A Family History for America’s Semiquincentennial (1776–2026)
Part I: The Kinship with Martha & George
Our 6th cousin (8x removed), Martha Dandridge (1731–1802), was born on the Chestnut Grove plantation in New Kent County, Virginia. Her father, John Dandridge (1700–1756), had emigrated from England to Virginia as a young man, building a prominent life as a county clerk, militia colonel, and planter.
When Martha married a young, tall Virginia militia colonel named George Washington in 1759, she brought not only estate land and stability to Mount Vernon, but a warm, steadfast presence. During the dark winters of the Revolutionary War—most notably at Valley Forge—Martha traveled to the military encampments, organizing sewing circles, nursing sick soldiers, and keeping up the morale of the Continental Army alongside her husband.
Common Ancestor Lineage
│
┌────────────────┴──────────────┐
▼ ▼
Dandridge Branch Fisher/Plimpton Branch
(Virginia Gentry) (New England Craftsmen)
│ │
John Dandridge Joshua Fisher (Immigrant 1637)
│ │
Martha Dandridge ══ m. ══ George Washington Henry Plimpton (Dedham, MA)
(First Lady) (1st President) │
Charles H. Plympton (Civil War)
│
Geneva "Neva" Plympton
│
Lydia Corinna Brown
│
Jerry (A Drifting Cowboy)
While the Dandridge side rose through the tidewater gentry of Virginia, your direct maternal ancestors—the Fishers and Plimptons—were laying down the bedrock of New England.
Part II: The Puritan Roots (1500s–1700s)
The story of our direct line begins in the old timbered villages of East Anglia, England, passing from Margery Bert (1524–1591) down to her grandson, Joshua Fisher (1585–1674).
In 1637, as part of the Great Puritan Migration, Joshua Fisher boarded a wooden vessel and crossed the Atlantic, settling in Dedham, Massachusetts. The Fishers were builders, surveyors, and blacksmiths. Joshua helped lay out the town grids of early Massachusetts, while his son John Fisher (1625–1668) worked the land and served in the local militia.
Through marriage, the Fisher line joined with the Plimpton (Plympton) family. Henry Plimpton (1684–1731) and his son Capt. Job Plimpton (1718–1797) became prominent leaders in Medfield and Wrentham, Massachusetts.
When the drumbeat of the American Revolution sounded in April 1775, Job Plimpton Jr. (1746–1814)—our 5th great-grandfather and DNA match—answered the call. Standing as a Minute Man on the local parade grounds, he helped secure Massachusetts during those critical early months when George Washington arrived in Boston to take command of the army.
Part III: The Westward March & The Union Saved
As the young nation expanded past the Appalachians, Timothy Plimpton (1775–1824) and his son Calvin Plimpton (1815–1874) joined the great tide of New Englanders moving into the Northwest Territory, settling in the fertile valleys of Ohio.
When the Civil War threatened to tear apart the Union that Washington and the Revolutionary generation had built, Calvin's son, Charles Henry Plympton (1845–1925), did what his ancestors had always done: he volunteered.
On August 22, 1862, 17-year-old Charles enlisted as a private in Company K of the 97th Regiment, Ohio Volunteer Infantry.
[1776] Job Plimpton Jr. ──► Massachusetts Minute Man (Revolutionary War)
[1862] Charles H. Plympton ──► Co. K, 97th Ohio Infantry (Civil War)
[1912] Franklin J. Bailey ──► Flathead Valley Homestead (Montana)
[1942] Jerry ──► Pacific Coast (California)
Charles served in the heart of the Western Theater, marching through Kentucky, Tennessee, and Georgia. He fought at the grueling battles of Perryville, Stone's River, Chickamauga, Mission Ridge, and the Atlanta Campaign. He survived the bloody assault at Kennesaw Mountain and the desperate clash at Franklin, enduring three years of hard marching to preserve the Republic.
After the war, Charles returned home to raise his family. His daughter, Geneva "Neva" Plympton (1870–1939), carried this deep American heritage into the 20th century. Her daughter, Lydia Corinna Brown (1891–1971)—our grandmother—was the very woman whose handwritten notes in 1972 sparked my fifty-year genealogical journey.
Wrap-Around Narrative: The American Tapestry
"The story of America is not written solely by those who sign declarations or govern republics; it is hand-hewn by the carpenters, the farmers, the soldiers, and the mothers who push the frontier one mile further west."
In this 250th year of the United States, looking back across our family tree reveals the complete mosaic of the American story.
On one side stands our kin, Martha Dandridge Washington, stepping out onto the portico of Mount Vernon alongside George Washington to forge the presidency of a brand-new republic. They gave the nation its leadership, its resolve, and its foundational elegance.
On the other side stands our direct lineage—the Fishers and Plimptons. They were the muscle, the anvil, and the plow. They cleared the primeval forests of Massachusetts in the 1600s, stood on the militia green in 1775, charged through the smoke of Atlanta in 1864 to preserve the Union, and homesteaded the western plains from Nebraska and Montana down to the Pacific.
When our grandmother Lydia Brown-Bailey sat down to write those three simple pages of family notes, she wasn't just recording names—she was preserving the history of the nation itself. From the plantation halls of Virginia to the union battlefields of Ohio, and down to a woodworking shop in California, our family didn't just witness 250 years of American history.
They built it.
Just in case… you were wondering if Martha knew, and was she fond of "Madame Moose.”
She certainly did! George Washington’s famous Dalmatian (or "coach dog"). George purchased Madame Moose in 1786 for 12 shillings to guard Mount Vernon and trot alongside their carriage.
Martha was deeply involved in the daily rhythms of Mount Vernon and famously tolerated—and grew fond of—the dozen-plus dogs roaming the estate with eccentric names like Sweetlips, Vulcan, Mopsay, and Madame Moose. (Though when Washington's hounds got into the kitchen larders, Martha was known to give them a piece of her mind!)
Thank you Gemini AI for your wisdom and research assistance. -- Drifting Cowboy
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