I am interweaving my response between the several points of your post:
Steve Davis wrote:
John German;
FICTIONAL? Strong words for a hunch. My genealogist Aunt Elma Maltzberger must be
turning over in her grave. Perhaps there is a better explanation.
I'm not sure why I'm the one to respond to this, since my Robbins branch is 90%
maternal and I'm barely a Robbins descendant, but here goes ....
I'm no expert, and you are obviously some kind of genealogy guru to feel it your duty
and obligation to report warnings of myths, fraud and fiction in my family tree.
Steve,
"my family tree"?! You are not the only descendant of the Robbins family
of Rowan and Randolph Cos., NC, and your sarcastic remarks about my
freely sharing of my research are neither appropriate or helpful. If you
have sources that contradict what I am finding then please post them so
they can be examined and weighed against contrary sources. Actually I
was not going to insert myself into this thread until Nelda mentioned
DNA testing and I believed it would be helpful to point out that
descendants of Richard Robbins have participated in the Robins DNA
project and to comment on those results.
I am an amateur at this, and I admit that the family records relating
to the Robbins side of my family are from many sources, known and unknown, and were
summarized by my aunt in the 1940's, but her research was extensive for her time, and
the history was passed down as gospel by a lot of people who were generations closer to
the truth than either of us.
I would encourage you to examine your aunt's notes to see what she
actually found or who she interviewed; all the while watching for what
seems original vs. what has simply been copied from already compiled
genealogies. I would also watch for what might have been added to your
aunt's research by others who may have been trying to compile her
efforts into a nice clean set of charts with no source citings.
That said, I am always open to any good discussion.
Great! That is encouraging.
If what you say is true, someone went to a lot of work to concoct
quite a tale. Are you saying that the family records that say that Richard Robbins, his
brother Elisha Robbins, and the possible third brother, who were born in Monmouthshire,
Wales, and came to America with their father Isaac (also born in Wales) and settled in
Rowan County (now Randolph County) in about 1751, are all FICTIONAL?
What are you calling "family records" - it would be unusual (but a great
treasure) if actual letters, writings, and Bibles from the 17th and 18th
century have been preserved - who owns them now?
In further chapters the family records speculate that Richard
Robbins' sons, [1] Richard Jr. (b.ca 1730), [2] William (b. ca. 1737), [3] James (b.
ca. 1739), [4] Isaac (b. ca. 1740 and undoubtedly named after the fictional grandfather
Isaac), [5] John (b. ca. 1741) and [6] Michael (b. ca. 1742), (all born in Wales), when
they grew up, also came to America and joined their father here. Even the family records
admit that they may have come with him as small children, but probably joined him later.
But they are consistent that the births were in Wales. Also fictional?
"family records speculate" sounds like modern compilations and not
records to me.
Michael Robbins is a real person, and his connection to Richard is well
settled by a 1761 Rowan Co. tax list. This record also establishes
Michael's birth as 1745 or earlier. A biography of Michael's grandson
claims that Michael was one of eight brothers:
Itawamba Co., Mississippi Biographies at
http://homepages.rootsweb.com/~robfra/robins.html, Abstracted from
BIOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL MEMOIRS OF MISSISSIPPI (Chicago: Goodspeed
Pub. Co., 1891 / Spartanburg, SC: The Reprint Co., 1978), vol. II, pp.
