I have spent hundreds of hours researching the genealogy of the Gadberry/bury name.  What I have accumulated though, is nothing compared to the information collected and shared by people like Elva Gadberry Bates and Joyce Gadberry Denchfield, each of whom has spent many years of their lives in this endeavor.  As I collected this information, and information from others, two things became clear:  Most researchers have reached the same impasses, asked the same questions, and are blocked by the same mysteries.  And, as time passes much valuable data is being lost as old courthouses are demolished, records destroyed, and, unfortunately researchers die and their work disappears. 

This in my small way is an attempt to record what we presently know about this family.  This history is not meant to be simply a recitation of facts, a Gadbury encyclopedia.  But instead a review of research compiled and the exploration of possibilities.  There are many things that may never be known.   For the aspiring researcher there are many Gadbury/berry mysteries yet to be solved.  What records yet lie in the recesses of the Fluvanna Co. Virginia courthouse, among others.  As you read this history we ask several questions and detail more of those mysteries.   Have you ever wanted to be a detective?  Could you be the next Sherlock Gadberry? 

I was recently visiting a genealogy lab and noted a sign that said, "Genealogy without Documentation is Mythology."  Certainly in a legal sense this is true.  You are not going to receive a valuable inheritance without legally documenting your relationship to the benefactor. 

Genealogical researchers realize that many times the absolute truth may never be known.  We have become accustomed to accepting different spellings of the same name, ages change from one research source to another.  We blame faulty record keeping illiteracy, bad penmanship, and typographical errors for these aberrations and many ancestors gave up personal information hesitantly and often inaccurately, just as many today wary of government intrusion do. 

This leaves the researcher in a difficult position with some genealogical relationships.  So, what do you do?  At this point there is a great deal of variance of beliefs.   Some will not accept anything without legal documentation, others will accept anything told them, without any evidence.  Common sense though always takes the middle road.  If documentation is missing, review the evidence; the  timing and placement of individuals, as well as  geographical commonalities.  Consider the reliability of the source, then make your common sense decision. If the decision is to include an undocumented relationship, say so, and provide reasons why you chose as you did.  Your readers can then make their own decision concerning the evidence. 

This is what I have tried to do in this history, documented evidence is treated as such, and assumptions are listed as possibilities. 

Sometimes though proof can go beyond paper.  Take the example of Peter Gadbury of London.   Peter, who has no documented American relatives,  came to the US for a business seminar and looked up the Gadbury's around Muncie, Ind.  He located Ross Gadbury and a meeting was planned.  Peter best explains what happened next.  "What I found startling at the time was the visual similarity between Ross Gadbury and myself, and further, his cousin Werth who I met later that day walked toward me with a gait my father had when walking and was very like my father to look at.  I was quite dumbfounded when Werth expressed a sentiment about one of the other relatives in exactly the dismissive off hand terms my father would have used.  Later an expert here (London) who lectures on the subject under the title  Genes and Genealogy' told me it was no surprise to him.  Evidently through hundreds of years physical features and personal philosophies carry on." 

Which raises the question?  How much of what we are, is what they were? 

 Russell Gadberry