WHO WAS CORNELIUS PAYTON?When I was a young woman with my first child on the way, I did an oral history for my grandmother, Ella Frances Payton Oliver. She gave me the names of her grandparents, her parents, her siblings, her aunts and uncles and her cousins. Her grandfather was Randolph Payton who married Sarah Ann Mahaley Talton. He was born in 1822 in Madison County, Georgia. For years, this was all I had until a fellow researcher told me about The Peytons of Virginia, Vol IIby the Peyton Societyof Virginia. They had a whole pedigree for Randolph’s ancestors as follows:Thomas Peyton (1580) of Horsley Parish EnglandPhilip Peyton (1612) of Gloucester County, EnglandPhilip Peyton (1644 England) -Westmoreland County, VirginiaValentine Peyton(1680) of Westmoreland County, VirginiaWilliam Peyton I (1718) of Stafford County, VirginiaWilliam Payton II (1742) of Stafford County, VirginiaCornelius Payton b. 1777 Va migrated to Madison County, GeorgiaRandolph Payton b. 1822 Madison County, GeorgiaThomas Asbury Cleveland Payton b. 1850 DeKalb County, GeorgiaElla Frances Payton b. DeKalb County, Georgia (my grandmother) I eagerly added this information to my genealogy database and was satisfied with it until several male descendants of thisline decided to do a YDNA test. As the Payton/Peyton YDNA project grew in numbers over the years, something strange began to happen. The participants from the line of my Payton family did not match any other Peyton/Payton family, even the ones we were supposed to match according to The Peyton of Virginia Vol. II. We did not even share the same haplotype. Now, Cornelius Payton and his siblings were orphans from an unknown ancestry. The father of siblings1William C, Margaret, George, Leroy, Gabriel,Elizabeth, Moses, Cornelius, and Randolph Payton has been speculated by the Peyton/Payton YDNA project coordinator as William Payton who died c. 1800 in Georgia. The birthplace of this William has been speculated as Stafford County, Virginia. Descendants of William C, Leroy, Moses and Cornelius have matching YDNA. Their YDNA does not match any of the other Peyton families in the project but they do have two Humphrey matches and two Prichard matches that are close enough in genetic distance to indicate a common ancestor. Since Humphrey and Prichard (“ap Richard”) are both Welsh names, they could be related to each other through a common Welsh ancestor who may not have been named Humphrey or Prichard. The Welsh naming system used the first name of the child and the first name of the father with “ap” between the two. Humphrey ap Hugh was the ancestor of the Humphrey family of our YDNA match. The children of his son Owen ap Hugh took the name Owens or Owings in America. Humphrey and Prichard families 1Per The Peytons of Virginia, Vol II
migrated from Wales to Chester Co, PA. See Humphrey and Prichard pedigrees for families they have in common. I had to approach this problem through the pedigrees of our YDNA matches and hope that something stuck out that would signal that I was on the right course.I learned a lot while researching my family history. I studied books written about my ancestral families, I took genealogy seminars, I studied for the genealogy certification, I took courses on DNA and I studied the morals, customs and social lives ofthe colonists in early America, I went to family message boards. I learned that when the genealogy of a family like my Payton family hits a brick wall, the rules have to be bent. Sure, documentation proof is most desirable, but when it is missing due to fires, floods, wars, rodents and insects over three or four centuries, other resources must be pursued, sometimes using unorthodox methods. Hey, if it works who is to say it is unorthodox. And, during the many years of my research, I learned a few things about researching Southern families.1.Marriages before the Civil War were really contracts between two families. Thebride and groom had little say in the process. A lot was riding on finding the “suitable” spouse2for a son or daughter: Land,slaves and other goods of value were at stake. Family reputation was important. Marry someone your family did not approve of and you got disinherited. I have read many wills that spell this out. Mostly Southerners married into families they were already related to. They already knew the family reputations and they would insure that the family fortune stayed in the family. First cousin marriages were common. 2.Once someone married into a family they brought all their other relations into thefamily as well. The children of all the bride’s siblings and cousins would now be considered as “suitable” marriage partners for the children of all the siblings and cousins of the groom. They were not marrying a spouse, they were marrying a family. Familyrelationships were complicated. Sometimes they knew who they were related to but not how they were related. The term “cousin” was used very loosely. And, to make sure family relationships were honored, they named children with names of prominent families they were related to. Many families gave their children given names that were the last names of their family connections. 3.Related families moved in herds like buffalo. Siblings, cousins, in-laws, cousins of in-laws all moved together or one family moved first and others soon followed. If you find one family in any given area you will find members of families they were related to in the previous location as well. Moving in groups of related families insured that you brought your social, financial and spiritual network with you as well. You were never alone in a strange place.4.Both men and women, even in the upper classes, had affairs that resulted in out of 2Sex, Courtship and the Single Colonist, Colonial Williamsburg website