The truth of the romance is more fascinating than any legend could hope to be. I have included a link, below, to an elaborate PDF compendium of the facts and some speculation based on them. The investigation of which I was a part some years back kind of bogged down after reaching a dead end in Yorkshire. But the Maryland portion of the story is pretty clear. Nicholas Harvey was indeed a Baron of early Maryland.

He maight or might not have been on the Ark and Dove, the first ships oficially colonizing Maryland at the behest of the Lords Baltimore. But in any case, by 1641 he was the master of a 1,000 acre plantation in what is now St. Mary's County.

During the English Civil War, troubles between Catholic and Protestent savaged Maryland, and became known as the Plundering, or Burning, Times. Harvey's manor house was "burned" as part of the troubles. Harvey himself died about this time, of unknown causes. His three year old daughter Frances inherited the manor. Harvey's wife Jane took off --or perhaps had run off earlier-- to Virginia, and remarried.

Frances Harvey was raised by neighbors, and the affairs of the plantation were managed by several planters of good standing. The head of the family with whom Frances was living was eventually hanged as Maryland's first condemned murderer. Frances herself was earlier in court for shoplifting.

Just about the time of her guardian's trial and hanging, Frances married George Beckwith. His antecedents are unknown. Paul Beckwith identified a possible source in Yorkshire, and if Paul's George is our Maryland George, he would have been fifty at the time he married 17 year old Frances. Yikes.

The new Beckwiths had six children. Eventually George went to London on business. He apparently took some or much of the family money with him, and lost it in a bad business deal. George then died in London. Frances died herself about six months after George. Their first son inherited the manor, which was gradually sold off over several generations.

For years, I regretted not having investigated this, and other family history while my older relatives were still alive to help. Now, in a way, I'm glad I didn't. I would have, in my younger days, taken a rather perverse delight in rubbing their old noses in the facts of their storied family. That the ancient ancestors were venal, rapacious murderers, and in the end pretty spectacular failures is, today, of no account one way or the other. It's interesting, in a trivial way, to see the facts of history so wonderfully distorted. But that's just how we are. I'm sure someone may be shaking their heads about my life and the legends I'm creating in these web pages some day.

I'm glad now my grandparents, great aunts and uncles and so forth went to their graves without my bothering them about the facts. I can have my little chuckle in peace.

So if you want to read the attested facts as we know them so far, download the PDF linked to below. Be ready for some grim reading!