The journey from Scotland to Haywood County, Tennessee
The Marbury family is loaded with interesting characters and, if you are willing to hop back and forth between husbands and wives for a few generations, it appears possible to get from my daughters, Alex and Liv, all the way back to Alfred the Great. Along the way you run into saints, kings, dukes and enough Leonards and Francises to make a sane person give up genealogy and take up golf. The one important caution is that one stretch of the line, around the colonial Maryland Marburys and their earlier English connections, appears likely rather than fully proved.
Even so, this is a pretty remarkable cast of characters. Joan Beaufort, Countess of Westmorland, appears in the line. She was the daughter of John of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford and the grandmother of Edward IV and Richard III through her daughter Cecily Neville. Saint Margaret of Scotland also shows up. She was the daughter of Edward the Exile, the wife of Malcolm III and the mother of Matilda of Scotland, who married Henry I of England. Keep going and you run into Edmund Ironside, Æthelred II, Edmund I, Edward the Elder and finally Alfred the Great. That is not a bad day’s work for one family tree.
Here is how the line appears to run.
Alex and Olivia Williams are my daughters.
Their father is R. Scott Williams.
My mother was Shirley Lovelace Williams.
Her mother was Virginia Brantley Lovelace.
Her mother was Allie Ern Marbury Brantley.
Her father was Hardy Joyner Marbury.
His father was Benjamin Franklin Marbury.
His father was Robert Green Marbury.
His father was John Marbury.
His father was Leonard Marbury.
His father was Francis Marbury.
His father was Leonard Marbury.
His father was Francis Marbury of Maryland.
Up to that point, the line appears solidly grounded in the family records and compiled genealogies I have been using.
After Francis Marbury of Maryland is where the careful wording begins. The line appears to likely continue back to an earlier Marbury family in England, most often through Eusebius Marbury of London, who was baptized in 1605. From there the commonly repeated line runs through Thomas Marbury, Elizabeth Cave, Henry Cave, Margaret Throckmorton, Katherine Vaux, Elizabeth FitzHugh, Alice Neville, Richard Neville and Joan Beaufort. That may well be right, but it’s not 100% proven.
Once the line reaches Joan Beaufort, things become much firmer.
Joan Beaufort was the daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster.
His father was Edward III.
His father was Edward II.
His father was Edward I.
His father was Henry III.
His father was King John.
His father was Henry II.
His mother was the Empress Matilda.
Her mother was Matilda of Scotland.
Her mother was Saint Margaret of Scotland.
Her father was Edward the Exile, also called Edward Ætheling.
His father was Edmund Ironside.
His father was Æthelred II.
His father was Edgar the Peaceful.
His father was Edmund I.
His father was Edward the Elder.
His father was Alfred the Great.
So are Alex and Olivia really descended from Alfred the Great? It appears they probably are, with one honest asterisk attached. The medieval royal portion of the line is well established. The softer spot is the jump from the Maryland Marburys back into the earlier English Marbury family. That link may be correct, and it has been repeated often enough to deserve serious consideration, but it should still be described as likely rather than certain. That does not make the story less interesting. If anything, it makes it more honest.
Alfred the Great, who ruled Wessex from 871 to 899, was the Anglo-Saxon king most remembered for stopping Viking advances, strengthening his kingdom’s defenses and helping lay the groundwork for a more unified England. Beyond his military success, he promoted learning, encouraged the translation of important religious works into Old English and supported the compilation of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. For those reasons, Alfred is remembered not just as a warrior king, but as a lawgiver, reformer and one of the most consequential rulers in early English history.
And honestly, the best part of family history is not being able to brag that your daughters might descend from Alfred the Great. It is the strange path it takes to get there. You start in Haywood County with the Marburys, run through Maryland, pass through old English families like the Caves, Throckmortons, Vauxes, FitzHughs and Nevilles, brush up against John of Gaunt and Saint Margaret of Scotland, and eventually end up in Anglo-Saxon England. That is quite a trip for a family line that also includes a lot of hard-working West Tennessee settlers who were much more comfortable in a cabin than a castle.
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