History is not that which occurs, but that which is written, and it is from what small scraps of written history we obtain, that our genealogy must be made. If the accuracy of this written history is in question, it is rightfully so, for we assume that our ancestors and those who would put forth have not with intent forged their own remains. It is to this false hope we are bound. With this manuscript I have sought to add to my family's history, upon what those before me had added to theirs. To this, all of my known ancestors and those of my dear wife have been included with what facts I have been able to discover of their great and sometime meager lives.

The following is a chart of our gateway ancestors, and from them, our descent. Unfortunately, all chains of decsent are not equally sound. See the notes which describe contentions. From these gateway ancestors, acsent to nobility can be directly found. In some cases, additional contentions exist.

Thomas NEWBERRY (1594)       Margaret WYATT (1594)                     Ralph LEFTWICH (1628)
Benjamin NEWBERRY (1624)--+--Mary ALLYN                                _____ LEFTWICH 
                          |                                            William LEFTWICH [Note 3]
                    Sarah NEWBERRY (1650)                              Lucinda LEFTWICH
                    Wait CLAPP (1670)                                  Randolph BOBBIT (1768)
                    Josiah TAYLOR (1701)                               Sarah BOBBIT (1794)
                    Abijah TAYLOR (1740)                               John Benjamin PAVEY (1813) [Note 2]
                    Robert Wiley TAYLOR (1769)                 _________________|_________________
                          |                                   /                                   \
                    Bennett TAYLOR (1794) [Note 1]    John Jefferson PAVEY (1838)     Leonora Ann PAVEY (1852)
                    Julia Ann TAYLOR (1824)           Francis Nathan PAVEY (1873)--+--Frances Ann COUVILLON (1873)
                    Phoebe Jane COMPTON (1857)                                     |
                    Minnie Elizabeth HUMPHREY (1894)                        Dora Lee PAVEY (1905)
                    William David FORSYTHE (1918)                           Jacqueline Therese LeVASSEUR (1937)
                    Timothy James FORSYTHE (1958)             +             Brenda Faye ALEXANDER (1960)
                                                              |                               |
                                                  Alexander William FORSYTHE (1990)  James Patrick SULLIVAN (1983)

In this manuscript I have gone to some length to ensure that known errors have been removed. Where contentions exist, I have tried to include a note discussing the matter. There is included in the appendix a list of improbable and in some cases impossible dates and relationships. This can be used to find contentions in the data. Like all claims, however, they are only as reliable as the evidence that supports them. All claims and parental assocaitions when known make reference to source documents as footnotes. The certainty of these references are then marked by 1 to 4 plus (+) signs to indicate the degree of certainty. The more plus signs the less contentious and more certain the evidence is. This is especially important when determining relationships between children and their parents. The Ancestor and Descendant Lists use an asterik (*) to indicate a relationship in which one or more of the child's parents does not have any supporting documentation. The Ancestor lists are also broken down into a "certain only" subset. A list of persons with uncertain parental associations can be found in the improbability list.

Evidence may be categorized as follows. Primary evidence is supported by original records, such as birth, marriage, and death certificates. Not all primary evidence is taken as fact. It must be considered where the information is likely to have come from, and who recorded the information. Secondary evidence makes up the bulk of genealogical data. Secondary evidence is generally a compilation of primary evidence recorded in a book, magazine, or pamphlet. Secondary evidence falls under the risk of mistakes made by the compiler and recorder. It can be generally accepted as fact if the evidence is found in multiple compilations that do not reference each other as a source. In that case the evidence would be considered tertiary evidence - that which is compiled from secondary sources such as the contents of much of this website. Tertiary evidence can only be accepted as fact if the referenced sources were in themselves reliable sources. It for this reason I have included as many sources as possible in the reference section, and when possible or convienient, included their citations as well. I am also a compiler and recorder, and as such just as suseptible as anyone to making mistakes. It is up to the user of this data to check all references before accepting the data recorded here as fact. All other forms of evidence should be considered unreliable. When evidence is supported only by the memory of the recorder, such as my own children's birthdates, is can be accepted as primary evidence or unreliable evidence depending on the period of time between when the event occured and when it was recorded, and possibly the type of data. For instance I have discovered that my own great grandmother did not know the year she was born. Memories are notoriously faulty.

