- The
Smythe family listing above comes from
the comprehensive ancestral files of Robin
Baden Clay (Electronic version created
2001.) Robin states that his
records are extracted from "The Powell
Pedigree" published by
Edgar Powell in two editions, 1896 and
1926.
-
- He continues - "The
genealogical link to Capt. John SMITH of
Virginia is generally agreed to be
"tenuous". The SMYTHE
line disappears into the mists of New
England, and as far as I am aware cannot
now with any certainty be traced further
back than I have shown. There were
several families of that name there then,
with the same first names, so it is not
possible to distinguish one from the
other. I have the identical problem with
my CLAY forebears in Derby at about the
same time! I accept that it is almost
certain that we are descended from the
English SMYTHEs you display, but without
proper evidence, I regret I cannot
include it in my Tree (yet!).
-
- The full name of my
grandfather, R.S.S. Baden-Powell, the
sculptor of the bronze you show, is
Robert Stephenson Smythe Baden-Powell -
the "Robert Stephenson" from
his godfather, the son of the railway
pioneer and designer of "The
Rocket"; the Baden from Andrew
BADEN, whose daughter Susannah married a
THISTLETHWAITE. She gave her son as
a first name her mother's maiden name,
Baden, and this name followed through
many generations in the POWELL
family. The widow of my
grandfather's father, Revd. Prof. Baden
POWELL (born 1796), and their children,
took his first name as a hyphenated
surname, and I bear that name as my
second name. Many POWELLs also bear it,
and there is another distantly related
family of POWELLs who hyphenated with
BADEN following the marriage of a POWELL
with a BADEN (not yet included in the
Tree from which you quote)."
Baden-Powell's first cousin (pictured
right) - Nevill Maskelyne Smyth - was the son of
Sir Warington Wilkinson Smyth (brother of
Henrietta Grace Smyth) and grandson of Admiral W.
H. Smyth. While serving with the 2nd Dragoon
Guards (Queen's Bays) at Khartoum in 1898, he was
awarded the Victoria Cross. Click on his image to
see military connection (not kinship) with
Tollemache - cousins to ancestors Tollemache of
this Family Vault.
Early
Smythe family from the "Powell
Pedigree" ...
+--- William POWLE, b. 1460, d. 1512 aged 52?
+--¦ Robert POWLE OR POWELL, b. 1508, d. 1570 aged 62?
+--¦ Barnabie POWELL, b. 1543, d. 1602 aged 59?
¦ ¦ +--- John DOBSON, d. 1542
¦ +--¦ Johane or Joanne DOBSON, d. Mar 1590
¦ +--- Johane ____, d. 1543
+--¦ David POWELL, b. 1580, d. 1656 aged 76?
¦ ¦ +--- John CLARK ALIAS WEBB, d. 1571
¦ +--¦ Agnes WEBBE OR CLARKE, d. Sep 1594
¦ ¦ +--- Robert SMYTHE
¦ ¦ +--¦ Robert SMYTHE, d. 1552
¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ +--- Robert WYSSETT
¦ ¦ ¦ +--¦ Margaret WYSSETT
¦ +--¦ Agnes SMYTHE, d. Jan 1572
¦ +--- Lucy ___
+--¦ David POWELL, b. 1625, d. Apr 1694 aged 69?
¦ +--- Agnes ELLIS, d. 1657
+--¦ John POWELL, b. 1661, d. 16 Jun 1725 aged 64?
Major-General
Nevil Maskelyne Smyth V.C. (1868-1941)
was nicknamed 'The Sphinx' and commanded
the 1st Australian Brigade on Gallipoli, then the
2nd Australian Division on the Western Front. His
courage at Lone Pine (1915) won the admiration of
the Australian troops - a respect that he never
lost. 
Much involved in the the
training of Australian troops in Egypt, he was
described as ‘sphinx-like, silent and
imperturbable’. He was (Scout Movement)
Baden-Powell's first cousin - the son of Sir
Warington Wilkinson Smyth and grandson of Admiral
W. H. Smyth. He was awarded the Victoria Cross
while serving with the 2nd Dragoon Guards
(Queen's Bays) at Khartoum in 1898. He settled in
Australia in 1925.
His son, Commodore
Dacre Smyth, A.O. (image
streamed adjacent) "joined the Royal
Australian Navy as a Matriculation Entry
Cadet-Midshipman in 1940. In World War II he
served in HMAS Australia in the Battle of the
Coral Sea, in Motor Gun Boats in the English
Channel, in HMS Danae at the Normandy invasion,
in HMAS Norman in the Burma campaign, and in the
British Pacific Fleet off Japan.
Commodore Dacre Henry
Deudraeth Smyth, Aide-de-Camp to the
Queen 1975-78; Order of Australia; director,
David Syme and Co. Ltd., 1982-94; patron, Animal
Welfare League. Son of Gen. Sir Nevill Smyth
(London), Victoria Cross, Knight Commander of
Bath.
He was Aide de Camp to
Australian Governor General Sir William McKell in
1948. He served in HMAS Bataan during the Korean
War. He served in HMAS Hawkesbury from 1953-55,
and his last seagoing command was HMAS Supply
from 1968-70 in the Vietnam War. Six of his last
eight years in the navy were as Naval Officer in
Charge, Victoria, from which post he retired in
1978.
