A standard work on royal genealogy, this collection contains nearly 200 pedigrees showing the lineal descent of hundreds of American families from the kings of England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and France. The data derives from authoritative reference works, from family histories, and from manuscript pedigrees held in both public and private repositories. The indexes contain references to upwards of 3,000 surnames, many with multiple entries. One need only trace a surname through a lineage to connect with the Blood Royal. (Earlier editions of this work are not necessarily superseded by the seventh edition, but the seventh is held to be the most authoritative, and is therefore the most popular.)

William Claiborne was born in 1600 in Crayford, Kent, England. His parents were Thomas Clayborne and Sarah Smythe James. He immigrated to America in 1621 and settled in Virginia. He married Elizabeth Butler in about 1635. They had six children. He died in 1679. Descendants and relatives lived in Virginia, Tennessee, Louisiana, Kentucky, Alabama and elsewhere.

The legal crusade of Myra Clark Gaines (1804?--1885) has all the trappings of classic melodrama -- a lost heir, a missing will, an illicit relationship, a questionable marriage, a bigamous husband, and a murder. For a half century the daughter of New Orleans millionaire Daniel Clark struggled to justify her claim to his enormous fortune in a case that captivated the nineteenth-century public. Elizabeth Urban Alexander taps voluminous court records and letters to unravel the twists and turns of Gaines's litigation and reveal the truth behind the mysterious saga of this notorious woman. Myra, the daughter of real estate heir Clark and Zulime Carrière, a beautiful young Frenchwoman, was raised by friends of Clark and kept ignorant of her real parentage until 1832, when she discovered her true lineage in letters among her foster father's papers. She thereupon returned to Louisiana with tales of a lost will and a secret marriage between Clark and Carrière and claimed to be Clark's missing heir. Was Myra the legitimate daughter of the prominent merchant or the "fruit of an adulterous union?" The courts would decide. The Great Gaines Case wound its tortuous path through the United States legal system from 1834 until 1891. It was considered by the U.S. Supreme Court seventeen times and pursued even after Gaines's death by lawyers trying to recoup fees. By courageously bringing her case to the courtroom and doggedly keeping it there, Alexander asserts, Gaines helped instigate a new type of family law that provided special protection of women, children, and marriages. Though Gaines never recovered more than a tiny fraction of the rumored millions, this riveting chronicle of her struggle for legitimacy and legacy as told by Elizabeth Urban Alexander is a gold mine for anyone interested in legal history, women's studies, or a good yarn superbly spun.

Dr. Malcolm Harris' two-volume history and genealogy of "Old" New Kent County (the three present-day counties in the aggregate) is one of the great achievements of Virginia local history of the last century. Clearfield Company is honored to have been selected by the Harris family to produce this hardcover edition of "Old New Kent County." Privately published and out of print for many years, this work takes on even greater importance in light of the loss of county records in New Kent and in King & Queen counties and the survival of mere fragments for King William County prior to 1865.