William Alldredge (b. 1702)

Name:	William Alldredge
Born:	13 Mar 1703 All Hallow's Parish, Anne Arundel County, Maryland
Died:	11 Apr 1786 Mount Pleasant Creek, Randolph County, North Carolina
Buried:	Sandy Creek Baptist Church Cemetery, Randolph County, North Carolina
Parents:	Believed to be son of Nicholas Aldridge and wife Martha
Children:	William Alldredge (b. 1729), Eleanor (Alldredge) York, Sylvania (Alldredge) York, Nicholas Alldredge (b. 1737, Nathan Alldredge, James Alldredge

Overview

William Alldredge, also known as William Alldredge Sr., settled in about 1755 in what is now Randolph County, North Carolina, but then part of colonial Orange County. He was born on 13 Mar 1703 in All Hallow's Parish, Anne Arundel County, Maryland, the son of Nicholas and Martha Aldridge. He died 11 Apr 1786, per Dennis York's reading of a discovered tombstone believed to belong to William. Compared to his son Nathan, I have scant records on William. The purpose of this page is to collect and verify what I do have and know.

History

As early as 1957, Memory Aldridge Lester connected our common ancestor, Nathan Alldredge, to William Aldridge born 1703 and to Nicholas Aldridge. I do not know the process by which she came to this conclusion, only that there was not a tradition of who Nathan's father or grandfather was. She appears to have reasoned out the connection by thorough and diligent research. I have known her book since I was very young, but was not completely certain of her conclusions until I was able to verify them though DNA research.

When I first became serious about Aldridge-Alldredge research in 2019–2020, I was concerned by the many unsupported claims (and it seemed to me, unsupportable) made by Dennis York and others on Find a Grave and Ancestry. I tried to get in touch with Mr. York, then the administrator of the Aldridge DNA Project, but was unsuccessful. Four years later, despite repeated attempts to contact him, I have never heard back from him. I can only conclude that he is no longer able to research or communicate.

Mr. York did not provide documentation for any of his claims. In the absence of any evidence, I am unable to accept his conclusions. They are, at least, pointers to possible places to search.

Records

Birth

The birth of William Aldridge is recorded in the parish register of All Hallow's Parish, Anne Arundel County. He was born 13 March 1703, the son of Nicholas and Martha Aldridge, and christened 11 April 1703. He was the second son of Nicholas and Martha by the name of William: another child named William was born and died in 1702. For this reason, our William's name is sometimes given as "William II."

Disputed marriage

Ever since Memory Aldridge Lester's book in 1957, the claim has been made that William Aldridge married Elizabeth Symmons on July 3, 1726. Without qualification, Memory wrote, "William ... married Elizabeth Symons July 3, 1726." There is only one problem: this is a misreading of the marriage record. I have not laid eyes on the actual record (as of 6 July 2023, I have ordered a copy of it), but all currently available transcriptions read "William Akeridge to Elizabeth Symmons."

The claim that William Aldridge's wife was Elizabeth Symmons has been asserted so many times in the time since Memory Lester that it has become an "accepted fact." Despite the original claim evidently being a mistake, researchers widely are unwilling to let go of the false identification. Dennis York, in his biography of William Aldridge at Find a Grave, states:

William ALDRIDGE married Elizabeth Ursula SYMMONS in Anne Arundel County, Maryland on about 1727, when he was 25 years old and she was 24 years old. This often is confused with the "William Akeridge & Eliza Symmons who were married July 3, 1726". This is the marriage of a different couple.

The bare fact is, the only source for William Aldridge's wife being named Elizabeth Symmons is this marriage record. If one accepts that this marriage record is for William Akeridge rather than Aldridge, then there is no longer any basis for claiming William's wife was Elizabeth Symmons or even that she was named Elizabeth. Prior to Memory's book in 1957, there was no family tradition of William Aldridge's wife's name, either among the Nathan Alldredge family or among the descendants of Sylvania (Alldredge) York (Dennis York's family). We have neither a will for William which names his wife, or a tombstone for her, or any other evidence. If this marriage record is out as belonging to William Aldridge, then his wife's name, both first and maiden, is unknown.

Children

William Aldridge left no will. Dennis York asserts a list of whom William's children "likely included":

1. Joseph Aldridge (b. 1728) — We now know, from DNA research that Joseph Aldridge was not William's son.
2. William Aldridge "III" (b. 1729)
3. Eleanor (Aldridge) York (b. 1730)
4. Sylvania (Aldridge) York (b. 1731)
5. Samuel Aldridge (b. 1735)
6. Nicholas Aldridge (b. 1737)
7. Nathaniel "Nathan" Benjamin Aldridge (b. 1740) — Mr. York has here conflated Nathan Alldredge with Nathaniel Aldridge.
8. James Aldridge (b. 1742)

Of these children, I am personally certain of my own Nathan, and of William, Nicholas, and James, who appeared together in records in Nathan. Sylvania (Aldridge) York is apparently Dennis York's ancestor, who married Semore York; Eleanor (Aldridge) York married Thomas York, the brother of Semore. The York brothers were sons of Jeremiah York, a close neighbor who had land dealings with both William and Nathan. So I feel confident that they are in the right place too. At this time, I have no knowledge of Samuel, and it appears, neither did Mr. York.

So I can list these children with some degree of confidence:

1. William Alldredge (b. 1729)
2. Eleanor (Alldredge) York
3. Sylvania (Alldredge) York
4. Nicholas Alldredge (b. 1737
5. Nathan Alldredge
6. James Alldredge