Person:Martha Unknown (1340)

Information on Martha, wife of Robert Cunningham

Sometimes old histories are inaccurate, and identities get recorded incorrectly, that is the case with Robert Cunningham's wife "Martha".

It was recorded in the book The McCues of the Old Dominion : supplemented with brief charts of the Steele, Arbuckle and Cunningham families that this Martha was "Widow Hamilton" and that case of "mistaken identity" has carried on for centuries:

The McCue book assigns Robert & Martha Cunningham as the parents of Martha Cunningham Davis [correct as deed records reflect this is accurate]. The McCue book then goes on to assign Robert & Martha the two daughters of Walter & Martha Cunningham [incorrect] based on (it appears) the author of the McCue book locating the record of the 1759 lawsuit wherein Black David sues Robert for caring for Robert's wife, Martha, while she was sick & dying.

It appears, since David Campbell was caring for Robert Cunningham's wife, Martha, the author of the McCue book seems to have just assumed David's Campbell's wife, Jane Cunningham, was Robert & Martha's daughter.... the author completely eliminates Walter & Martha Cunningham from existence and assigns their two Cunningham daughters, that married into the Campbell family, to Robert & Martha Cunningham in error.

The same author [granddaughter of Moses McCue] then donates this faulty history to Joseph Waddell as Waddell was gathering family lineages during the Civil War before lineages were lost to death and time. Waddell states Robert Cunningham's data was donated by McCue but, because Waddell includes her erroneous lineage in his Annals of Augusta County, Virginia the mistake has spread like wildfire.

Perhaps Robert Cunningham's wife Martha was a Campbell and that is why David was caring for her? ... who knows but to totally eliminate Walter & Martha Cunningham, and assign their two daughters to Robert & Martha Cunningham, has created errors on all online trees from Ancestry.com to WikiTree to Family Search and Find A Grave.

The McCue Book is incorrect and the Parks Manual, as well as many DAR/SAR Applications, use the McCue Book as the basis of their lineage [instead of using primary source documentation].

The book The Campbell, Pilcher & Kindred Families correctly identifies "widow Hamilton's" marriages.