For Pamunkey Davenports and Others Interested: A DAVENPORT-L Rootsweb subscriber wrote me privately yesterday to say that while she was not arguing with the conclusion that John Davenport, Sr., son of Martin of Hanover (d. 1735), had both a son named Jack Smith Davenport and a son named John Davenport, her research indicated that on at least two occasions Jack Smith's name had appeared as John Smith Davenport in Charlotte County, Virginia, records. Hence, she could not accept the statement that invariably, without exception, Jack Smith always appeared in the records as Jack Smith. The sources she cited were secondary, i.e., were from a source that had either abstracted or extracted from an original records, or weaker yet, were from a source that had copied from a secondary source or tercerary source, ad infinitem. Fortunately, I had abstracts/extracts from those original records. Also, where she cited one deed in 1779, I found two. Here are the substantive facts extracted from those two deeds, one of which allegedly recorded Jack Smith as John Smith: 31Jul1779 - Deed: William Harvey, Jr., wife Drusilla, to Richard Davenport, all of Charlotte County, for L460, 150 acres in Charlotte County, adjoining Jack Smith Davenport, said Richard Davenport, John Wilson, Decd., and John Robinson... /s/ William Harvey, Jr., Drusilla Harvey. Wit: Thomas Paullet, Jack S. Davenport. (Charlotte County, VA, Deeds, 4:181) 9Dec1779 - Deed: Samuel Webb, of Buckingham County, to William Davenport, of the Colony of Virginia, for L200, 280 acres in Charlotte County on Long Creek, now in the possession of John Wood, adjoining Richard Davenport, Jack Smith Davenport, John Hunter, John Clayton, and James Overton... /s/ Samuel Webb. Wit: Richard Davenport, Jack S. Davenport, William Harvey, Jr. (Charlo tte County, VA, Deeds, 4:176) The careful reader will note that not only did the original conveyances identify the bounding landowner as Jack Smith Davenport, that Jack Smith himself apparently witnessed both deeds, signing himself as "Jack S. Davenport." If his legal signature was John S. Davenport, he ignored two opportunities to make the fact known. My correspondent also cited Jack Smith's appearance in Charlotte County Court records in 1780 when he was recommended for a commission in the Militia, stating that her source had given the name as John Smith there also. Here's what my full quotation of that Court Order is: 4Dec1781 - Militia Service: "Ordered that Jack Smith Davenport be recommended by this Court to his Excellency the Governor to be Ensign in Captain William Harvey's Company of Militia, in place of John Barksdale who stands recommended to the rank of Second Lieutenant in said Company." (Charlo tte County, VA, Court Orders) Clearly my correspondent's source or sources had either cooked the books (purposely changed Jack to John) or had used a source that did. When you take into account the fact that the DAR Patriot Certification of Jack Smith Davenport as Corporal John Davenport (who was Jack Smith's cousin, the son of James Davenport, Sr., of Hanover County, Virginia, and Ogelthorpe County, Georgia) predated my correspondent's sources, it is not difficult to determine where the error began. Those who followed either took the DAR identification as gospel or had a vested interest in continuing the misrepresentation. When faced with a contradiction between the original record and the DAR certification, the DAR won. Unfortunately, that happens too often. Much of the nagging error permeating both Pamunkey Davenport and Newberry Davenport genealogy today can be traced to erroneous DAR certifications. Lest someone conclude that I am anti-DAR, I note that I am a past president of the Utah Society of the Sons of the American Revolution (SAR), am a current active member of the Society, and that my wife is a member of Unitah Chapter, Utah Society, Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR). The SAR and the Marine Corps League (Semper Fi) are my memberships of prime interest. My wife's greatest interests are the DAR and the Disabled American Veterans Auxiliary. I am not anti-DAR, but I am anti-erroneous certifications--and I've encountered at least a dozen in my research, three of which have plagued Davenport genealogy. Jack Smith Davenport's certification as a Patriot was right for the wrong reason--he was eligible in his own right for he made the supreme sacrifice, and those qualifications, readily ascertainable if the research had been done, need not have been sullied by a descendant's lazy hooking on to his cousin John's Continental Line service and creating thereby the genealogical consternation over John vs. Jack that has followed. DAR and SAR Certifications should not be taken as gospel unless there is corroboration in primary records. (I can cite one DAR Patriot certification of a man who accepted a commission as a Captain in the King's Loyal Militia, was on the British Army payroll for two years, who refugeed to Charleston with his family and went to East Florida with the British Army, where he was given his choice of going to Nova Scotia with the British or remaining in Florida as a subject of the King of Spain and converting to Catholicism, who so converted and died a subject of King of Spain in 1798, having never accepted the existence of the United States, yet who was certified as a Patriot by the DAR when one of his female descendants applied for membership, having hooked on to the military service of a man of similar name who fought under Colonel Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox. That's the worst one I've found yet, but there are several others that come close.) If you will examine the process whereby Patriots are certified by the DAR and who is doing the vetting, you can understand why classic examples of fraud, such as the one described above, can occur. It's inherent in the system. That's the DAR's problem. Our problem is blind reliance on those certifications. There is too much blind faith in old data and conclusions among Pamunkey Davenport family researchers. All research, including mine, should be vetted (to vet = to examine, investigate, and evaluate in a thorough, expert way) before being accepted. But as a matter of reality, few family searchers, genealogy being essentially a hobby or avocation, have either the time, the perspacity, or the desire to get that deep into the subject. When a hobby becomes hard work, it ceases to be fun. It's fish or cut bait. So corners are cut in dependence on authority. Acceptance of any authority, unfortunately, is commonplace, and the result, among the Pamunkeys at least--but it just as true in other families, is that the blind frequently are leading the blind. But then, who amongst us has the sight? Then too, there is a great deal more data available today than existed ten years ago. New evidence engenders new conclusion. The old conclusions, if no longer valid, should be assigned to the wastebasket--but they will not be. They will continue to circulate, and doubtlessly be hung on super web pages. Fifty years from now, old, disproven Davenport genealogy will still be circulated. Whatever, after that philosophical ramble, I again submit that Jack Smith Davenport invariably did appear as such in Eighteenth Century Virginia records. John Scott Davenport Holmdel, NJ