In cleaning up a little my family tree this morning, I happened to see a name in the tree that looked familiar. I did a little more checking and found that the stories in two earlier blogs were actually connected.
In my blog on "Family Connections - a Followup to 'Finding Bonnie'", I had noted that a distant ancestor of my cousin Rob (his 9th great grandfather) was William Leete, a former governor of the Colony of Connecticut.
In my blog on "Marrying my cousin - part 2" I noted that one of my ancestors was John Rogers (1538-1601). He was the 7th great-grandfather to my step-grandfather, Charles Rogers, and the brother of my grandmother's 9th great-grandfather.
What I discovered that I had not noticed before was the John's wife was a woman named Mary Leete. Having only recently investigated the Leete ancestors of my cousin, I wondered if there was a connection -- and of course there was! Mary is the first cousin of William (the governor) Leete's grandfather.
Thus, Mary [Leete] Rogers is not only the first cousin (13 times removed) of my cousin Rob, but she is also my 12th great-aunt, my wife's 12th great-aunt, and (ignoring the step- part), my 9th great-grandmother!
It's been said that if you go back far enough that we're all connected. That's a theoretical statement. But here is at least one small demonstration of how connected we are.
orrection - John Rogers (1507-1555) is NOT the grandfather of Thomas Rogers. Thus, it is not confirmed that my grandmother married her distant cousin. There were multiple William Rogers living in the same area of England at about the same time, thus the confusion.
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