692-693:
Colonel Jephthah Robins
Col. Jephthah Robins has for many years been a most conspicuous and
influential member of the bar of Mississippi, and is worthy of mention
in this record of the men who have been important factors in the
development and cultivation of the resources of the state. He is a
native of Pickens district, S.C., born in 1814, and is a son of Albert
and Susan (Norton) Robins, natives of South Carolina and Virginia
respectively. Albert Robins was a son of Michael Robins, a native of
North Carolina, and a farmer by occupation. When Albert was a mere lad
his father removed to Greenville Courthouse, S.C. The father was one of
a family of eight sons and four daughters. He and all his brothers were
soldiers in the Revolutionary war. he lived to the allotted age of man,
three score and ten years. He reared a family of four sons and four
daughters, all of whom lived to be grown. Albert was next to the
youngest child, and was reared in South Carolina, where he resided until
1841. He then came to Fulton, Miss., where he lived at the time of his
death, in 1849; he was seventy-eight years of age. His wife died two
years later at about the same age. She was a consistent member of the
Baptist church. To them were born three children: Levi died in South
Carolina; Mrs. Arminda Copeland died in Fulton, Miss.; the Colonel was
the second born. He passed his youth in South Carolina, and received his
education in the common schools. When he had reached his twentieth year
he went to Moulton, Ala., where he clerked in a dry goods store for one
year. Thence he went to Fulton, Miss., in 1836, and there he was
employed as a clerk for some time. He then engaged in the mercantile
trade on his own account, and while in this business, he was elected
treasurer of the county of Itawamba. After discharging the duties of
this office for one term he was elected probate clerk for two years. he
was then made clerk of the chancery court, the district comprising
Itawamba, Monroe, Chickasaw and Tishomingo counties. He held this office
eight years, and during that time he read law, and was admitted to the
bar at Aberdeen, Judge Rogers presiding. He practiced his profession at
Fulton until 1852, when he came to Lee county, and located at Guntown.
For several years he devoted himself industriously to the law, but of
late years, he has paid more attention to agriculture, and has turned
his practice over to his son, John Quitman Robins, a partner of the Hon.
John M. Allen. Colonel Robins was attorney for the Mobile & Ohio
railroad, which position brought him many duties, and he still attends
to all legal matters pertaining to the road. He is a man well read in
all points of law and every class of literature. He is A man of rare
judgement, quick insight and keep observation. He has won a wide
reputation and his ability is recognized in all legal circles throughout
the South. He was married to Eliza D. Allen, a sister of the Hon. J.M.
Allen, a native of Virginia (See sketch of John M. Allen). Nine children
were born to this union, one of whom is deceased: Mrs. Belle Gore, Mrs.
Molliue Allen, John Q., Jephthah (deceased), William, James, Edwin,
Annie and Harrison Lamar. The younger children are now attending some of
the best educational institutions of the South, and all have had
superior advantages in that line. Colonel Robins served on detached duty
during the late Civil war, and was on intimate terms with Jefferson
Davis, McNutt, Foote, Prentiss and Poindexter. He was a member of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows at Aberdeen, but the lodge is no longer
in existence. He and his wife are members of the Methodist Episcopal
church. The Colonel is a selfmade man, and is fully deserving of the
honors that have been conferred upon him, and entirely worthy of the
high regard in which he is held in the state.
I doubt that Michael was born in NC as claimed above because I find
Richard was in Frederick Co., VA, court records in 1745.
Two sons of Richard - Isaac and Jacob - are documented in the 1750 and
1751 Dan River district tax lists. The modern genealogy compilers
guessed that Jacob was a son of Elisha - no reason is given. Elisha
Robbins was a real person who appears in land records and tax lists in
the 1750s and abruptly disappears - I have not found any documented
children for Elisha.
So far as I have found, Isaac, Jacob, and Michael are the only
documented sons of Richard Robbins. Richard Robbins Jr does seem a
likely son however. There were two Williams in Rowan Co. in the 1750s
and later but I can't say that either of them was a son of Richard.
James may be another son but it was the sloppy combination of 2
identities that was my first clue that something was very wrong with the
Robbins genealogies. See
http://german.jarman.net/james.htm and now
evidence of yet a third James has emerged
http://german.jarman.net/isaac.htm There is a 1785 tax record that
includes a John Robbins "son of Richard" but at that late date it could
be Richard Jr - the only record of a John I find in the 1760s is likely
a son of Joseph - thus my comments about wishing a descendant of Moses
would participate in the DNA project.
Here is a striking curiosity, John. In my family research and
records, not one son of any Robbins family was ever named 'Daniel'. Don't you
think that strange in a family that passed on so many traditional names over and over
again.
