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My Royal Descent

The following outline summarises several of my possible descents from British royalty (full details of each person are to be found in the file posted on Wikitree. After clicking on the Wikitree link you can click on the small red/blue triangles after a persons name to see more ancestors of that person.

I have also tried to indicate the points where some uncertainty exists (due to the paucity of the records) but also remembering that with any pedigree chart there must always be a degree of uncertainty about the male parent of any person listed!

I have often encountered skepticism when I have claimed descent from royalty, although mathematically it can be simply demonstrated that most people of European descent are likely to have a royal ancestor.

With each generation we go back we double the number of ancestors we had in the preceding generation. Thus in the first generation we have 2x1 = 2 ancestors (our parents), in the second generation 2x2 = 4 grandparents, then 2x2x2 = 8 great grandparents etc.

If we take a generation to approximately equate to 30 years then a 300-year period would represent the passing of about ten generations. So taking the year 1400 as an example, it would mean that about twenty generations had passed. That in turn means that each of us alive today would have approximately 2x2 twenty times = 1,048,576 ancestors in that generation. Go back another 30 years and the number doubles again to 2,097,152 and go back another thirty years (to 1340) and the number is 4,194,304 and another 30 years to the time of King Edward I of England and the number is 8,388,608 - more than the estimated population of England at that time. (estimated to be between 5 and 7 million in 1300)

Of course there are going to be a number of instances where people who married were distantly related which will reduce the number of our ancestors but it still remains highly likely that at least one, probably more, of our ancestors was a member of the royalty.

It also means that even if we assume each of my ancestors had only three children who produced offspring (in fact it was likey to be far more than three) then it would mean that in my (26th) generation of descent from Edward I, assuming no intermarriage, there would be 2,511,865,830,000 descendants!

For a fuller explanation of why almost all people of European descent are descended from Charlemagne (and hence royal families of Europe) see the articles Are you a descendant of Charlemagne? and We are all descended from Charlemagne and related to each other

Alternative 1:

Descent from KING EDWARD I of ENGLAND and MARGUERITE of FRANCE

Edward Plantagenet (1239-1307) Edward I, King of England

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Thomas of Brotherton (Earl of Norfolk) (1300-1338)

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Margaret Duchess of Norfolk (c1320-1399)

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Elizabeth de Segrave (1338-1375)

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Eleanor de Mowbray (1364-1426)

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Sir Eudo Welles

NB there are alternative royal descents for Sir Eudo Welles (see below)

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Lionel Wells (6th Lord Welles) (1406-1461)

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Margaret Wells (1434-1480)

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Lionel Dymoke (1463-1519)

Lionel Dymoke is also a descendant of King Henry II of England (see alternative 4)

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Katherine or Ann Dymoke (1500-?)

The descent from Edward I to this point seems fairly well documented and seems to be a matter of historical record that is not in dispute.  The next two generations are where it gets tricky.

John Fulnetby Goodricke (1485- ?) is known to have married a daughter of Sir Lionel Dymoke but there seems to be uncertainty as to her first name. According to the book "Plantagenet Ancestry" by Douglas Richardson, Lionel Dymoke had two daughters, Alice and Anne with the latter marrying John Goodricke.  Anne and John had three sons and two daughters, with one of the daughters Katherine becoming the wife of Thomas Palfreyman. (see p124) The book quotes a range of sources to support these claims.

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Katherine Goodricke (? -?)

Potential confusion arises here because Thomas Palfreyman may have been married twice, to two different women both named Katherine Goodricke! The Harlian Pedigrees refer to Thomas's first wife being a daughter of Ambrose Jermyn however further research revels that elsewhere in the Pedigrees it is shown that she is the daughter of John Fulnetby Goodrick and Katherine Dymoke.

His second wife is referred to as a sister of Edward Goodrick, who was Ambrose Jermyn's son in law. Katherine was the daughter of Lionel Goodrick and Dorothy Jermyn - Ambrose Jermyn's sister.  Lionel Dymoke was a son of John Fulnetby Goodricke in any case so the second Katherine Dymoke would have been a niece of Thomas Palfreyman's first wife.

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Anne Palfreyman (ca1560 – 1615)

A will is in existence of Anne Palfreyman the widow of Thomas Hutchinson of Louth. The will of Thomas Palfreyman refers to his son-in-law Thomas Hutchinson. Descent from this point seems reasonably well-established through the existence of wills and baptismal and marriage records – however there is always the possibility of confusion when people of the same name lived in the same general area.

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Bridget Hutchinson (1590-1653)

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Thomas Waldegrave (1625-1707)

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Daniel Waldegrave (1659-1732)

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Rebecca Waldegrave (1694-1764)

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Mary Allenby (1715-1783)

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Frances Richmond (1743- ?)

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Frances Thacker (1776-1841)

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Jane Copland (1815-1869)

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Betsy Featherby (1854-1913)

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William James Bond (1878-1942)

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Alexander Henry Bond (1905 – 1953)

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Brian Peter Bond (1950- )


The Wells and Dymoke families both have a range of links to royalty. Some of the various ways in which family members are descended from royalty are shown below.

