Isaac Harby I

It has long been believed by many Harby descendants that Isaac Harby II's grandfather, Isaac I was the son or grandson of Sir Clement Harby, a British diplomat and the British Consul to Morea and Zante (now the Peloponnese, Greece) and a scion of the noted Harby family of county Cambridge, England.

This connection is tenuous at best and with the advent of the internet it has been easier to get genealogical information of one's family history. Current research has produced the last will and testament of Sir Clement Harby who died in Venice in 1689. There is no mention of a wife or wives or of any children. Another fact that puts doubt on this connection is that during the 1600's, in Morea and all of Greece, "it was impossible to have an official recognized marriage between a Christian and a practicing Jew". (Maria Fusaro, PHD, professor, Univ. Of Exeter, UK. Director of Centre for Maritime Historical Studies).

The biography, "Isaac Harby of Charleston, 1788-1828: Jewish Reformer and Intellectual" by Gary Phillip Zola, upholds a more reasonable theory that the Jewish Harby forbears were Sephardic Jews who left Spain in 1492 and settled all over the Mediterranean; North Africa, Turkey, Italy, Greece, etc. Information from the papers of Isaac Harby and from his family bible support this. These papers are now in the possession of Clifford Harby of Seattle, WA.

entered by Carolyn Harby Schaefer.