- Descendants
- Surname List
- Name Index
- Download current GEDCOM file (Jan 2000)
- To the Compton Geocities Genealogy Site
- To the Compton Master Page
Background
This is a personal history of the Island Creek, Kentucky Comptons, which began as a surf of Internet resources, and which has ended (to the extent these things ever end) with fieldwork--visits to county seats and surrounding environs in Virginia, Kentucky, West Virginia and Maryland, incuding courthouses, cemeteries, the heads of Eastern Kentucky hollers, as well as libraries from the Russell, Botetourt, and Tazewell Counties (among others) in Virginia, to the Daughters of the American Revolution library at Constitution Hall.
My name is Stephen L. Compton. I was born November 14, 1947 in Pikeville, Kentucky. the son of Roy E. Compton, son of Grover C. Compton, son of James Buchanan Compton, son of William F. Compton, who came to Island Creek, outside of Pikeville, Kentucky, sometime prior to 1851 from Southwestern Virginia. To this day, there is a tributary of the left fork of Island Creek, called the Billy Compton Branch. A couple of years after the sudden and untimely death of my mother Ellena Turner Compton of a heart attack in April, 1957, I left Pikeville in the fall of 1959 with my father for the Florida panhandle, where I lived in the vicinity (excepting a year in Vietnam in 1970-71) until 1973, when my first wife Linda and I, with daughter Ellena Carole, relocated to the Memphis, Tennessee area, where I have been for the most part ever since. In 1980 Linda and I divorced, and I remarried in 1982 to Nancy Dickson Compton.
I believe I have established a reasonable record to run 29 generations of Comptons, back to Alwyne the Anglo-Saxon of Warwickshire in the 11th Century, and have marked my direct line accordingly at critical junctures. Of course, there are questions and issues which have arisen at certain junctures during the course of this inquiry. The principal issues are the parentage of William F. Compton and the identity of another, 17th Century William in New Jersey, who I believe, with good evidence, to have been the son of a New York William of a distinguished line. I mention these two in particular because the lack of definite proof has created controversy among those who have researched it. In any event, one cannot come away without a tremendous respect for one’s ancestors, the challenges and the migrations they undertook while making their mark in both Europe and America.
European Comptons
The following pedigree has been derived from an excerpt of William Bingham Compton, The History of Compton Wyngates, London, 1930(obtained from Catherine Thorsen of Colorado); Delton Blalock, British and American Comptons, 1984; a genealogy by James H. L. Lawler on the Internet (which makes the American William I connection with the English line); and, Comptonology [a journal edited by C.V. Compton which ran from the late 1930’s through the early 1950’s, and an indispensible tool for the Compton family student], inter alia v.1, No. 1; p. 74. I also have a copy of Compton Wynyates, a history of the famous English castle and also of the family, which contains information which largely corroborates the lineage.
Comptons are an ancient family, traceable to theAnglo-Saxon Alwyne, circa (ca.) 1042, a contemporary to King Edward the Confessor, in the times before surnames. "Compton" means a settlement (town) in or on a hill. Alwyne’s son Turchill, Saxon Earl of Warwick at the time of the Norman conquest (1066), did not assist the English King Harold (contrary to his father, who "fought valiantly" against the invading forces, according to Comptonology), thereby earning the gratitude of William the Conqueror. He was therefore allowed to retain his lordship and many landholdings, and an inspection of the Domesday Book is replete with Compton estates, thereby reinforcing the importance of being on the right side of history. Turchill became one of the early English to have a surname de Eardene (presumably from his residence at Arden). His son Osbert had several sons, including Philip (ca. 1200), who were the first in the line to take the surname de Compton. Philip was followed in the line by Thomas, Philip, Robert, Robert, Thomas, Edmund, William, Robert, Edmund, William (where the Wm. Bingham Compton document ends, ca. 1482), son Compton (name unknown, possibly Peter) b. ca. 1500), Henry, William, Spencer, to our first American William, b. 1622 in Gravesend, New York.
There is an ancestral (portions dating back to the 12th century) castle in Warwick, England, called Compton Wyngates, or "Compton in the Hole" (for its topography), which has been modified over the years and circumstances. See the William Bingham Compton document; I also obtained castle information from William H. Compton with my set of Comptonology, and have the aforementionedCompton Wynyatesvolume, authored in 1904 by a Compton, the Marquis of Northampton.
Early American Comptons (up to John I)
The Gravesend, Long Island William lived with the Dutch and was referred to as Weilleum. Gravesend is in modern Brooklyn and is near Coney Island.It was an English colony originating with 39 people of which William was one. Between 1650 and 1670 the Dutch and English entered into conflict, with, among other things, conflicting land patents being granted. It is a hop, skip and jump to Monmouth County, New Jersey. He became a leading citizen and was appointed constable in 1677. (See inter alia, Stillwell, Historical and Genealogical Miscellany, New York and New Jersey, 1930, Blalock and others.) Comptonology and Blalock, among others, then opine that his son, William, married Mary Bowne, daughter of Captain William Bowne and Mary Haverland [whose descendants also reportedly include Daniel Boone], and went with a number of others in 1666 to Monmouth County, New Jersey. (Mary’s sister Sarah’s descendants include Abraham Lincoln, see Blalock). It is reported both Comptons and Bownes were "Accursed Baptists" and left to escape religious persecution. (They may have come from England to Massachusetts.) This may have been one reason, but the political conflicts between the Dutch and the English resulted in the English gaining title to New Netherlands around 1670, and the resulting colony became New York. The move of the younger William occurred during this timeframe. It is well-documented that they were one of the founders of Middletown, in Monmouth County. William and Mary had ten children. One of his sons, Richard, married Prudence (Providence) Isselstyne (of Dutch extraction), and had a son, Isselstyne, the father of John I, who in turn married (his second marriage) Margaret Raemer, a German lady. Richard was born December 1673. He and Prudence had seven children. It is from this theory that this genealogy is based. In Whitehead (ed.), New Jersey Colonial Documents, v. 2, 1687-1703, p. 397, Comptonology, Blalock (pp. 2-3), Richard signed a petition to the King to appoint a suitable person as Governor, 17 July 1701. It is relevant to note that the next signature on the document is that of William Bowne, thus reinforcing the Dutch (and New York) circumstantial evidence supporting the New York identity of William.
Others believe the William here is the son of John Compton of Roxbury Massachusetts and Kent County England. There is some discussion of this in Comptonology, v. 1, No. 1, pp. 2-3. There is certainly a William of Middlesex County with a family with issue including an eventual John, but the William of Monmouth (New York) has the virtue of the multiple Dutch and Bowne historical connections. We also believe with Comptonology that the Middlesex Comptons eventually migrated through Maryland to Virginia. My research, particularly a copy of an old family Bible and an accompanying analysis, at the Maryland State Archives, indicates this branch migrated to Culpeper County Virginia, and includes Zachariah. Beyond William, there is little dispute with respect to the remaining early generations in this line, but a great deal of confirmation is needed. Please feel free to provide comments and references.
Roy and Ellena Compton, 1946
Prepared by:
Stephen Compton
912 Fortune Place
Edgewater, MD 21037
Send e-mail to: tnsquire47@aol.com
This web site produced 17 Oct 1999 by Personal Ancestral File, a product of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I highly recommend this free software for its clarity and ease of use. The Compton history text and picture is, of course, mine.
Visitor number 
Thanks for stopping.