George Smith lived in the Huguenot community around Manakintowne in the Goochland and Powhatan counties of the Virginia colony. He eventually married into this community and joined the King William Parish. His wife was Ann Perault Bailey, our 5th-great-grandmother.

The Baileys have been in America for a very long time.

Roger Bayley appears to have been the first of this family to set foot on American soil. He was with Sir Walter Raleigh’s Lost Colony in 1587.

The next Bailey to America was William Bailey, who came to Jamestown with the first supply ship for the settlers there in 1608. Under Captain Francis Nelson, he set sail on the ship ‘Phoenix.’ Upon arrival, he found himself mingling with Captain John Smith and Pocahontas.

Like many of our ancestors who have been here a while, some landmarks bear the Bailey name, like Bailey’s Point and Bailey’s Creek. Another William Bayley arrived on the ship ‘Prosperous’ in May of 1611 and was granted a land patent.

The Prosperous left England May 1611 for Virginia, a fleet of three ships and three caravels under Sir Thomas Gates. She was accompanied by the Starr with Captain Christopher Newport, now vice Admiral of Virginia and pilot John Clark, and the Elizabeth, three hundred people, supplies, horses, kine, goats, besides “coneies, pigeons and pullen.” They reached the Canaries in April, the Dominica West Indies May 9, Porto Rico and anchored at Point Comfort at night, May 22, 1611. The men were listed as “honest, sufficient artificers, carpenters, smiths, coopers, fishermen, tanners, shoemakers, shipwrights, brickmen, gardeners, husbandmen and laboring men of all sorts.” The Prosperous arrived from Virginia November 13, 1611, announcing the arrival of the Spanish ships in Virginia, the “landing of spies.” “Baley, William, 1611 voyage, 41 at muster. Wife Mary was on the George 1617.”

“WILLIAM BAYLEYS MUSTER WILLIAM BALEY aged 41 yeares in the Prosperous in May 1610 MARY his wife aged 24 yeres in the George 1617 THOMAS his Sonn aged 4 years”

The Bailey family, of which we descend, is still being researched. I know that Ann Perault Bailey (George’s wife) was the daughter of Henry William Bailey, born in 1665 in Goochland of the Virginia Colony. We do not know Ann’s mother’s name. Henry William Bailey was the son of Thomas Bailey and Jane Perrin. Thomas was the son of Henry Baileyand Anne Osborne. The Osborne family came to the Virginia Colony one generation earlier with Capt. Thomas Osborne II arriving in November 1616. He is our 9th great-grandfather, and is the earliest American immigrant in our family tree. The Baileys and Osbornes would remain allied families for generations.

Ann Bailey was born on October 19, 1694, in the Henrico area of the Virginia Colony and died on June 17, 1768, in Manakintowne in the Virginia Colony. She was of French descent and part of the Huguenot community that settled there.

The Bailey family would eventually own several tracks of land in Henrico County, Virginia and named it “The World’s End.”

The Generall Historie of Virginia, New-England, and the Summer Isles (often abbreviated to The Generall Historie) is a book written by Captain John Smith, first published in 1624.

It mentions “many” of this family with different spellings.

Bailey, Baly, Bayley, Baily, Baylie, Baylye, Baley

The Bailey’s Creek mentioned above now has a Historical sign commemorating the Bailey it is named after, Temperance, our paternal grandmother of the husband of 1st cousin 9x removed, WOW.

Temperance Bailey was the daughter of Cicely __?__, whose maiden name is unknown. Some people claim her maiden name was Reynolds, but it is unproven. While records are sketchy as to which Bailey was her father, he was most likely Thomas William Bailey, or John Bailey, who died in 1620, three years after Temperance was born and the same year her mother remarried.

Mr. Bailey possibly died of malaria, which was endemic in Jamestown in 1619, making Cecily a widow for the first time and leaving his 200 acres to his 3-year-old daughter, Temperance, making her a wealthy child.

Cecily was said to have introduced the art of flirting into Virginia; she was the original southern belle and undoubtedly enchanting and beautiful, for she won the hearts of some of the colony’s outstanding citizens. Cicely’s second husband was Samuel Jordan, who owned the property next to her daughter’s. Samuel and Cecily settled at “Beggar’s Bush,” later renamed “Jordan’s Journey,” near the confluence of the Appomattox and James Rivers southside. They were living there on March 22, 1622, when the Powhatan Confederacy launched a concerted colony-wide attack to drive the English from Virginia. Thanks to Samuel’s foresight in building their home as a fortified, well-defended compound, their family and their neighbors survived the attacks that came to be known as “The Jamestown Indian Massacre.”

Almost 1/3 of the English colonists died that day, but everyone at Beggar’s Bush survived. Not long after that, however, Samuel died before February 1623. As was the custom of the time, it was an absolute necessity for the safety of the early female settlers to have a male protector. For this reason, we frequently find widows marrying within a few weeks or months following the death of their husbands.

Besides having a reputation for beauty, Cecily is famous for another reason: the first breach of promise suit in America.

During the Massacre, William Farrar used a rowboat to flee his nearby home at “Farrar’s Island” to Samuel’s fortified house. This saved his life and that of the other survivors from his household. William was still living at “Jordan’s Journey” when Samuel died. William was trained for the law in England and was Samuel Jordan’s estate executor.

