Re: Temple-Bonner marriage(s)

Just for those who may read this thread subsequently, lest they be otherwise confused, I want to make a few more notes about this.

Firstly is to clarify who the Bonner was that lived on the land with his mother Nancy Temple. Tom King in this thread suggested it was Robert Bonner. I don't know where he got that idea. Robert Bonner is the person who sold the land to Leath, and it was the executor of Robert Bonner's estate who brought the Chancery Court cause. But this does not mean that it was Robert who lived there. Clearly, it was not Robert living there regarding the Chancery Court cause because Robert was already dead, hence the executor of estate language. Reading the cause makes it clear that it was Littleberry Bonner who was living there. So Nancy Temple was the mother of Littleberry Bonner. What relation to Robert Bonner this is cannot be determined from the Chancery Court cause.

Secondly is the 1791 Will of James Burge, where he states:

Leave to my loving Wife Elizabeth Burge the use of all the land and plantation whereon I now live also the use of all my Estate of what kind soever, that shall not be given away in the will (Except one Negro man Simon) during her widowhood, and the said Negro man Simon I leave her the use of until my son Thomas Bonner Burge, arrives to the age of Twenty one years, and except one Negro boy Elijah which Negro Elijah I leave her the use of until my Grandson Augustine Burge, son of James Burge arrives to the age of twenty one years.

Recalling the Chancery Court cause names both James Burge and Augustine Burge, these are probably the same people. The relevant parts of the cause abated on the death of Augustine Burge. He was the executor of Stephen Leath, whose will was written in 1824, which first instance of its probate I can find is 1825.

This inclusion of Augustine Burge makes it pretty clear that Littleberry Bonner and Robert Bonner were related to the Elizabeth Bonner who married James Burge, and hence also she to Nancy Temple.

There are some pretty fundamental questions surrounding it. Firstly, since Nancy Temple of the Chancery Cause doesn't have her husband named explicitly, then he could be any Temple. Also if the Eppes Will mentioned names daughter only as Temple, with no husband's first name given, she too could have married any Temple. So the resolution of this, it would seem, rests on what the Bible says (since her tombstone just says Ann). Does the Bible say Bonner, or does it say Epps/Eppes? It would be really nice to see the scans of the family record, so we could finally put it to rest, but it seems like nobody can do that. Gee, I guess we'll just have to wonder!

So going back to the original subject, is Nancy the daughter of William Bonner? It seems the simplest would be that Nancy was sister to Robert, and had Littleberry out of wedlock, and then married Peter Temple (hence a Bonner-Temple marriage where Bonner is the maiden name). William had a son Robert, so that would all fit. That's Occam's razor for you. But knowing all the inter-connections of early Prince George, the simplest solution is probably wrong.

Furthermore, I am wondering what the evidence is that the Peter Temple who is buried in Sparta with his wife Ann was the same Peter Temple who was in Prince George. I have yet to see any reason why this could not be a different person, and with a different Ann altogether.

I am going to close with this final comment - why is it that so many people seem to have so many constructions of this family, and when you ask to see some evidence, they can produce not a single jot, iota, or scintilla? Why is it that when you ask someone to demonstrate ANY assertion they make, all they can produce is an MS-Word document, or some HTML, or something clearly produced in the last 50 years, and NOBODY can ever produce ANYTHING that is a scan of an extant contemporaneous court clerk copy of anything, or any Bible record scan, or any diary scan whatsoever? The only scans brought to bear on this issue are the Chancery Court cause documents that I described. They are online, and anybody with an internet connection and a web browser can see them. I wish the same could be said about ANY of these other items mentioned in this thread.