INTRODUCTION AND COMPENDIUM.
3
possession of numerous pedigrees from a prolific family in Virginia, Tennessee,
and Georgia, of whom I previously had no knowledge; these used the same
surname as many of my own kindred, but were evidently descended from
another stock. These southern families were wealthy, highly respectable, and
well allied by marriage with many of the most eminent families in the southern
States; they were deeply interested in my undertaking, and were as anxious to
have their genealogy incorporated into my book as I was to publish my own;
hence, to give general satisfaction, I again enlarged my plan, and encompassed
within the circle of my inquiries the history and genealogy of every family in
America known by our surname, not only in the United States, but in all the
British North American Provinces.
Thus my undertaking assumed broader proportions from time to time, as I
prosecuted my work of gathering records from the several American branches
of the connection, until I had canvassed the ground quite thoroughly. In com-
paring my records in order to arrange them for composition, I was not willing
to put the work to press without making a reasonable effort to learn how these
numerous families, descended from ancestors widely removed from each other
in their settlements in America, were related to each other in the old country;
to learn, if possible, whether or not they all sprung from one common stock,
and where their progenitors lived. But the work appeared of too great a mag-
nitude, and as turned my mental vision toward foreign lands, with an intense
desire to trace the family line across the seas, insurmountable obstacles seemed
to arise before me; but while contemplating the subject there was another
favorable turn by the wheel of fortune, a book fell into my hands, in which I
found the name and address of one of the family in England. I immediately
forwarded a letter to that gentleman, which resulted in the establishment of a
correspondence with several representative heads of families in England and
Scotland, which has been uninterruptedly continued ever since, hardly a week
having passed for eight years, in which letters were not crossing the ocean, to
and from this country.
-
As data of a very interesting character reached me from Great Britain, I
continued to amplify my plans and extend the limits of my search. My interest
grew with every new accession to my historical materials. I saw that my work,
if published as it then was, must present a fragmentary and disconnected
appearance; there would be confusion, uncertainty, and dissatisfaction in the
mind of every reader of such a book; and after much consideration and
weighing of the probabilities of success, I set my mind toward the consumma-
tion of a work so great, that, had I known its magnitude at the time, it
would never have been undertaken by one of so limited means as I have been
confined to during all the years of my investigation. But there was no limit
to the range of my examination commenced at that time, short of a history of
the family reaching back to the earliest ancestor of whom any account could
be found, and covering the centuries during a period of a thousand years. I
also enlarged the character of my inquiries, seeking to procure not only genea-
logical but biographical materials for my work. My correspondence had made
me aware that the family, from its earliest history, had been ornamented by
many distinguished men; that representatives of the old sept had filled impor-
tant civil and military stations, and hence it was desirable to preserve in a
family memorial a comprehensive account of their lives and services.
Anticipating discouragement from those who could not quite appreciate my
ambition and family pride, and wishing to evade the taunts and appellations
that are usually pronounced upon an enthusiastic antiquary, I kept my new
