Repinski-Dietz Family Tree
"My Mayflower Heritage"
As I continue to research my mother's (Marlene Dietz Repinski) family history going back to Colonial New England and the Mayflower and the pilgrims, I was brought to tears by the monument below and the photos of it.
Engraved on this majestic monument are the names of the 102 brave souls who journeyed across the Atlantic Ocean from Europe to America in the year 1620 to start new lives in a new world. Of these 102 people, I and my siblings, through our mother, would descend from 16 of them and an additional 9 of them would be ancestral great aunts and uncles.
I have a feeling that I share kinship with many more of these 102 people but research to this date has not showed any more than the 25 people I have discovered.
Close to 400 years later, these "Forefathers" now have over a million descendents including myself and my siblings and their children.
I am honored and proud to be one of these descendents of the "forethathers".
The "Forefathers Monument"
The National Monument to the Forefathers, formerly known as the Pilgrim Monument, commemorates the Mayflower Pilgrims.
Dedicated on August 1, 1889, it honors their ideals as later generally embraced by the United States. It is thought to be the world's largest solid granite monument.
I never knew of this monument when I was in Plymouth in Feb of 2017 exploring my ancestry.
I'm crushed that I wasn't able to see it but I am so thankful for these photos.
Kirk Cameron (Growing Pains) made a movie a few years ago called "Monumental" which I recently acquired after conversing with several Mayflower related cousins and this tells the story of these ancestors that we descend from via our mother.
How very lucky and blessed we all are to have this lineage from these ancestors.
We are truly of "Pilgrim stock"
Next time I am in Plymouth I will not miss touching this masterful work of gratitude to our "Forefathers".
On the main pedestal stands the heroic figure of "Faith" with her right hand pointing toward heaven and her left hand clutching the Bible.
On this (the largest granite monument in the world) 81 Foot High Memorial are listed the names of my 11th great grandparents and 11th great aunts and uncles and cousins who came over on the Mayflower as well as some of my 10th great grandparents (some of who were the children of the 11th great grandparents)...
11th Great Grandparents
Isaac & Mary Allerton
William & Mary Brewster
Richard Clarke
Doctor Samual Fuller
William & Alice Mullins
John & Joan Tilley
George Soule
Richard Warren
10th Great Grandparents
Mary Allerton
Love Brewster
John Howland
Elizabeth Tilley
Mary Warren
11th Great Aunts and Uncles
John Allerton
William Bradford
Edward and Mrs. Fuller
Joseph Mullins
Degory Priest
Edward & Agnes Tilley
10th Great Aunts & Uncles
Wrestling Brewster
Joseph Mullins
My 11th great grandfather, Robert Cushman is so eloquently mentioned at the bottom of the Forefathers plaque.
Robert's son Thomas would wed Mary Allerton, the daughter of my 11th great grandfather, Isaac Allerton.
(See photo below)
The passage below that is engraved into one of the panels was written by my 11th great uncle William Bradford in his journal ,which would later be known as "Of Plymouth Plantation" that chronicled the first years of the Plymouth Colony in great detail.
Of Plymouth Plantation was written over a period of years by William Bradford, the leader of the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts. It is regarded as the most authoritative account of the Pilgrims and the early years of the colony which they founded.
The journal was written between 1630 and 1651 and describes the story of the Pilgrims from 1608, when they settled in the Dutch Republic on the European mainland through the 1620 Mayflower voyage to the New World, until the year 1647. The book ends with a list of Mayflower passengers and what happened to them which was written in 1651.
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