Hello everyone,
I have been spending some time sourcing and cleaning up Joe Biden’s family tree here on Geni and I have started this discussion to note important changes and to share research in a centralized and transparent place.
To start with arguably the most important change, which should affect the genealogical connections that many Geni users have to Joe Biden. Elizabeth Johnson, wife of Capt. Griffith Johnson, Sr. is currently listed as the daughter of the Philip Thomas, but there is a slight problem here. Philip Thomas did have a daughter named Elizabeth, but she was not the Elizabeth who married Griffith Johnson. Philip’s daughter was Elizabeth Snowden who married her cousin, Samuel Snowden, Sr. The birth dates of the two Elizabeths’ children prevent the theory that the same Elizabeth might have married twice. See here: https://msa.maryland.gov/megafile/msa/speccol/sc3500/sc3520/001200/... and for some primary source-based proof, see the 1777 will of Ann Thomas, wife of Philip Thomas, in which is written:
“I give and bequeath to my Daughter Elizabeth Snowden one hundred pounds [?] money, also I give to my said Daughter Elizabeth my Silver Baking dish, and all my wearing apparel…”
Page 1 of the will: https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33SQ-GT5G-CTJ?i=9&w...
Page 2 of the will: https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9T5G-ZKK?i=10&...
I want to make it clear that due to the nature of Joe Biden’s tree, when Elizabeth Johnson is disconnected from Philip Thomas, many Geni users will unfortunately lose their direct relationship to Biden. I’ll leave the connection intact for a few days in case other users want to weigh in with further sources to add to this discussion.
(On a side note, the fact that Elizabeth Johnson represented the path through which many Geni users can trace their connection to Biden is also very problematic since the proof behind the origins of the immigrant Thomas ancestor, Lt. Philip Thomas, is highly questionable, but I’ll get to that later.)
This brings me to my second reason for starting this discussion. Joe Biden’s tree is not complete. There are multiple lines that currently dead-end in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. These includes multiple families in the United States which might well have older colonial roots. The issue is that records for this period in Maryland seem a bit hard to come by and those that are available, such as the wills on familysearch, are often not indexed for these earlier years, which renders using them a bit time consuming. Families in the United States which still need some expansion include the Elkins, Randle, Shoemaker and Bomberger families to name just a few. There is also the question of his Irish ancestors and there might also be room to expand his ancestry a bit in Ireland.
Sincerely,
Tamas Caldwell-Gilbert