From an article in “An American Quilt”

The Reverend Grivell Pooley conducted Samuel’s funeral. Samuel Jordan had been in his grave only a day when Pooley sent Capt. Isaac Madison to plead his suit for Cecily’s hand in marriage.

Cecily replied that she would take Pooley as soon as any other man, but since she was pregnant, she would not engage herself “until she delivered Samuel Jordan’s baby.” But the amorous Reverend would not wait and came a few days later with Capt. Madison, telling her “he should contract himself to her” and spoke these words: “I, Greville Pooley, take thee Sysley, to be my wedded wife, to have and to hold till death do us part and herto I plight thee my troth.” Then, holding her by the hand, Pooley, speaking for her, said these words, “I, Sysley, take thee Greville, to my wedded husband, to have and to hold till death do us part.”

Cecily said nothing, but they drank to each other, or so Pooley thought, … but she believed she drank to the memory of her late husband and revealed that she did so bestowing her love for her late husband.

But not wanting to lose such a prize and without any concern for the wealthy young widow, Rev. Pooley proceeded to recite her vows for her, and then he planted a kiss on her. The witnesses to this unusual ceremony later testified they never heard her say “I do” and that Cecily had begged Poole not to tell anybody. But he did anyway, and she later remarked, “If Mr. Pooley had not bragged about it he might have fared the better.”

Pooley was soon boasting of his conquest, which so irked the young widow that she refused to go through with any plans for a wedding. But, so fervent was Pooley’s mind that he believed he had succeeded in winning Cecily’s somewhat sworn hand. Cecily refused to go forward with the marriage proposal.

Undaunted, the enraged Rev. Pooley brought suit for breach of promise to compel Cecily to marry him. When the Parson sued on June 14, 1623, he accused the lady of having jilted him and alleged that it was nothing short of “Skandelous” for William Farrar, his rival, who was still living at “Jordan’s Journey” to be “in ordinary dyett in Mrs. Jordan’s house and to frequent her Company alone.” This was the celebrated case of its day. William Farrar was also enlisted by Cecily to represent her.

According to The Records of the Virginia Company of London (vol. 4, p. 218):

“Captain Isack Maddeson sworne and examined saith that (as near as he remenbeth) the first motion to him by Mr. Grivell, touching a match with Mrs. Jordan was about three or four days after the Mr. Jordan’s death, who entreating this examinant to move the matter to her, he answered he was unwilling to meddle in any such business; but being urged by him he did move it. Mrs. Jordan replied that she would as willingly have him as any other, but she would not marry any man until she delivered Samuel Jordan’s baby. After this Mr. Pooley (having had some private talk with Mrs. Jordan) told this examinant that he had contracted himself unto her, and desired him and his wife to be witnesses of it, whereupon Mr. Pooley desiring a dram of Mrs. Jordan, and she bidding her servant fitch it said he would have it of her fetching or not at all. Then she went into a room, and the examinant and Mr. Pooley went to her, but whether she were privy to his intent this examinant knoweth not; when Mr. Pooley was come of her, he told her he would contract himself unto her and spake these words. I Grivell Pooley take thee Sysley to my wedded wife, to have and to hold till death us depart and there to I plight thee my troth. Then (holding her by the hand) he spake these words, I Sysley take thee Grivell to my wedded husband, to have and to hold till death us depart; but this examinant heard not her say any of those words, neither doth he remember that Mr. Pooley asked her whether she did consent to those words or that she did answer ant things which he understood. then Mr. Pooley and she drank each to other and he kissed her and spake these words, I am thine and thou art mine till death us separate. Mrs. Jordan then desired that it might not be revealed that she did so soon bestow her love, after her husbands death; whereupon Mr. Pooley promised before God that he would not reveal it, till she thought the time fitting.

Mary Maddeson sworne and examined saith, that she was not present at the making of the supposed contract between Mr. Pooley and Mrs. Jordan say if Mr. Pooley had not revealed it he might have fared better and saith further that her husband told her that night, that Mrs. Jordan had made her self sure to Mr. Pooley, but what words passed her husband did not particularly repeat, but spake of their drinking to the other and of Mr. Pooley saluting her. John Harris sworne and examined saith that he heard Mrs. Jordan say that Mr. Pooley maught thank himself for he might fared the better but for his own words.”

Shortly thereafter, it became obvious that Cecily preferred William Farrar and intended to choose him. ​

The Governor and Council could not bring themselves to decide the questions and continued the matter until November 27, 1623, then referred the case to the Council for Virginia in London, “desiring the resolution of the civil lawyers thereon and a speedy return thereof.” But they declined to make a decision and returned it, saying they “knew not how to decide so nice a difference.” The Reverend Samuel Purchase finally persuaded Reverend Pooley to drop the case. As a result, on January 3, 1625, the Reverend Pooley signed an agreement freely acquitting Mrs. Jordan from her promises. Cecily then formally “contracted herself before the Governor and Council to Captain William Farrar.”

The extraordinary incident so stirred the Governor and Council of the Colony that they issued a solemn proclamation against a woman engaging with more than one man at a time. The passage of this law for the protection of Virginia bachelors gave Cecily a place in history. And there is no known record in Virginia that this edict has ever been revoked.