I'm currently wrestling with
one of those family stories that get passed from generation to
generation by word of mouth, often with absolutely no supporting
evidence - at least, none that lasts as long as the stories. I'm
99 per cent sure (maybe even surer) that this particular story
is untrue. Still, if even a small part of it is accurate, it could
open up some new avenues of research for me. So, I wrestle.
Every family has such tales. I grew up thinking that I descended
from President Grover Cleveland. I didn't. I am related, in
the sense that my great grandmother was a Massachusetts Cleveland,
but her and Grover's lines diverged pretty early. Any gene pool
I share with the former President is a pretty small one.
I also grew up thinking that my Gordon ancestors in Scotland
left me a castle that I could claim if I would just pay the Scottish
Government the back taxes owed on the place. The oft-repeated
story was that, every so often, family members would get letters
from Scotland concerning ownership of the castle, and the Government's
desire for someone to take it off their hands. I never saw a letter,
and I occasionally wondered how anyone in our family had been
tracked down. We only had one Gordon family that reached America
- John Gordon reportedly came to the United States after his father
disowned him for joining the Mormons - and only part of that family
came because John's sons were not enthusiastic about their father's
new religion, and stayed behind in Scotland with their grandparents.
In any event, by my time the Gordon name had been absent from
the family tree for six or seven generations. The little I've
since learned about our Gordons makes me doubt they were of the
castle-owning branch of the clan.
If you're not serious about your genealogy, these family tales
are harmless and fun - and sometimes more exciting than real life.
But if you really want to identify the branches and twigs on your
family tree, they can be confusing and frustrating. Maybe the
worst aspect of them is that it's often impossible to completely
discount them. There must be something behind them, you
think, even if the story has become muddled since its inception.
My Grover Cleveland story is probably easily explained, and discarded:
Grover was a Cleveland, my great grandmother was a Cleveland -
ergo..... Somebody just speculated, and it became family
lore. Similarly, I imagine a large proportion of the Lincolns in the
country (and it is a very big clan!) think they are descended from President Abe. But what
about the Gordon castle? It doesn't seem like a story that would
have developed out of thin air, does it? And that's why I keep
wrestling with an almost certainly wrong story about Nova Scotia
in the 1700s.
* * *
I think my favorite story of "family history" run
amok has its beginning in Philadelphia just before the Revolutionary
War. These are the details as published in a Trenton, New Jersey
newspaper in 1933. The narrator's grandfather, Kollock McCully,
was from a Philadelphia Quaker family. As Quakers, they would
not actively fight for either side in the war, but their sympathies
were with the Loyalists who opposed war with Britain. Rebels broke
into the McCully home in Philadelphia, and killed Kollock's father.
Kollock reportedly barely escaped the mob by jumping out a window,
wearing only his night clothes. He made his way to British headquarters,
and enlisted to fight for the King. For his services, he was granted
land in New Brunswick, Canada. Later, during the War of 1812,
he commanded the Kent County militia against the Americans. After
the Revolution, two of Kollock's sisters came to Saint John, New
Brunswick, and settled there.
Pretty good tale, right? Lots of good, concrete details, right?
Best of all, the story is only two generations old, not some tale
out of deep family obscurity. If not completely true, it must
be pretty close.
Well, there are a few problems with it:
1. The Philadelphia family were not Quakers; in fact, at
least two from the Revolutionary period were Presbyterian clergy.
2. Family sympathies were not with the Loyalists. Probably
a dozen or more served in the rebel army.
3. Kollock's father was not killed by a mob. He died a traditional
death before the Revolution.
4. Kollock did not flee to the British before an angry
mob. He very purposefully went over to the British camp, taking
his family with him. In fact, he enlisted two of his sons in the
Army with him, even though one of them was too young to actually
serve.
5. He did serve with the British through the Revolutionary
War, and was granted land in New Brunswick. He didn't command
the Kent County militia - that was his son. I don't think the
Kent County militia saw any real service during the War of 1812.
6. His sisters did not move to Saint John, after the Revolution;
it was his daughters.
So, maybe the story isn't quite as accurate as it first looked.
It's still a good story.
* * *
Oh, there is one other thing I should mention: there was no "Kollock McCully." There were two grandfathers - William McCully, a farmer in Kent County, New Brunswick, who apparently had nothing to do with any war; and Simon Kollock, who did fight in the British Army, and whose "crimes" (by rebel standards) were so great that he was one of the few Loyalists not granted repatriation after the war.
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