Dacre Smyth was Deputy
Chairman until recently of the Trustees of
Melbourne's Shrine of Remembrance and is now a
Life Governor of the Shrine. He is an artist,
author, and publisher ..." Details
In 2004, he was awarded
France's highest honour - Knight in the Order of
the Legion of Honour. Created in 1802 by
Napoleon, the medal is the highest award given
for outstanding service to France. As a D-Day
veteran, he was interviewed on Australia's Radio
National Breakfast Program on
Thursday June 3rd. and spoke about this era of
his Naval service.
The
Age (newspaper) reports (14.05.04) - "There are
no individual honours for Dacre Smyth - not even
the gold Legion of Honour that French President
Jacques Chirac will pin on his chest at a
ceremony to mark the 60th anniversary of the
D-day landings on June 6, 1944.
"There were other
Australian Navy men there, too," the
81-year-old said from his Melbourne home
yesterday. "I will accept it in memory of
them.""
He married Jennifer
Haggard in 1952. This would not be the
first linking of Haggard and Smyth/e families ...
WEST BRADENHAM Norfolk - Bradenham
Hall
Thomson - Smyth - Haggard 1766+
Rider Haggard grew up here. Kentworthy-Browne
[et al], Guide to Country Houses, III, 1981.
- A Haggard family website
had this to say: "There was no
house of any size in West Bradenham until
Bradenham Hall was built by James
Smyth (Smith) in 1766 and it
is pretty safe to say no Haggards lived
there until about 1818 when Thomas
Smith sold the property to William
Henry Haggard, Jr., born in
1757. Any connection between James Smith
who built Bradenham Hall and Elizabeth
Smith, born 28 September 1680,
Walsoken, England, who married Andrew
Ogard, great-grandson of Sir Andrew Ogard
is unknown."
- From the Royal
Geographical Society, May 2002 - Information
courtesy of Sarah Strong - Maps
and Archives Assistant - Royal
Geographical Society (with the Institute of British
Geographers) 1 Kensington Gore, London.
Sarah writes - " 'Dear
Sir, I can confirm that the 2 letters (that the
reference RGS/CB4/1545
is attached to) are items pertaining to H. J. Smythe. The first is sent from the Royal
Artillery Barracks, Woolwich, February 1851 to Dr
Norton Shaw, the Secretary of the Royal
Geographical Society, and reads: 
My dear
Sir, Might I beg the favour of your getting good
Seconders for the Candidate whose name I enclose.
His father Capt Du Lane, RN recently deceased was
a zealous Member of our Society, and was
doubtless well known to our President. Believe me
My dear Sir very truly yours H.J. Smythe
The second is sent from the
Royal Artillery Barracks, Norwich, May 20th 1851
to (once again) Dr Norton Shaw, and reads:
My dear
Sir, As I fear I shall not be in town during the
week, might I beg of you the favour to add my
name to those intending to be present at the
Annual Dinner on Monday night. Believe me My dear
Sir Yours very truly H.J. Smythe' "
These letters are
particularly significant and may show a family
connection between the writer and the President
to whom H. J. Smythe refers - who was Sir William
Henry Smyth - born
on January 21, 1788 in Westminster, England and
married to Eliza
Anne "Annarella" Warington. From the inference made by the words
"is doubtless well known" one
may assume that H.J Smythe and W. H. Smyth were
well acquainted - and perhaps kin. WHS was an
only son. From the two locations of the sender of
the letters, it may be assumed that H. J. Smythe
was connected with the Army or perhaps with the
Navy. The reference to "Capt. Du Lane,
RN" suggests the latter.
- Royal Geographical
Society - Presidents at that time
- W. R. Hamilton 1847-1849
Captain
W. H. Smyth 1849-1851
Sir Roderick Murchison 1851-1853
Was this,
perhaps, Henry John Smyth/Smith
(1826-83) of Dublin who was educated at Rugby and
Oxford? He lectured at Balliol College until
1861. He was made a fellow of the Royal
Astronomical Society and, despite many
commitments, came to be acknowledged as "the
greatest authority of his day on the theory of
numbers".
It is perhaps
significant that this website contains
the following information: "In 1646 William
Smith started his fifth term as
Lord Mayor of Dublin. He was a Colonel in a
regiment of foot that protected the city and was of
a Yorkshire family that later settled in Suffolk.
Several other members of this Yorkshire family
are also recorded in Ireland. In 1677, John Smith
was Lord Mayor of Dublin. He was of the same
family as the Carrington-Smiths, whose
ancestor was on the Crusades with King Richard."
(See "Medieval Smyth' link below.)
Members of this family returned to England
(Suffolk).
Who
was ...?
1851 Census - Norfolk -
Kings Lynn - St Margaret, Chapel Street
Surgery .. .. .. .. .. .. (HO107/1829/115/17)
| Henry SMYTHE |
head,
married, 39, General Practitioner
Of Medicine & Surgery,
Brandon, SUFFOLK |
| Lucy
SMYTHE |
wife,
married, 34, Wood Rising |
| Henry
SMYTHE |
son, 3,
Lynn |
| Lucy
SMYTHE |
dau, 6,
Lynn |
| Elizth.
BOYCE |
servant,
unmarried, 22, House Servant, Norwich |
| Elizth. WAGG |
servant,
unmarried, 16, House Servant, Dereham |
| Thos. BALES |
servant,
unmarried, 17, Groom Servant, Dereham |
|
