Category Archives: Edward Maddox

Pulling a thread

21 Friday Apr 2017

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The 16th-century Guild in Shrewsbury.
A ribbon of metal inlaid in the stone below the Guild explains that the Welsh and English cooperated in the Guild.
A Shrewsbury church steeple.

We’ve been trying to understand our Edward Maddox‘s (d. 1694) origins in Shropshire, England, and add any more evidence to our assessment of his migration to the American Colonies.  Most evidence of such early migration is oblique, so maybe it shouldn’t be surprising to find hints of Edward’s origins in obscure write-ups about the 17th-century English cloth trade…

It turns out that the town of Shrewsbury, in Edward’s County of Shropshire, was the center of trade (export) for woolens and the headquarters of the Drapers Guild.  Edward lived just south of Shrewsbury in the town of Munslow, placing him ideally for involvement in the cloth trade.  Perhaps he was warehousing locally grown wool.  Other towns in the area were used as markets or warehouses.

One author explains that “The ‘proud Salopians’ of Shrewsbury, as their rivals termed them, achieved the high-water mark of their prosperity in the century before the [1642-51] Civil War: the town’s population rose from 3,000 to 7,000, the urban area was largely rebuilt, and the borough evolved from a county seat into the economic and social focus of an area stretching from the Wrekin to Cardigan Bay. Shrewsbury’s urban growth mirrored developments at neighbouring Chester and Worcester, but the simultaneous expansion of its hinterland gave it a regional significance comparable to that of much larger centres such as York, Norwich, Bristol or Exeter. This expansion was partly due to Shrewsbury’s location at the head of the Severn navigation, which facilitated communications to Gloucester, Bristol and beyond, while Shrewsbury’s proximity to the upland pastures of southern Shropshire [where Edward’s town of Munslow is located] made it the entrepôt for top-quality March wool coveted by broadcloth weavers from Gloucestershire to the Low Countries.” (Source: http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1604-1629/constituencies/shrewsbury)

The Drapers Guild fell apart in the mid-1600s after the Glorious Revolution. According to a Wikipedia article, “after the English Civil War (1642–51) regulations were made in 1654 ‘for preventing the Drapers forestalling or engrossing the Welsh flannels, cloths, etc.’ Many of the drapers supported Parliament during the civil war, and as a consequence the Company was not given royal support after the monarchy was restored in 1660 under Charles II (r. 1660–85). The cloth trade went into a gradual decline after this date. The number of drapers had fallen back to 61 in 1665.” (Source: The Shrewsbury Drapers and the Welsh Wool Trade in the XVI and XVII Centuries, T.C. Mendenhall)  Edward migrated to Virginia at about this time.

The cloth trade suggestion is particularly compelling as an explanation for Edward’s migration because he imported “fuetiane” (a kind of heavy cloth) to Maryland in 1675 .  It was enough cloth to be reported in official Colonial records (Source: Colonial Survey Report #3964, p. 16).  His son Cornelius would be called a merchant in some records and this might have been because of a cloth import business.  We’ll have to continue pulling this thread.  The Shrewsbury archive contains records of the Guild.

Edward the puritan?

03 Friday Feb 2017

Posted by in Edward Maddox, Religious leanings

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Our ninth great grandfather, Dr. Edward Maddox, emigrated from England to the American Colonies sometime between 1656 and 1668.  We wonder at his motivations to leave England, and the resolve it must have taken to settle in the harsh wilderness along the Potomac River.  He was among the very first Englishmen to live in the area.  Court records document Edward’s rough frontier medicine, land speculation, wolf hunts and conflict with the Native Americans.

In his early adulthood in England, Edward would have endured the 1642-1651 English Civil War, during which 6 percent – or 300,000 – of his countrymen died.  It was a fight between “roundheads” and “cavaliers” – parliamentarians and royalists.  The parliamentarians won in 1651.  It was England’s experiment with republicanism, and for a decade it functioned roughly as intended, with Oliver Cromwell’s cronies keeping order over a rowdy parliament until 1659.

But beneath Cromwell’s anti-monarchism there was a darker religious fervor… against Catholics.  The English establishment could not stand the implications of a Catholic king – the economic upheaval it would risk – and rumors of English kings’ Papal alliances were truly incendiary.

