Last Monday we noted the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible, and today (one day late, oops) let's take note of the 300th birthday of David Hume. Nearly 300 years of philosophers should find some amusement in those neighbors!
Now a note to the relatives: David Hume was my ninth cousin five times removed. That means that if you start at my 13th great grandfather and count down through the cousins, his line ends five generations ago and mine continues on to me.
Hume's genealogy and mine actually intersect several different times through Hume and Home intermarriages, and their royal ancestral connections across Europe. Because of this, my Scottish grandmother and Swiss grandfather seem to have been distant cousins. "Home" was the original family name, but as the English liked to pronounce that like a place where you live people changed it to be spelled the way it sounds. David Hume himself was born "Home" and changed his name to "Hume."
Hume's great-great-great grandmother Margaret Home married her distant cousin John. Her grandmother was also a Home intramarriage. Her great-great grandparents were my 13th-great grandparents, David Home, Third Baron of Wedderburn and his wife Isabella Hoppringle.
The Third Baron of Wedderburn died in the Battle of Flodden. His fifth-great-grandchild was a Scottish patriot and ended up in the American colonies; legend has it he had been deported. In any case, a large number of English "dissenters" arrived in the colonies about the same time he did. He trained George Washington, the future President of the United States, in surveying and the equipment they used together can be seen in the currently traveling George Washington exhibit.
This ancestor qualifies those who can document their linkage for Daughters of the American Revolution. Any Hume or Home can join the Clan Home Society, no documentation needed.
