It’s time for descendants of William and Dorothy (Lane) Randolph to consider trimming up their family trees. All those reputable sources of bygone days need to be reconsidered, or do they?

The Randolph Family: Is DNA Always Right?

The similarity and interconnectedness of immigrants Henry Randolph (1623-1673), who arrived in 1642, and William Randolph (1650-1711), who arrived in 1673, are intruiging. They and their descendants married into some of the same families and repeatedly used the same given names for their offspring. Perhaps the strangest events are that Henry died in 1673, the year William arrived from England, and it was William who took over Henry’s job as Clerk of Henrico County. William was, in 1683, succeeded in the job by Henry’s son, Henry II, who was only 18!

Is there a solution to this DNA-hatched anomaly? Yes, there is, but if true it probably could never be documented. The answer would be that either Henry’s mother or William’s mother sired this particular child by a non-Randolph father, or that one of the children was adopted and assigned the Randolph surname.

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