The following news release was received from the New England Historic Genealogical Society. I immediately checked out their new Mayflower Families 5th Generation database and absolutely love it! Over 59,450 people in the fifth generation of 50 of the 51 Mayflower passengers known to have descendants are included. Over 7300 families are in the database. I’ve been a member for years, so access was free. However, those without memberships can now purchase a 3-month trial at the site. Read on…
The Largest Online Database of Authenticated Mayflower Pilgrim Genealogies Now Makes It Easy to Learn Whether One Is Descended from a Pilgrim
June 13, 2018 — Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historic Genealogical Society (NEHGS) has announced the release of an invaluable resource in the field of genealogy on its award-winning website AmericanAncestors.org. Through a partnership with the General Society of Mayflower Descendants (GSMD), the “Mayflower Families Fifth Generation Descendants, 1700-1880” database offers meticulous documentation on the Mayflower passengers who arrived in 1620 and left descendants.
It is the largest online database of authenticated Pilgrim genealogies, with more than half a million searchable names,” said D. Brenton Simons, President and CEO of NEHGS, “making it easier than ever to learn whether an individual is descended from one who planted the first permanent settlement of New England in Plymouth Colony and ultimately laid the foundation for America.”
The announcement follows months of work by NEHGS who scanned and indexed print volumes of genealogical data researched and published by the General Society of Mayflower Descendants (GSMD). The database contains authenticated information on more than 7,300 families — more than 59,450 people — in the fifth generation of 50 of the 51 Mayflower passengers known to have descendants.
More than 193,000 records—birth, baptism, marriage, deeds, death, and burial–cover all the Pilgrims, with the exception of one: the family of Moses Fletcher. Fletcher died during the first winter at Plymouth, while his family remained in Leiden, the Netherlands. The database contains information for the descendants of John Alden, Isaac Allerton, John Billington, William Bradford, William Brewster, Peter Brown, James Chilton, Francis Cooke, Edward Doty, Francis Eaton, Edward Fuller, Samuel Fuller, Stephen Hopkins, John Howland, Richard More, William Mullins, Degory Priest, Thomas Rogers, Henry Samson, Myles Standish, John Tilley, Richard Warren, William White, and Edward Winslow.
The “Mayflower Families Fifth Generation Descendants, 1700-1880” database is a result of a collaboration between NEHGS and GSMD announced in July of 2017. Through that agreement, GSMD made its “Silver Books” resource available to NEHGS for the purpose of digitization and indexing. Known by that name because of their distinctive silver covers, the Mayflower Families Through Five Generations series meticulously documents the first five generations of Pilgrim descendants. This new online database encompasses the fifth generation portion of these. It is available for use in family history research by anyone who is a paying member of NEHGS.
The organization has announced a 3-month new membership program for those interested in researching this and 450 other unique online database resources on AmericanAncestors.org; GSMD members have the benefit of discounted annual membership fees at NEHGS.
With a growing collection of more than 1.4 billion online records on its website AmericanAncestors.org, original published scholarship—including the journal Mayflower Descendant—and unique educational resources, NEHGS is America’s founding genealogical organization and has more than 250,000 constituents worldwide. It offers tools and expertise to help family historians of all levels explore their past and understand their families’ unique place in history.
The URL of the webpage description of this newly-released database, with options for paid access, is found at https://Mayflower.AmericanAncestors.org/Pilgrim-Database.
