Jonathan Smalley - Son of Walter Raleigh and Elizabeth (born Throckmorton) Raleigh

Nuh-uh. Unless you have actual primary documentation (birth/baptismal record giving both parents' names - and in this case I think nothing less will do) you've only got another old "family legend".

In any case, you have linked in several generations later - along about the tail end of the Stewart line (James II/VII, William & Mary, Anne).

Here is the John Smalley you mean: John Smalley

His parents are unknown.

To add the Raleighs, we would need primary evidence.

The story is that John Smalley is the son of

Edward Small

Which he’s not, and that Edward Small was the son of Walter Raleigh, which he wasn’t.

Lots of information in the Overviews to those profiles.

Edward Small was born in 1600. By that time, Walter Raleigh and Elizabeth Throckmorton had already had two sons; they would later have another. Why would they be hiding one baby when they didn’t hide the others. They didn’t, of course, since Edward Small wasn’t theirs.

Another version of the story is that Walter Raleigh was the father, but Queen Elizabeth was the mother. When she was 67. That didn’t happen, either.

The primary evidence that Edward Small was the son of Walter Raleigh, by either mother, is not going to show up.

Because back then after the parents had their son they divorced. And Queen Elizabeth frowned up divorced parents that had a child. So to keep their son safe Sir Walter had his servant Mr Smalley and his wife take his and Elizabeth's baby boy to keep him safe from the Queen

So I'll keep searching for the proof that I need to prove that he is their son. It should be in the history books.

Raleigh and his wife did not divorce. She was given his head after his execution.

So it can’t be that.

Also Edward Small was born in between the births of the last two sons Raleigh and his wife had. So again, not working as a theory.

Frankly, the arguments over Edward Small are irrelevant, because Edward has been shown by both chronology and DNA testing to be NOT the father of John Smalley. So, Tereasa, Edward is not your ancestor anyway.

Oh Maven! Arguments over history are never irrelevant!

lol.

Edward Smalley and his wife adopted John Smalley that's why it say's their not blood related. And it won't show that either.

Back then they don't have records of children being adopted.

Anne by any chance if I find what I was talking about you read what I've found on the internet and what is on my heritage. Because I don't think anyone should judge without at least looking at what I'm talking about.

Tereasa A. Timmerman

I am very willing to look at anything you send me. Please provide links.

Indeed records of adoption did not exist at that time, for the Raleigh piece of things. I can certainly work in the Colonial period, but my expertise lies in the English side of the argument, so I am focusing there.

However, birth, baptism, marriage, and death records did, not in the form that we know them now, but in church records, in England. And I am trained to read them. So please send me links to whatever you have found.

Did you follow the logic of what I have said above?

Do you understand that Raleigh and Elizabeth Throckmorton had already had two sons by the time Edward Small was born, and that they had long been released from the Tower? They then had another son, born after Edward’s birth date. What is your theory as to why they suddenly, for no reason, gave up one son, and kept the others (with the exception of the first son, who had died already)?

What is your evidence that they were divorced at the time that Edward Small was born? They were living together, had another son later, and when Raleigh was executed, Elizabeth was given his head, because she was his wife. So, not divorced.

Please understand.

The genealogical websites, and even some of the genealogy books, are full of theories which are simply not so and for which there is no evidence. One of the major pastimes of humans over the eons has been that of inventing connections to famous, noble, royal, or mythological personages. But saying something is so does not necessarily make it true.

In this case, though as I say, I will absolutely look at any links you send me, on account of my deep and abiding love of Explaining How History Works, I have pretty clearly explained why this particular story won’t be having any actual proof show up. It’s in the chronology and the logic.

This is a story invented in the Colonies, I gather, tying ancestors with unknown antecedents back into a glorious bit of history. But it was created by people who didn’t really understand that history. And it doesn’t make any sense.

Anne, I think we've got another diehard who just *won't* give up their Glorious Family Legend no matter how implausible, or even outright impossible, it is.

I noticed the pretzeled logic in trying to hold on to some fragment of the fable: "Edward Smalley and his wife adopted John Smalley" - except that it's *Edward*, not John, who was supposedly the son of Sir Walter Raleigh and whoever, and Edward and John were only 13 years apart in age.

How about this link (https://www.britannica.com>Walter.... And when I get ahold of my Public Library I'll see if they can help me out. And I might have relatives that probably can, too. So give me sometime to prove it. Because the history room at my Public library should have the proof that I need. Thanks in advance.

Tereasa A. Timmerman
The link which you posted does not work. I think that the tail end of it was lost, but could it be sir Walter Raleigh's biography on Britannica? If it is then: "In 1592 the birth of a son betrayed him, and he and his wife were both imprisoned in the Tower of London. Raleigh bought his release with profits from a privateering voyage in which he had invested, but he never regained his ascendancy at court. The child did not survive; a second son, Walter, was born in 1593 and a third son, Carew, in 1604 or 1605."
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Walter-Raleigh-English-explorer

Three sons. The Encyclopedia Britannica is a very authoritative and scholarly source. If i got the wrong link please let me know.

I looked into previous research notes on the unrelated families of colonial arrivers John Smalley and John Smalley, it is here:

https://www.geni.com/discussions/127161

http://www.werelate.org/wiki/Person:Edward_Small_(2)_

According to WFT CD#10 Tree #839, and "family tradition", Edward Small was a son of Sir Walter Raleigh II, but there is no concrete evidence to prove this, based upon research by several recognized genealogists.

There is also much speculation that Edward Small was a brother to John Small, who migrated to New England in the early 1600's, but recent DNA testing seems to have ruled this out. Several DNA tests for descendants for both Edward and John Small have not shown common genetic markers.
——

This is an example of a tree trying to make connections, which has, alas, been disproved:

http://www.laronde.info/Descendants%20of%20Walter%20Raleigh.doc

Tagging Edward Small who was a very different person with a very different history from John Smalley of Piscataway.

The descendants of Jonathan Smalley and Sarah FitzRandolph do in fact have an “illustrious” pedigree, from American genealogy point of view, anyway.

Sarah (Fitzrandolph) Smalley is Samuel Fuller, "Mayflower" Passenger's great granddaughter!

https://www.geni.com/path/Samuel-Fuller-Mayflower-Passenger+is+rela...

Samuel Fuller, "Mayflower" Passenger