Lewis Families

This work is fourteenth in a series about Maryland families. The author, already well known for his works on the Brandenburg, Browning, Burdette, Fry, Fulks, Hines, Hurley, King, Lowder, Maddox, Miles, Niekirk, Perry, Pratt, Purdum, Soper, Stottlemyer, Walker and Watkins families, now turns his attention to the Lewis families. In this volume, the author is primarily concerned with those members of the Lewis family with origins in Montgomery County, Maryland, and the counties from which it was formed. Following the custom of the earlier works in this series, the book begins with a look at the early history of the Maryland Colony and the formation of the counties. The first chapter is devoted to exploring the earliest records of Lewis family members in colonial Maryland up to the Revolutionary War, specifically several individuals bearing the Lewis surname but with no direct connection yet discovered to an established family line. Chapter 2 discusses Jonathan Lewis, progenitor of the first identifiable Lewis lineage, and his issue. Little is known about the life of Jonathan Lewis except that he was the father of at least nine children and that he settled in Prince George's County. The following eight chapters are concerned with the descendents of several of Jonathan Lewis' great grandchildren and great great grandchildren. Chapters 11 and 12 are concerned with members of the family found in Montgomery County public records that cannot be conclusively linked to the lineages already discussed; of particular note is the rather large family headed by William Lewis, born c.1805, whose descendents can be found all over Frederick and Montgomery Counties. The final chapters focus on information surrounding family members as yet unidentified in the established lines and noted for the benefit of future family research. A bibliography of relevant sources is included as well as a full-name index and numerous cross-references to other volumes in Mr. Hurley's Our Maryland Heritage series.