Last week I spent two full days at the Alderman Library at the Univ. of Virginia in Charlottesville scanning the 22 boxes of material in the Col. Brooke Payne collection (mss. #920). I was hoping to find a link between the many VA Payne families that Col. Payne was studying and a group of Paynes that started settling in the Kershaw/ Camden around 1750. Many of these Paynes in the Kershaw/Camden area relocated to Wilkinson and Laurens Counties in GA or to parts of AL shortly after 1800. Unfortunately, among the thousands and thousands of documents in that collection that I scanned, I couldn't find any links between the fairly well established VA Payne families and those 1750-1800 Paynes in Kershaw/Camden, SC. Due to Col. Payne's intensive focus on VA counties and records in that state, the boxes of documents don't often mention relocations of these Payne families to other states. When there are references to such moves, these seemed to be to Kentucky, Tennessee, and a few to North Carolina counties. I wonder if anyone on this list has been able to trace these Kershaw/ Camden, SC Paynes back a generation or so to their roots in VA, MD, or otherwise. I do know that some of the Paynes in the Greenville, SC area derive from earlier MD families, but I would appreciate any guidance about earlier ancestors of the Kershaw/Camden, SC Paynes. Among the individuals in that area are the early settlers (and probably their sons) of Camden or Frederickborough, SC: William, Phillip, several Josephs, several Georges, several Johns, Daniel, Benjamin, Samuel, Elisha, and James Payne. I know a few others have also been examining these early Kershaw/Camden, SC Paynes and perhaps someone can help several of us with some info. Thanks. --- Steve Payne