Richard's son Isaac had a son named Daniel mentioned in his 1808 will.
A Daniel Robbins married a daughter of a neighbor of Jacob Robbins in
Virginia. One of the two Williams I mentioned above had a son named
Daniel. . . .
If indeed you believe these facts to be 'fictional', give me
your ancestors' version of how the family emigrated to America from Scotland and
landed in Rowan County. Being proudly mostly Scottish on the other branches of the
family, I may like your version better.
No traditions have been handed down the Overton Co., TN branches. One
genealogy of a collateral Ledbetter family reported a belief that the
Overton Co., TN progenitor was Scots but nothing supporting the origin
of that belief is cited. I'll make an aside comment here that most
genealogical "how to" books are generally dismissive of the infamous
three brothers stories that have emerged in so many families. I
recommend reading books by Donald Lines Jacobus and Elizabeth Shown
Mills, two renowned professional genealogists and editors.
I believe in DNA if done correctly. From your representations,
I'm not convinced yet that the data has been scrutinized correctly if the only
conclusion is that it is a hoax..
Traditional research had already exposed the hoax - the DNA results
support that conclusion
Since there are at least two generations between your Daniel and my
Isaac, perhaps the best possibility to explain the enigma is that a son of Daniel
(1627-1714) in Scotland,
Daniel Robins c1627-1714 was well into his mid to late thirties before
he married Hope Potter and began his family. Even his oldest son Daniel
Jr. did not marry until the 1690s. Chronologically, Richard Robbins (b.
c1710) is likely a grandson of Daniel Robins Sr and he had no sons named
Isaac. Coincidentally, Daniel Jr is known to have had many children that
are not yet identified but there was an Isaac Robins in NJ that would
"fit" as a son, and Daniel Jr's first father-in-law was named Elisha
Parker.
In 1754 in Rowan Co. Richard Robins witnessed the will of Daniel Robins
Sr's grandson Joseph Robins Jr. In the will of Joseph Robbins Sr written
in 1709 are provisions for a child not yet born. Some of Michael's
likely descendants would like to believe that Richard is that posthumous
child, but I have not yet seen any records that identify that child or
even its gender.
perhaps Isaac's (b. ca. 1670 or later) father or grandfather, ran
away from home or was dispatched from it (that happened a lot in those days) and ended up
in Wales, from which he and/or his progeny emigrated to North Carolina separately from
Daniel's other descendants who may have gone to New Jersey. In that case, they would
both contain the same DNA markers, right. This version makes more sense than that someone
made up a fictional ancestor to concoct a very elaborate hoax for the 1700's.
What do you have to say about that?
To accept the genealogies claiming Richard Robbins came from Wales will
require you to accept that 17 unindentured people got on boats in Wales
and just happened to wind up in the North Carolina back country and
coincidentally associated with an unrelated Scottish Robbins family from
NJ with matching DNA. Its quite a strain to even say its possible let
alone probable.
A problem with your trying to put off the connection between Daniel and
Richard to an earlier generation in Scotland or Wales are some details
of Daniel Robins life. He was captured by Cromwell at the Battle of
Worcester and sent to New England. His immigration record as well as his
marriage and the births of his first two children record his name as
Daniel Robinson or Robeson. He removed from New Haven to New Jersey just
a few years after England took that colony from the Dutch. In NJ the
records are of Daniel Robins. Daniel was not literate so how his name
was spelled could be of no concern to him, nevertheless, I was at first
very very skeptical of this claim. However the identity of Daniel Robins
as Daniel Robinson is supported by deed records disposing of his wife's
property in New Haven after the move to New Jersey. To attempt to
connect Richard to Daniel via an older generation would require the
immigration of another Robinson family that also changes the name to
Robins - its just too many twists and turns to only defend the
indefensible and undocumented genealogy of the Rowan Co. Robbins family.
I suspect my responses will raise more questions. I don't mind trying to
answer them.
Best Regards,
-John German