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The reviews are the opinion of the editor (unless indicated otherwise). They are solely for the aid of our readers. Reviews appear in every issue of the journal. If you would like to subscribe or order any back issue, please click here. To return to the master index of reviews, please click here.
This review was published in 2005
The General Society of Mayflower Descendants, P.O. Box 3297, Plymouth MA 02361, publishes books of interest to Mayflower descendants. Below is a list of what has been published since the last issue. U.S. residents add $8.00 p&h, Mass. residents please add 5% sales tax. Canada addresses add $7.00 p&h and pay in U.S. funds.
Family of Henry Samson [:] Fifth-Generation Descendants of Henry’s son James Samson and daughters Elizabeth (Samson) Sprout[,] [Daughter] (Samson) Hanmore[,] Hannah (Samson) Holmes[, and] Dorcas (Samson) Bonney [Volume 20, Part 2] compiled by Jane Fletcher Fiske, Robert Moody Sherman, and Ruth Wilder Sherman (Plymouth, Mass., 2005), hardcover, xiii + 634 pp., index. $45.00. Part 1 was published in 2000 and covered the first four generations of Henry Samson. Part 2 is the fifth generation for the first seven children of Henry, though two children had no issue. Part 3 will cover the fifth generation for the last two children of Henry: Stephen and Caleb. This book has been long awaited and it was good that Jane Fiske could step in and complete it. There are differences from the other “silver” books that readers should know. Citations are found in several places. The word “several” is a red flag. It is not good to have the reader searching in more than one place because there is more chance for error (as well as an author ensuring that all citations are there). With this type of book, “short cites” keyed to a long bibliography found somewhere else does make sense. The reason that short cites were used in the text was said to make the sketch more readable. That is an admirable goal, but the now standard footnoting in genealogical journals does the job so much better – and puts all the citations in one place. This book uses short cites within the text (that is not reader-friendly) and unnumbered end-sketch notes (the newest silver books used only numbered end notes to cite all sources – an okay substitute for footnoting). In flipping through the volume, some of these imbedded short cites read “p.360” or “White, 3617, citing #S42605.” An experienced genealogist might recognize the last one as a reference to Virgil D. White, Genealogical Abstracts of Revolutionary War Pension Files, most may not. Since it is a short cite, you need to look at the bibliography. The book is there, but not under White like you would think. It is not even found under its title (though from this cite, most readers would not know that). It is under “Abstracts” – which is neither the title nor the author. The first one is the reference for an 1800 census entry. Since it is a page number and many of the first two censuses have been in print for a long time, you would think that is the source cited. In fact, it is the page number stamped on the original census that is available on several website and government microfilm. The number 360 is misleading. A double page layout is numbered once on the right (or folio) side. The citation is to an entry found on the left side, so it is more accurately labeled either 360 (a), folio 360, or just p. 361. This volume has listed the sixth generation as children and occasionally the seventh generation as grandchildren in a sketch. The previous silver books would treat the fifth generation as the children of the fourth. This is nicer as it is moving our knowledge of the descendants one generation further. Including the seventh generation when it had to be done to sort out the sixth or easily obtained when researching the sixth only makes sense. Why throw away good research. It is out of the scope of the book, however, when all the five generations are done; one hopes the sixth and seventh will be next. With this volume, much of that work is already done. A reader using part 2 with part 1 might notice that the numbering of the fifth generation is off. Though this is not an ideal situation, the author made a decision to renumber the entire fifth generation when her research found many more children that should have been listed in part 1 for the fifth generation. To help bridge the gap, each fifth generation sketch lists the number of the fourth generation in square brackets when mentioning the parents. This seems like the only logical way to handle this issue without having to reprint part 1.
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