Branches of the Family Tree
First of my family to come to this country came on the Mayflower - five of them: John Alden, Priscilla Mullins, Priscilla's parents , William and Allen (Ellen?) Mullins, and George Soule. Surely children today are still hearing the story of Captain Myles Standish's part in the romance of John and Priscilla. According to the tale, Myles asked John to go to Priscilla to ask her to marry him (Myles.) Priscilla replied, "Speak for yourself, John." So, John must have done just that. They married and had nine children, the youngest of whom, David, is my ancestor. His daughter, Priscilla, was the next generation in that line and with her marriage the Alden family name was lost in my ancestry. On the passenger list of the Mayflower John Alden is listed as a cooper and William Mullins as a tradesman. He must have sold shoes because, according to a recent article, Pilgrim's Progress, by Bill Bryson, he brought 126 pairs of shoes and 13 pairs of boots.
George Soule, my other ancestor on the Mayflower, is listed as a servant but other sources have noted that he was a teacher. I prefer to believe the latter because he brought books described in his will as a library. He, as well as John Alden, was a signer of the Mayflower Compact. He was a representative to the Legislature of the Plymouth Colony for six years. He married Mary Beckett who came as a maid with the Brewster family. No one by that name is on the passenger list and the only unnamed woman listed as a maid came with the Carver family so it is not clear whether I should name her as my sixth relative on the Mayflower. Well, why not? At any rate, the Soule's daughter, Susannah, was my ancestor so the Soule family name was lost. Another ancestor of my grandfather was John Elliott, the first translator of the Bible into an American Indian language.
These ancestors are all on my maternal grandfather's side. Edgar Thomas Robens was born in Saratoga, New York, on June 22,1854, so all the branches of my grandfather's ancestry stayed in the northeast until about two years after his birth when the family moved to northern Ohio. My grandfather was the sixth generation of his family to be born in the United States. Several of his ancestors fought in the Revolutionary War but none in the Civil War. My mother belonged to the Daughters of the Revolution (DAR) and to the Mayflower Society. My maternal grandmother's side of the family will be the next branch on the family tree.