This manuscript is structured so that each ancestral generation from the root person is contained in a single chapter. The root person and their siblings will always be contained in chapter 1. The Ahnenlist is the master ancestral list for the root person. See below for a description of the numbering system used. The right-hand column of the Ahnenlist lists the locations of any recorded and dated events so that their migration path can be easily viewed. States use their capitalized two-letter code and countries use a non-capitalized three-letter code. Unfortunately the code order is not perfect, and I need to do more work in this area to correct errors. It can be used however as an indicator that can still be of some interest.

I would like to make a special comment on the use of the improbability list to find contentions. The improbability list uses some of the most common mistakes to find errors in the data. It includes some impossible combinations of facts. An example would any date that occurs before a birth date (estimated birthdates are not used in the improbability list). When an impossible relationship is found, a definite contention exists and must be resolved before the facts can be ascertained. In some cases, one of the dates is inaccurate, such as: before 1900, and therefore may only need adjusting. The improbability list also includes some improbable combinations. A few of these, although listed, are not necessarily contentions, and should be reviewed on an individual basis. Some of these are worth mentionsing here:
Ancestors Baptized Past the Age of 5 - it is uncommon but not unheard of for children to be baptized past the age of five, or as an adult.
Ancestors Married Before the Age of 14 - it is uncommon but not unheard of for persons to be betrothed when quite young, or even as an infant.
Ancestors Married After Their Children Were Born - it was less common in the past for illegitimate children to be born, but not unheard of.
Ancestors Died Before Their Childrens Birth - obviously there is a 9 month possible overlap here.

In addition a couple of other contentions are worth mentioning:
Ancestors Whose Age at the Time of an Event is Error by More Than 1 Year - this refers to a recorded event for which and age was listed in the source records, for instance a census record, which disagrees with a known birth date. The age of the event is listed, and a rough calculation of the expected age based on the known birthdate is listed. It is unfortunate, but it was not uncommon for census and immigration records to have inaccurate ages listed.
Ancestors Whose Birthdates Could Not Be Estimated - to estimate birthdates, the program processes the database and using a complex algorithm, attempts to find a suitable birthdate that fits with all other known dates or other previously estimated birthdates from close relatives. This includes using known average ages per generation and average ages of marriage, etc. (See Preface) In the case where no suitable birthdate can be found that fits in with these other dates, the database will be reprocessed, until no new birthdates can be estimated for any individual. At that point, the estimating process ceases, and any individual that does not have an estimated birthdate is recorded. The contention is therefore due to deficiencies in either the algorithm or errors in other recorded known dates of the individual's close relatives. This is then a good indication that further research needs to be done for that individual to understand why the contention arose.

The Ahnenlist is an ancestor list whereby all of the known ancestors of a single person or family can be listed in such a way that no two different ancestors receive the same number, the root person is assigned the number 1, and their ancestors are assigned numbers as follows:

1. self
2. father
3. mother
4. father's father
5. father's mother
6. mother's father
7. mother's mother

The next generation (the eight great-grandparents of individual number 1) then receive the next eight numbers (i.e., 8 through 15). If an ancestor is unknown, then the number that would have been used for that ancestor remains blank. If, at some future date, the information becomes known, the relevant numbers are still available for use. In cases where a person is descended from the same ancestor through two or more siblings, in the same or different generations, the ancestor will then be assigned two or more ancestor numbers. In this case, each ancestor will reference the smallest ancestor number and only the smallest ancestor number will be used in assigning ancestor numbers to their parents. For instance if the root ancestor's parents were siblings, then they have the same parents:

1. self
2. father
3. mother
4. grandfather
5. grandmother
6. grandfather (same as 4)
7. grandmother (same as 5)
8. grandfather's father
9. grandfather's mother
10. grandmother's father
11. grandmother's mother

16. grandfather's father father
17. ...

Note that there are no entries between 11 and 16 because those individuals would be duplicates. Since the smallest number is always used, it is possible for a child to be placed in a higher generation than their parent.

The Descendant lists are similar to The Ahnenlist with the exception that only ancestors of the root person that are descended from the anchor person (the person from whom the root person is descended from) are included in the list, and ancestors having multiple ancestor mubers are resticted to only the lowest ancestor number.