What Is Proven and What Is Tradition

A plain line between record and legend, so the two are never confused.

Documented (record or authoritative pedigree)

• The maternal gentry lines, Jones of Drombeg, Travers (to Lancashire, 1583), Lucas, Beamish, Bernard (and cousinship to the Earls of Bandon), Freke (to the Tudor West Country, and the Irish house of Castle Freke), Townsend, Smyth, on Burke’s, Kingsley, Brady, The Ancestor, the Registry of Deeds and the Trinity register.
• The Elliott origin at Golden, Co. Tipperary, on the National Library's Catholic register microfilms (the 1836 Elliott–Connors marriage and the 1842 twin baptism of John and James), proven to our John by the full 1865 Cork civil marriage record naming his father Robert, the same record that names Honora's father, Cornelius Sheehan. Behind them: the Birr baptism transcripts of 1774–1786 (Irish Midlands Ancestry), Alice Acres's 1791 Ettagh baptism (Tipperary Genealogy Centre), and the Killaloe marriage licence bond indexes of 1771 (Elliott–Evans) and 1813 (Elliott–Acres).
• The Ryves of Damory Court and the Swaynes of Blandford and of Sarson, on the 1623 Visitation of Dorset, Hutchins's History of Dorset, the Reeves Project's collation of the wills, and the Prerogative Court of Canterbury wills of Robert Ryves (1549) and Joan Ryves (1560). Robert Ryves (c. 1490) is the earliest documented ancestor in this book.
• The White of Kilmoylan and Huleatt/Brady lines, on Burke's Irish Family Records and the Galway estate records now carried up through the wives, each verified in the original volumes: the Ievers of Mount Ievers (to Henry Ivers, fl. 1667); the Lanes of Lanespark (documented to William Lane the "49 officer", d. 1672, on the Record Commission grant and the pre-fire will abstracts; their claimed descent from Lane of Bentley Hall is examined and set aside in Ch. 12 and with it the Bagot and Cecil kinships, which stand or fall with that claim); and the Pennefathers of Marlow, proven end to end from Cornet Matthew (1618–88, buried at the Rock of Cashel) and his father Abraham of Staffordshire down to Ellen, with the Kingsmill and Moore marriages. The Smyth line's Hickeys on Alumni Dublinenses, with the Herricks of Shippool to John Herrick (1612) on Burke's LGI, read in the original.
• The Webbs, on Burke’s Landed Gentry and Brady; the Cambridgeshire origin on a family-bible transcript.
• My Damery direct line back to Richard Damery (fl. 1752), and the Bandon Damerys of the 1690s, on the Cork registers (ffolliott) and the 1750 proclamation; the American emigration on the New York manifests (under the "Demery" spelling), the federal censuses, and the full Granby, Connecticut probate file of James Damery (d. 1865), read in 2026.
• The medieval d’Amory barons themselves, and their male line down to the Damer Earls of Dorchester, in the 1790 Peerage and the standard records; what is NOT yet proven is the link between them and my Cork Damerys.
• The Suffolk lines (Channell, Wright to 1617, Symonds, Clarke, Ransome, Ely, Newport), on parish registers and the 1814 Ely will (register-level).

Tradition/legend (cherished, not proven)

• The descent of my Cork Damerys from the medieval d’Amory / Damer kindred, likely, on the rarity of the name and shared arms, but not joined by a record.
• Damory Court as the seat of Sir Roger d’Amory; Burke's and Dorset tradition against the "Manor of Dame Marie" of the place-name scholars; a convergence of name and place between my Damery name (my father's father's line) and the Dorset house my grandmother's Freke–Swayne–Ryves kin married into, not a bloodline.
• The deeper French and Frisian story: Damery-on-the-Marne, the Duchy of Bar, the Burgundian baron, the Frisian “Dammritter,” and the court of Charlemagne.
• The English crossing of the Cork family. The weight now lies with Gloucestershire: the Cromhall–Dursley Dimery broadweavers, whose one documented emigrant (Richard Dymery, indentured at Bristol for Jamaica, 16 July 1685) is the working hypothesis for our Richard of Bandon. Devon (the Amory of Chappell) keeps the tradition; Dorset is set aside, its wills naming no Richard. Probable at best; not yet tied by a record.
• The Spenser/Althorp (Diana) kinship, and the Beamish, Bernard, Freke, Lucas and Townsend traditions of yet-earlier origin.

Loose ends, still to chase

• Richard Damery's father: the naming pattern points to a John (Richard's first son, 1752, had an adult John Dammery for sponsor, plausibly the grandfather at the font); the William of Ballymodan c.1700 re-reads as Ann's father or a kinsman. Kilbrogan's pre-1752 register, if it survives, decides.
• James of Kilnameela's father: placed as Richard (1763), probable; the proving record would be the Bandon estate lease papers — brief lodged with a Bandon genealogist, 2026.
• Robert of Golden's father: placed as Robert Senior of Birr (m. Alice Acres, Killaloe bond 1813), probable on the family's account, the naming grid and the run of dates; the proving record would be his baptism, c. 1813–20, at Golden or in the Birr borderland or an Elliott-of-Golden grant in the will calendars. With it wait John the weaver's death "1918", his claimed weighmaster years in Cork (Guy's Directory the test), and Julia's "1951"; the "China" soldiering tradition is traced to a false record-match and rejected (Ch. 15).
• The Bernard origin above Castle Mahon (the Essex/Margaretting link).
• The Brady line above Hugh Brady (d. 1785); the Webb step above George of Maryborough.
• The Suffolk lines at the level of individual register entries.
• The identity of William Lane the '49 officer. The Bentley claim is examined and set aside in Ch. 12; the live leads are the four Lanes of the '49 lists, the 1625 "cousin german to the Earl of Oxford" entry, and the Lanes of Vernon Mount, Cork. Behind the answer, if it ever comes, wait the Bagot and Cecil depths.
• The Bagot pedigree above Richard (d. 1597), in Burke's Peerage, toward its Domesday tradition.
• Vere Hunt of Curragh's parentage (Burke's, De Vere Bts); Matthew Bunbury of Kilreacle (Richardson-Bunbury); Maria Minchin; the Moore of Mooresfort and Falkiner of Cork pedigrees; William Kingsmill of Ballybeg Abbey.
• Henry Ivers's English origin, a fresh brick wall behind a well-documented Irish founder.
• Hildegardis Hyde's parentage: the Townshend book itself only believes her a kinswoman of Clarendon.

A note on the arms

• The coat of arms on the front cover of the printed book is a full decorative achievement: the shield is quartered to show the Cork arms-bearing lines closest to me (Damery, Freke, Beamish, and Townsend), and it is drawn with supporters in the older, grand manner. This quartering is decorative, an assembly made for the book, not a grant or a matriculation.
• My own registered arms on its back cover are borne without supporters and do not quarter these families' coats, to which I hold no formal right. Instead, my shield keeps the ancient Damery field, barry nebuly of six argent and gules, and adds a pale azure bearing, all in argent: an escallop (for Townsend, Travers and Bernard); a lion (for Beamish and Pennefather); and a mullet (for Freke and Lane). A quiet salute to seven of my arms-bearing lines. The motto, Tu ne cede malis, is freely assumed. The talbot's head, used as a device throughout, is also a registered heraldic badge and is my personal mark.