To be certain, everything in Edward’s records indicates he was a fervent anti-Catholic.  We see him in Stafford County, Virginia, in the late 1680s befriending the notorious Parson Waugh, whose claim to infamy was his 1681 incitement of an anti-Catholic riot in Virginia.  Waugh falsely claimed that Maryland Catholics were crossing the Potomac River with Seneca Indians to murder Virginians in their sleep. Waugh and Edward Maddox’s other friend George Mason (grandfather of the Founding Father) would be punished for the subterfuge.

But where Edward’s Colonial records reveal his strong anti-Catholic sentiments, the records do not reveal any strong favor for the king.  Instead, his departure from England around 1660 – as the parliamentarians lost power and King Charles II restored the monarchy – could mean just the opposite.  If Edward left England at the time of Charles’ crowning in 1660, it could mean he was fleeing the royalists’ wrath, or rejecting the king’s rumored Papism in favor of more puritanical Protestantism in America like many others did.  He would have been among friends in Maryland, where he resided until 1684 –  a year before King Charles II’s death.

Edward’s later life also raises some questions about his competing allegiances to god and king.  Although Edward rose in social prominence in Maryland and Virginia through the 1680s by marrying into the prominent Stone and Mason families, he did not attain a public position as a Justice of the Peace in Stafford County, Virginia, until 1691.  His very late Justice appointment – when he was probably 80, and just after the king’s death – may indicate that Edward had been a political outsider during the king’s reign, but that he was finally brought into the fold after allegiances changed.

Just a theory.

The possible parents of Dr. Edward Maddox (d. 1694)

08 Friday Jul 2016

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We’ve already linked Dr. Edward Maddox (d. 1694) to his son Cornelius Maddox (d. 1705) and his other children Edward, Elinor, John and Alice by the children’s baptismal records in the Munslow Parish record book.  This paternity is confirmed by Edward’s later interaction with Cornelius, Edward and Alice in Colonial Maryland and Virginia records.

Two more records in the Munslow Parish book show an Edward Maddox buried on 10 October 1658, and an Alice Maddox, widow, buried on 16 February 1662/3.  Edward and Alice could be the parents of our Dr. Edward Maddox.  While their paternity and maternity to our Dr. Edward Maddox remain uncorroborated, these records are so far the closest we’ve gotten to another link in our chain.

Edward Maddox’s (d. 1658) and Alice Maddox’s (d. 1662/3) earlier residence at Munslow Parish also hints at a temporary geographic location for our Maddox line in Shropshire, England, during the 17th century.  One genealogist recently listed the handful of Maddoxes who took up residence in Munslow Parish shortly after 1600, all of whom were fathered by a John Maddockes.  However, Edward Maddox (d. 1658) is not listed as one of John’s children.

Munslow Parish Church of St Michael

A research trip to Munslow Parish’s Church of St. Michael is in order.

 

Did Edward have a brother in Virginia?

30 Saturday Apr 2016

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Some genealogists claim that Edward Maddox (d. 1694) had a brother named Rice Maddox (d. 1664) in Colonial Maryland and Virginia (Rice, pronounced “reese” is probably short for Richard).  So far there’s zero documentation of a link, but here are some places to start…

  • Rice Maddocke was called a “chirurgion” (surgeon) and Edward also was a surgeon. (Westmoreland County deed, 6 Dec 1653, in “Virginia Colonial Abstracts Vol. 23,” p. 15)
  • Rice received 200 acres in 1650 by transporting four people, including himself, Thomas Cockrill, Susan Hale, and Thomas Tillitt, into the Virginia Colony. (Northumberland County Deeds & ORDERS 1650-1652, p. 47)
  • Rice lived 36 miles down the Potomac River from Edward’s land, on a 300-acre tract at the mouth of the Nomini River in Westmoreland County. (Westmoreland County Deeds and Wills No. 1, p. 182, 29 October 1662, in “Westmoreland County, Virginia, Records 1661-1664,” abstracted and compiled by John Frederick Dorman)
  • Rice Maddox and Samuel Maddox  witnessed a 200-acre land purchase by Robert Coleman from Francis Carpenter, 22 Aug. 1659, recorded in Westmoreland County, Virginia.  Rice and Samuel could have been brothers or otherwise related.  It’s tempting to identify this Samuel with the Samuel Maddox (1638-1684) who lived in St. Mary’s, Maryland, around the same time; however, Samuel Maddox (1638-1684) reportedly immigrated to Maryland in approximately 1665.

