https://www.americanancestors.org/browse/publications/the-register/...
NEHGR Vol. 174, Summer 2020
Our lead article is Ancestry of Agnes Spencer, Wife of Thomas Higginson of Berkeswell, Warwickshire, Ancestor of Nine American Immigrants, Cousin to Diana, Princess of Wales, Sir Winston Churchill, President George Washington, and Others. Building on his earlier Higginson article, author Clifford L. Stott shows how all these people were descended from three Spencer brothers of Warwickshire and Badby, Northamptonshire, born in the mid-fifteenth century. The immediate descendants of the three brothers are traced in the text, and a two-page chart shows how those named in the article’s title and U.S. Presidents Washington, Coolidge, Franklin Roosevelt, and the two Bushes are descended from one of the three Spencer brothers. As the author’s major articles have shown, finding a network of distantly related American immigrants is not surprising.
The article begins with “The Despencer Forgery.” In 1595 a successful Spen-cer descendant paid a corrupt herald to grant him arms based on the arms of the extinct noble Despencer family. This Spencer family clearly was not descended from the Despencer family, as proved in print in 1901. However, the Spencers rose to gentry status, several men were knighted, and Robert Spencer (1570–1627), ancestor of Diana, Princess of Wales, and Sir Winston Churchill was granted a title
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