Rolfe" [link]. Historic Jamestowne. National Park Service. Retrieved August 31, 2011.
Pecquet du Bellet, Louise (1907). "Bolling Family". Some prominent Virginia families [link]. Lynchburg, VA: J.P. Bell Co. p. 304. Retrieved August 31, 2011.
"The Descendants of Pocahontas: An Unclosed Case", by Elizabeth Vann Moore and Richard Slatten, Magazine of Virginia Genealogy, XXIII, no.3, pp. 3–16, cited by John Frederick Dorman, Adventurers of Purse and Person, 4th ed., Vol. 3, p. 26, fn23–24. Moore and Slatten traced the suggestion that his wife was a Poythress back to a comment by W. G. Stanard in "Abstracts of Virginia Land Patents", Virginia Historical Magazine (I, 1894, 446–447): "His wife is said to have been a Miss Poythress (if so, doubtless a daughter of Francis Poythress." According to Moore and Slatten, Stanard cited as evidence handwritten notes on the flyleaf of a copy of A Complete Collection of All the Laws of Virginia Now in Force Carefully Copied from the Assembled Records (London, 168[?], now in the Library of Virginia. Moore and Slatten state: "Interestingly, Thomas Rolfe here is recorded as married to a 'Miss Payers'. We recall that in John Rolfe's will the name of his third wife is spelt Pyers (Peirce) and that it was John who married a "Jane". Here again a Bolling descendant confused the son with his father. Not recognizing the name 'Payers' as another variant of Peirce, someone searched the records for a name beginning with 'P' and having a 'y' in the first syllable. Francis Poythress lived in adjacent Charles City County and his name ended in s! Stanard wrote, 'His wife is said to have been a Miss Poythress (if so, doubtless a daughter of Francis Poythress).' (VMHB I, 446) Wyndham Robertson, a Bolling descendant, wrote in Pocahontas Alias Mataoke and Her Descendants (Richmond, 1887), 'I adopt "Jane Poythress" (not "Poyers") whom he is stated in the Bolling Memoirs to have married in England.' He added in justification of his charming adoption of an ancestress, '...no such name as "Poyers" is anywhere known ... the family of Poythress was already settled in Virginia.' ... The result has been the acceptance of a non-existent personage, 'Jane Poythress', in the Bibles of Virginia genealogy, as the bona fide ancestress of many illustrious Virginians. Who the wife (or wives) of Thomas Rolfe may have been remains an unanswered question."
Source: S-1601358972 Repository: #R-1690532405 Title: Ancestry Family Trees Publication: Online publication - Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com. Original data: Family Tree files submitted by Ancestry members. Note: This information comes from 1 or more individual Ancestry Family Tree files. This source citation points you to a current version of those files. Note: The owners of these tree files may have removed or changed information since this source citation was created. Page: Ancestry Family Tree Data: Text: http://trees.ancestry.com/pt/AMTCitationRedir.aspx?tid=48729764&pid=373
There is nothing to suggest that this Francis that was baptised in Newent, Gloucestershire, is in fact the same person who came to Virginia. In fact the baptismal entry states that his father was John., not Joshua.
Francis married Mary... maiden name unknown, who married (2) Robert Wynne.
This means that Francis could not have been married to two different women who both died after he did.
Mary Sloman's profile has her born 1610, died 1675. So does the profile for Alice Payton, which calls her Mary.
Lots of text on Mary Sloman's profile, although not much proof. I found a couple of online trees that had an Alice Payton, but no sources. Could it be that the two profiles are actually intended to represent the same wife of Francis Poythress, but one proposing her maiden name as Sloman and one as Payton? If so, then maybe his wife's profile should have the LNAB "Unknown" with both possibilities addressed in the text of a single profile.
Poythress-5 and Poythress-115 appear to represent the same person because: these were set as rejected but they appear to be intended to represent the same person, despite the different birth years (they're attached to the same mother & are both shown as died in Virginia, within a year of each other). If they're not intended to be the same person, please add notes about who's the son of Susan/who died c1650 in Virginia. Thanks!
This means that Francis could not have been married to two different women who both died after he did.
Mary Sloman's profile has her born 1610, died 1675. So does the profile for Alice Payton, which calls her Mary.
Lots of text on Mary Sloman's profile, although not much proof. I found a couple of online trees that had an Alice Payton, but no sources. Could it be that the two profiles are actually intended to represent the same wife of Francis Poythress, but one proposing her maiden name as Sloman and one as Payton? If so, then maybe his wife's profile should have the LNAB "Unknown" with both possibilities addressed in the text of a single profile.
need sources for his children... but I'll be detaching the Wynne profiles:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Rolfe says her mother was not a Poythress (see text in profile... last entry under sources)
https://lists.rootsweb.com/hyperkitty/list [email address removed] thread/15957378/
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The link Jeanne post in Dec. 2014 is viewable at https://web.archive.org/web/20150216014807/http://www.tc.umn.edu/~timsx001/batte.html
The one I posted in May 2016 is viewable at https://web.archive.org/web/20160805174154/http://www.tc.umn.edu/~timsx001/date1633.html