Our Smith Family History 1776 1995

Author : Delano Freeberg
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780615693996
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (939 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Smith Family Loyalists and Patriots written by Delano Freeberg and published by . This book was released on 2012-09-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It was the most turbulent period in North American history. Two of our ancestors were there. The most important decision they would ever make, with their lives and the lives of their daughters and sons in the balance, required immediate response: Remain true to King and Country, or take up the cause of Independence and Liberty? One of our ancestors, Daniel Smith Sr., pledged loyalty to the king. Another of our forefathers, John Gilkey, pledged his all to the patriot cause. Both men followed their conscience. Both men were imprisoned. Both men were separated from family, forfeited property, and nearly lost their lives. But neither man stopped believing in the truth and the virtue that motivated him in his just and righteous cause. This book is about these men, their daughters and sons, the struggles that gave their lives value and purpose, and the blood connection that makes every detail of their stories immediately engaging and endlessly fascinating to every one of us, their grandchildren's children. This is not only their story, but our story, written in the blood, sweat, and tears of those who gave us life, whose dearest hopes and most passionate prayers were for us. This is the story of a very specific branch of the Smith family, beginning with Theophilus Fletcher Smith Sr., born in 1810. It is the story for every one of Theophilus' 16,400 descendants now living in the United States and Canada. This is no dreary tome filled with lists and dates. There are pedigree charts and descendant tables and the normal sorts of hard, factual information one expects to find in a genealogy. All of that material is here, to be sure. But the meat of this book, the material that gives this volume its substance and significance, is the story of six men and one woman, all descendants of Daniel Smith, each one chosen from a different generation. Through them we experience the unfolding of history and the Smith family saga beginning with William Smith in 1598 and ending with the grandson of Blanche Smith in 1998. Our forebears faced the greatest challenges of the last four hundred years: Starting life on a new continent, defending young colonists against local uprisings, choosing sides in the first-ever revolt against a mother country, converting the vast wilderness into the world's breadbasket, and fighting the good fight against the forces of tyranny and oppression. It is the epic story of the North American continent, but it is the intimate, personal story of the dozens of ancestors you will meet in this volume. In these pages you will read their own words. You will experience their successes, their greatest accomplishments, their most fearful moments, their most unthinkable tragedies. It's all here, often in primary documents culled from the historical record over years and decades and centuries. In the end, it is our story, our words, our tragedy, our joy. Read now, and find out who you have been, the person you are now, and the wealth of wisdom and fortitude to which you are full and rightful heir.