This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/DAw.2ACIB/1707.1 Message Board Post: I have Lawrences in Somerset County, Queen Anne County and Baltimore, Maryland. I am a descendant of William Henry Lawrence who is reported to have come from Westmoreland County Virginia on the Potomac River about 1820. He was born March 3, 1802, presumably in Westmoreland County, Virginia and died September 22, 1900 in Somerset County, Maryland. Two stories have been documented concerning William Henry Lawrence’s journey from Virginia to Maryland. In 1977 Mrs. Shirley Richards, the “Somerset County unofficial historian”, told Frank Lawrence that William Lawrence left Virginia in a canoe at night “amid shooting and trouble”. This may have been in 1816. Also in 1997, Frank Lawrence spoke to Mr. Walter Bloodsworth of Somerset County, Md who related the following tale. In 1820, William was serving dinner at a home in which he lived. As he entered the dining room, a lady seated there asked of someone else, “How long will he ! be here?”. Hearing this, William dropped the platter of food and bolted out the door and into the [Potomac] River. A passing boat picked him up, according to Mr. Bloodsworth. The captain of the boat was Edward Tyler, who carried William to Somerset County. The Tyler name is intertwined with the Lawrence name as neighbors in the census records, witnesses in legal documents and several descendants were named Tyler. August 5,1834 William married Mary Ann Sheperd. They are listed in the Somerset County 1850 census. They remained in Somerset County. Mary passed on in 1884 and is buried at Saint Peters Methodist Church in Oriole, Maryland. William passed on September 22, 1901 and is buried next to his wife.