Beyond that, Rice seems to have lived a complicated life, based on a few records:

  • Rice married Anne Dandy in 1657 or 1658.  She was the widow of John Dandy – a notoriously violent man who served as a hangman in Maryland, and who was himself hung in 1657 for murder.  Rice, along with Emperor Smith, both surgeons, examined the body of Dandy’s victim – and cut off his head to present it to the court.  Anne was tried by the Maryland Provincial Court for embezzlement because she did not properly administer John Dandy’s estate after his death, but Anne successfully argued that harsh punishment would affect her two (unnamed) children. (AOMOL, 10:546; 2:326; 10:559; 10:443; 10:432.)
  • Rice Maddox was arrested for failure to pay a debt in 1663. (Westmoreland County Deeds and Wills No. 1, p. 15, 24 June 1663, in “Westmoreland County, Virginia, Records 1661-1664,” abstracted and compiled by John Frederick Dorman)
  • Rice was murdered in January or February 1664 under unknown circumstances.  Edmund Goddard, John Fryer and William Webb were jailed for his “untimely death.”  Rice’s body was dissected by the surgeon Robert Noble. (Westmoreland County Deeds and Wills No. 1, p. 24, 24 February 1663/1664, in “Westmoreland County, Virginia, Records 1661-1664,” abstracted and compiled by John Frederick Dorman)

Rice’s wife Anne was left to work through the wreckage of Rice’s estate and relied on the court’s attorneys.  Rice’s wife was clearly the widow Anne Dandy in Maryland as of 1658.  In Westmoreland, County, Virginia, Rice’s wife is listed as Alice on 8 October 1662, but just 21 days later she is named Anne in the same record book, and she is named Anne consistently in all other known records. (Westmoreland County Deeds and Wills No. 1, p. 181-182, 8 October and 29 October 1662, in “Westmoreland County, Virginia, Records 1661-1664,” abstracted and compiled by John Frederick Dorman)

Pesky parson

30 Saturday Apr 2016

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Parson John Waugh was a notorious Protestant Whig in Stafford County, Virginia, in the late 1600s.  He incited Catholic-Protestant violence, officiated men’s marriages to preteen girls, and connived his way into free acreage from at least one rich woman.

Edward Maddox willed about 500 acres in King George County, Virginia, to the parson and we’ve always wondered at the circumstances.  Edward, as a Stafford justice of the peace, personally ruled against the parson for one of his preteen marriages and must have understood his character.  So why would he give land to Waugh?  We know that Edward was politically aligned with the Waughs and their Mason allies, but the 500 acre conveyance seems unusual.

Today we discovered that John Waugh not only received 500 acres from Edward’s estate, but also was appointed to directly administer Edward’s estate (Westmoreland County Order Book 1690-1698, Part Three (1694-1698), p. 178-179).  No conflict of interests there, right?  Something stinks.

 

Locating Edward Maddox’s early Maryland properties

29 Friday Apr 2016

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Dr. Edward Maddox owned numerous tracts in the Maryland Colony in the mid-1600s, mostly along tributaries of the Potomac River in Charles County and modern Prince George County.  A recent survey conducted by the Broad Creek Historic District provides estimates of the locations of Edward’s Stone Hill, Lyon’s Hole and possible Athey’s Hopewell tracts.  See the map below.  The Vainall tract, which is used as a reference in some of Edward’s deeds, was centered on 38.756851, -76.985385.

Edward Maddox land locations 1696

Deeds/sources of Edward’s tracts:

Lyons Hole: Charles County Circuit Court Liber R, Page 144: 31 Dec 1690; Indenture from Daniell Smith of St. Mary’s County, carpenter, to Henry Goodridge; for 6,000# tobacco; a tract called Lyons Hole; bounded by Richard Fowkes’ Vaineall; containing 100 acres; formerly granted to Edward Maddocks by patent; /s/ Daniell Smith (mark); wit. John Wilder, Cleborne Lomax; ack. by Elizabeth Smith, wife of Daniel. [Note: Edward is untitled in this transaction (normally he’s called “apothecary”), and it’s possible that this Edward Maddocks is the younger Edward.]