 

Alternative 2:

Royal descent of LIONEL WELLS from KING HENRY III Of England and ELEANOR of PROVENCE through their son EDMOND

Henry III King of England (1207-1272) and Eleanor of Provence

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Edmond Plantagenet (1245-1296)

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Henry Plantagenet (Earl of Lancaster) (1281-1345)

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Joan Plantagenet (1312-1349)

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Sir John de Mowbray (1340-1368)

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Eleanor de Mowbray (1364-1426)

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Sir Eudo Welles (descent from here is as given in alternative 1 above  from Edward I and Marguerite of France)

 

Alternative 3:

ROYAL DESCENT of LIONEL WELLS from KING JOHN of England and Clemence.

John, King of England (1166-1216)

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Joan, Lady of Wales (illegitimate) (? -1236)

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Gwladys (? - ?)

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Roger de Mortimer (1221-1282)

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Edmund de Mortimer (1252-1304)

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Roger de Mortimer (1287-1330)

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Catherine de Mortimer (1309-1369)

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Maud de Beauchamp (1335-1402)

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Katherine de Clifford (1358-1413)

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Maude Greystoke (1390- ?)

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Lionel Wells (1406-1461)

 

 (see alternative I  for the descent from Lionel Wells son of Eudo Wells and Maude Greystoke)

 

Alternative 4:

Royal descent of LIONEL DYMOKE from KING HENRY II of England

Henry II , King of England (1133-1189)

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William "Longsword" Plantageent (1176-1226)

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Sir William Longspeer (1209-1250)

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Ela Longspeer

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Hugh de Audley (1267-1325)- ?)

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Alice de Audley (d1375)

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William FitzRalph (1320-1359)

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Ralph de Greystoke (1353-1417) - ? )

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Maud de Greystoke (b1390) - ? )

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Lionel Wells (1406-1461)

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Margaret Wells (1434-1480)

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Lionel Dymoke

 (see alternative I  for the descent from Lionel Wells son of Eudo Wells and Maude Greystoke)

In total my ancestry includes 16 Kings of England, 21 Kings of France and 17 Kings of Scotland. The French connection comes through the marriage of an English or Scottish King to a French princess eg Edward II married Isabella a daughter of Philip IV of France. A selection of these ancestors are noted below:-

Henry III, King of England (1207-1272)

King John of England (1166-1216) (signed the Magna Carta, although reluctantly!)

Henry II (King of England)

Empress Matilda

Henry I, (King of England)

Stephen, King of England

William I, King of England (William the Conqueror)

St Margaret, Queen of Scotland

Robert II (King of France)

Emperor Charlemagne (Charles the Great)

St Louis IX (King of France and grandfather of Marguerite of France, the wife of King Edward I)


Royal descent from Kings of Scotland

As mentioned above our family is descended from eleven Kings of Scotland including Malcolm I (d 954) and his descendants Kenneth II (d 995); Malcolm II (d 1034); Duncan I 1001-1040); Malcolm III (1031-1093); David I (1084 -1153); Robert the Bruce (1274-1329); Robert II (1316-1390); Robert III (1337-1406); James I (1394-1436); James II (1430-1460); James III (1452-1488) and most recently James IV (1472-1513).

Some lines of descent from some of these earlier kings have been already noted above, for example Edith Matilda a daughter of Malcolm III and St Margaret of Scotland married King Henry I of England and Matilda a grand-daughter of Malcolm and Margaret through their daughter Mary, married King Stephen of England and were ancestors of King Edward I from whom our families descent has been described.

All of the kings of Scotland mentioned above are ancestors of my 6th great grandmother Janet (Jessie Campbell). Due to intermarriage of members of earlier generations there are multiple pathways of descent – too many to list here. Janet is descended from 10 of the 22 children of King Robert II for example.

Janet is descended from Kings of Scotland on the side of both her father (Archibald Campbell of Lerags) and mother (Margaret Campbell) as shown below


Paternal ancestry of (Janet) Jessie Campbell

James II, King of Scotland (1430-1460)

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Princess Mary Stewart (?-1488)

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Elizabeth Hamilton

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Lady Elizabeth Stewart

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Sir Matthew Campbell of Loudon (1531-?)

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Marion Campbell (1548-1597)

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Isabella Boyd (1572-?)

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Ann Campbell

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Colin Campbell 5th of Lochnell (1625-1671)

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Janet Campbell

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Lachlan McLachlan (1642-1720)

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Florence McCallum (1700-?)

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Archibald Campbell of Lerags (1731-1809)

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(Janet) Jessie Campbell


Maternal ancestry of Janet (Jessie) Campbell


James IV, King of Scotland (1472-1513)

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Janet Stewart(1502-1562)

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Margaret Fleming (1536-1586)

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Lady Jean Stewart (?-1593)

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Robert Campbell of Glenorchy (1575-1657)

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Jean Campbell

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Margaret Stewart of Appin

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Alexander Campbell of Ardslignish

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John Campbell of Ardslignish (1712-?)

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Margaret Campbell (1742-1816)

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Janet) Jessie Campbell