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The Arledge Family History Project (on the web at arledgefamilyhistory.org; also see the Geni Project Page) seeks to explore the history of the ARLEDGE family in America.
If you are an Arledge or Arledge descendant
NOTE: As of November 2008, AFHP Coordinator Pam Wilson has put the entire Arledge family tree (about 30,000 names) on Geni.com and invites any Arledge descendants to join the Geni tree and be involved in updating and providing information about (and pictures of) your own branch of the family. Before you build a fresh new tree, first use the search and check to see if your branch of the family is already on the Geni Arledge tree, and then connect to that rather than creating duplicate profiles. (If you have questions, please message Pam). Geni profiles may be set to various levels of privacy, especially for the younger generations (living people) to maintain security of information, yet you can specify that family members and "family of family" be allowed to view and access it. Sharing stories and photos is especially rewarding!
Some Arledge History and Characteristics
The traces of history left by this family during the past 300 years tell a story that parallels and embodies the settling of America.
Descending from one single 17th century immigrant couple (Clement Aldridge and Elizabeth Tilles) in Northumberland County, Virginia, whose children and grandchildren began being called ARLEDGE instead of ALDRIDGE starting about 1700 (probably due to their pronunciation of the name), there are thousands of Arledges today all over America. There are also some descendants who spell their names Aldridge and/ or Aldrich, too.
Large communities of Arledges (and branches of Arledge family tree) live in many distinct areas of the country--especially North and South Carolina, central and southern Ohio, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Texas. Some branches--in Stanly Co, NC and in central Alabama--have retained or returned to the ALDRIDGE spelling. Our family name resides in the most humble of cabins as well as the most powerful boardrooms of corporate America.
Arledges can be found who are of white, African-American, Hispanic, and/or Native American descent, through the blend of marriages and cultures along the way as well as the legacy of slavery.
We are Democrats and we are Republicans--in either case, many of our family have, from the earliest days, distinguished themselves through passionate civil service and political activity. We represent many different religious denominations (with, interestingly, more than our fair share of "Preacher Arledges") as well as occupational categories, with an extraordinary number in public roles such as law, teaching and sales. In several counties and regions of the U.S., Arledge is a name associated with major civic offices such as Clerks of Court, Magistrates, Justices of the Peace, Sheriffs, Fire and Police Chiefs.
In fact, a very informal survey shows a tendency for Arledges to gravitate toward careers that allow them to indulge in what seems to be a genetic predisposition for gregariousness--a love of talk, of storytelling, and engaging with people through teaching, preaching, arguing (in and out of the courtroom) or political leadership!
FROM NORFOLK, ENGLAND, TO NORTHUMBERLAND COUNTY, VIRGINIA
CLEMENT ALDRIDGE (1601-c.1668) and his wife Susan Crompton Boswell migrated from Norfolk, England to Northumberland County, Virginia in the late 1600's. At least four of his sons --George, Thomas, William and Clement -- are believed to have come to America as well. The descendants of George (1639-1677) and his wife Ann, who settled in Talbot County, MD, stayed ALDRIDGE or became ELDRIDGE. Thomas and William may also have settled in the tidewater area of Virginia or Maryland. It seems to have only been the children of the junior Clement (1636-1699, below), whose name became ARLEDGE....
Clement Aldridge / Arledge (1636-1699) and his wife Elizabeth Tilles settled on Virginia's Northern Neck in Wicomico Parish, Northumberland County, Virginia on an area called Cherry Point. They had nine children.
All of the Arledges in America can trace their ancestry through Clement and Elizabeth's son William Arledge / Aldridge (1678-1725), who married twice and was the father of four sons and at least two daughters.
With his first wife Alice Fallin, William's eldest three sons were John, William, and Clement Arledge, and he also had a daughter Jane. With his second wife Sarah (last name unknown), William fathered his fourth son Isaac Arledge and a daughter Sarah.
- John married Elizabeth Thomas and moved first to Frederick County, Virginia and then to the area around Camden, South Carolina, where he died in the following decades. Elizabeth remarried Matthias Fellows. Children of John and Elizabeth settled in Fairfield, Kershaw and Edgefield Counties of South Carolina.
- William married a woman named Mary (last name unknown) and migrated to South Carolina as well. He seems to have died childless, but many records exist for him there, and his nephews administered his estate.
- Clement married a woman named Anna (last name unknown) and migrated into central North Carolina, with records in Warren and Bute County. His son Isaac Arledge, who married Susannah Sullivan, raised a family in Randolph County, NC, and their known children migrated west to establish Arledge communities in Ohio, Tennessee and Iowa. Although most of the descendants of Isaac's and Susannah's sons Isaac and William settled and established a strong presence in Hocking, Highland, Pickaway and Ross Counties of Ohio, some (notably the family of William G. Arledge, 1815-1894) ventured west onto the frontier, settling in Illinois, Nebraska, and in Oklahoma's Indian Territory (where some of them were members of the Cherokee Tribe). Children of Isaac and Susannah's son Jesse settled in Iowa and in east/middle Tennessee, from which place many went on to Texas.
- Isaac Arledge (youngest son of William) migrated, along with his brothers John and William, to the Camden District of Couth Carolina. Although he likely married twice, the only name we have is a wife named Anna or Hannah. He settled and prospered in Fairfield County, South Carolina and had a large family.
- His son Caleb settled in the Mecklenburg, North Carolina area, and his children (some Arledge, some Aldridge) ventured far: Jonathan and his descendants headed northwest into Kentucky, Illinois and all the way to Minnesota, Wyoming and Alberta (Canada); Caleb Jr. settled in Stanley County, North Carolina; Isham headed southwest into Louisiana; Eli moved south into Alabama...
- His son Clement had one son, Clement Jr, who settled in Franklin County, Tennessee and raised a large and prominent family, while another son, Cyrus, was the progenitor of a large family that migrated southwest through Limestone County, Alabama into Fannin and Crockett Counties of Texas
- Isaac's son Amos moved a few hundred miles west into the foothills of the Blue Ridge mountains and settled in the Green River Cove of Rutherford (later Polk) County, NC, where many descendants still live today.
From Northumberland County, VA, then, three of William ARLEDGE's sons -- JOHN, WILLIAM and ISAAC ARLEDGE -- settled along the Wateree River in old Camden County, SC in the mid-1700s. Most of their descendants ended up in that area that would later become Fairfield or Kershaw Counties of SC, while another important group branched off and settled in Edgefield County, SC.
These families populated the South during the next century, with some branches spreading south and west into Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and into Texas, while others reached up into several areas of North Carolina and some even ventured northwest into Tennessee, Arkansas, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, and beyond to the Pacific frontier.
All of the Arledges on this Project are believed to be descended from one of these four sons of William Arledge.
ARLEDGES and ARLIDGES in ENGLAND and CANADA
While the Arledge spelling (an alternate pronunciation of the name "Aldridge") seems to have started being seen in census and court records in Virginia about 1700 and become increasingly dominant over the next century and a half until it became more uniform in the late 19th century, there seems to have been a somewhat parallel experience in England, and some of the Aldridge families in England in the 18th and 19th centuries also began seeing their names spelled ARLIDGE and less frequently ARLEDGE. The relationship between these British cousins (and later immigrant to Canada with the name) and our American Arledges is not clear, but it predates the immigration of Clement and Susan to America in the 1660s.