Doges Neck: Charles County Circuit Court Liber H, Page 132: 5 Sep 1678; Indenture from Edward Maddock, apothecary, to John Reddick; for 30,000# tobacco; a parcel of land called Doges Neck; on the south side of the Piscataway River to the mouth of Chingamuxon Creek; laid out for 200 acres; /s/ Edward Maddock; wit. Rando. Brandt, Geo. Godfrey; acknowledged by Margery wife of Edward Maddock.

Cheshire: Charles County Circuit Court Liber I, Page 125: 5 Jun 1681; Indenture from Edward Maddock, apothecary, and Margery his wife, relict of Matthew Stone, to William Chandler, Gent.; a tract called Cheshires being part of Poynton Manor; inherited by Margery from the will of William Stone; containing 500 acres; for 40,000# of tobacco; /s/ Edward Maddock, Margery Maddock; wit. Tho. Hussy, John Richards.

Greene’s Purchase: Charles County 1671-1674, Vol. 60, Pg. 532-534: “Luke Greene acknowledged the ensueinge Conveyance unto Edward Maddock for two hundred acres of Land called Greenes Purchase in open Court Vizt…”

Stone Hill: Charles County Circuit Court Liber F, Page 22: 29 Oct 1674; Indenture from Henry Aspenall, planter, to Edward Maddocke, apothecary; for 20,000# of tobacco and 300 acres of Stone Hill; a tract called Doegs Neck on the south side of Piscataway River, bound by Chingamuxon Creek; laid out for 450 acres; also a parcel on the east side of the said neck by the sd creek containing 200 acres by patent granted Walter Hall 26 Apr 1658; Isl Henry Aspenall; wit. Richard Edelen, Stephen Murry

Athey’s Hopewell: Charles County Circuit Court Liber F, Page 180: 12 Apr 1676; Indenture from Edward Maddock, apothecary, to Philip Carey; for 3,000# tobacco; a parcel called Athey’s Hopewell; containing 100 acres; /s/ Ed. Maddock; wit. Philip Lines, Luke Greene

Maddock’s Folly: Charles County Circuit Court Liber F, Page 200: 8 Aug 1676; Indenture from Edward Maddock, apothecary, to Philip Lines; for 8,000# tobacco; a parcel called Maddock’s Folly; on the east side of Piscataway River; containing 350 acres; /s/ Edward Maddock; wit. Henry Bonner, Joshua Guibert, John Hamilton

Nanjemoy: Charles Co., MD, Land Record L #1, folio 142: 17 February 1684, Edward Maddock and wife Margery of Stafford Co., VA, conveyed 500 acres called “Nanjemoy” in Charles co. to Gerard Fowke.

 

Early parishes of Stafford County, Virginia

21 Sunday Feb 2016

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When trying to understand early Stafford County, Virginia, land and parish records, it’s helpful to understand local parish name changes over time. Here’s a chronology:

Circa 1653-1680: Potomac Parish

Circa 1664-1680: Upper Parish (north) and Lower Parish (south)

Circa 1680-1702: Stafford Parish

1702-1776: St. Paul’s Parish (north)

1702-1785: Overwharton Parish (south)

1731: Hamilton Parish formed from land that transferred from Stafford Co to Prince William Co when Prince William Co formed

1776: Brunswick Parish formed in King George Co from Hanover Parish in 1732. A part was added to Stafford Co, when its boundary with King George was altered in 1776.

Dr. Edward Maddox bequeathed about 500 acres to his local Stafford Parish minister (Rev. Waugh) in 1694. This land was along the Passapatanzy Creek, just south of Marlborough Town.  The acreage would form the Overwharton Parish glebe.

Source: http://vagenweb.org/parishes.htm

Cornelius Maddox likely arrived in Maryland before 1680

21 Sunday Feb 2016

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Cornelius Maddox is regularly described by genealogists as having arrived in Maryland in 1680, based on a 9 July 1680 claim made by the merchant John Reddich/Redich/Reddick for transporting Cornelius and 19 other “transportees” (Maryland Patents Liber WC2, Folio 199, 9 July 1680).  However, John Reddich’s claim is likely an aggregation of these 20 transportees’ obligations.  These 20 transportees almost certainly did not arrive together on 9 July 1680.  Instead, the transportees probably arrived in the years before 1680, based on typical claim patterns at the time (“The Five George Masons: Patriots and Planters of Virginia and Maryland.”  Copeland, Pamela and MacMaster, Richard.  University Press of Virginia: Charlottesville, 1975. pp. 10&23.).

John Reddich was exercising the Colonial headright system, which rewarded sponsors of immigrants’ travel into the Colonies by providing 50 acres for each transportee’s arrival.  By claiming 20 headrights, including his own name, Reddich would have earned a 1,000 acre land grant from the Maryland Calverts.

The year 1680 would have been one of the worst times to arrive in the Maryland Colony.  The Colony was dealing with Catholic-Protestant upheaval, Indian territorial fights, and – most important for a merchant like Cornelius – a tobacco market recession.

Edward Maddoxes in Colonial Virginia

29 Sunday Nov 2015

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In addition to our Edward Maddox, a few other Edward Maddoxes appear in Colonial-era documents, potentially conflating the identity of our Edward.  They deserve more research:

One Maddox genealogist claimed about 10 years ago that Edward Maddox’s father was Thomas Maddox (Lord Scethrog), who arrived in Jamestown in 1620 and died in 1623.  The link to this Lord Scethrog would bring us back to the 7th century in Wales.  His claim has proliferated on ancestry.com and other sites, and by now has become a standard claim among other family researchers.  It is true that a Thomas Maddox died in the Jamestown area in 1623, but he is not described as a lord or by any other titles, and nobody has yet proven our Edward’s link to this Thomas.  (Source: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~maddoxetc/Thomas.html)

The same genealogist claims that Edward Maddox is first found in the Virginia Colony “in 1642 Charles City Co., VA, with an unknown amount of acreage next to Joseph Royall’s 600 acres in West Sherley/Shirley Hundred on James River to Dickinans Creek. … [Source, Land Patent to Joseph Royall, August 20, 1642, Land Office Patents No. 1, 1623-1643, pg. 790].”  The genealogist does not explain why this might be our Edward.  Is it possible that our Edward made an initial effort in Virginia, returned to England in the 1650s where we know he had children, and then came back to Maryland in 1668?  (Source: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~maddoxetc/Edward.html)

An Edward Maddox is listed as a servant “3 tymes” to Lawrence Dameron on 340 acres “butting southeast upon the head of Tanx Yeococomico River,” possibly in circa 1652, on page 258 of Nell Marion Nugent’s Cavaliers and Pioneers: Abstracts of Virginia Land Patents and Grants 1623-1666. Vol. I (1934; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1991).  It’s unclear who this Edward is or what “3 tymes” means.

The genealogist claiming that Edward’s father is Thomas also claims that Edward Maddox owned land in Jamaica in 1670, according to a census available at http://genealogy-quest.com/census-records/1670-st-thomas-parish-jamaica-census/.  However, this was not a list of land owners – it was a census of permanent residents in Jamaica with their families.  Wouldn’t residence in Jamaica be impossible for someone already living in Maryland, which we have proven?

Finally, the records of Munslow Parish in Shropshire, England, list an Edward Maddox, buried on 10 October 1657, and an Alice Maddox, widow, buried on 8 February 1662. This is the same parish where our Edward’s children were baptized, and where he was married to two wives.  Could this Edward (d. 1657) be the father of our Edward?

Finally… Edward is listed as the father of Cornelius in Munslow Parish records, 1651

27 Tuesday Oct 2015

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We’ve worked for years to connect our known ancestor Cornelius Maddox (d. 1705) to his purported father, Dr. Edward Maddox (d. 1694). Connecting Cornelius to his father promises to bring us to the beginning of the line of American Maddoxes, at long last. Now we have what we think undeniably proves Edward’s paternity of Cornelius.

After much searching, we happily discovered the Munslow Parish record book – a series of registers from a small and ancient Anglican parish in Shropshire, England. Page 93, covering parish transactions for the year 1651, clearly lists Cornelius Maddox’s baptism on 4 October 1651, along with his father Edward Maddox and his mother Ellinor Maddox. The Munslow Parish record book is online at http://www.melocki.org.uk/salop/Munslow.html.

We’re happy to have found Cornelius with his parents – finally – but just as importantly the same record book lists the baptisms of a brother Edward and a sister Alice. These two names confirm that the Cornelius in the record is our Cornelius because Edward (Cornelius’ father) would later list Alice in a will and list his son Edward’s widow Amey/Anne in a will in Stafford County, Virginia, in 1694. Also, according to the Munslow records, the younger Edward was baptized on 8 April 1648, a date that reconciles with the birth year that he would apply to himself in two Charles County, Maryland, documents decades later.