When John Endsley set out from South Carolina about 1800 in search of a  new home, he was following a family tradition.  His father Andrew had done the  same, leaving the Old World for America at some time before the Revolution.   Andrew, however, may have traveled on his own (we don't know when or from  whence he came), but John was planning a move for his entire family. One Indiana history says that John traveled 7 times, by horseback and on foot,  between South Carolina and Indiana before settling his family. (Well, he  stopped long enough to get a bride in Ohio!)  Most likely, he followed the  Kanawha Trace, which seems to have passed almost directly through his  cousins'(?) dooryard.  After all those trips, it might well have been  named "The
 Endsley Trace".

Our line of Endsleys has always been both prolific (not just in  offspring, 
 but in surname spellings, as well) and restless.  Wherever they stopped for a  while, and we can trace them from Wayne Co, Indiana to the Pacific Coast, they  not only left roots, but they sent out runners.  Joan and I are two of those  runners: she lives in Missouri and I live in France!

Because you're here, we invite you to walk awhile with us along the  Endsley Trace.  Leave us the footprints of your visit in our Guest Book.  If  we 
 are part of your family, please let us know.

This Website can only offer the "skeletons in the closet": names, dates  and places.  That's the way it's set up and we can't change that.  But we both  know that a family is made up of people, and people are:  funny, interesting,  dull, peculiar, persevering and ... much more.  They are my mother, your  uncle, 
 our strange aunt who always knew what 10-year-old boys wanted for Christmas  when Mother and Father hadn't a clue!  And so many more.

We are still interested in facts.  If you think we have them wrong,  please 
 let us know.  If you have more, we would love to have them.  Here, we will  claim no links to mythical, undocumented aristocracy, but we may err by  making "logical leaps" based on real documents.  We have an Endsley cousin who  hates this, but we think that no progress can be made along the Trace without  guessing the route sometimes and hoping that someone with a better map will  set 
 us straight.

If you've read this far, you must be an Endsley, so please sign our Guest  Book and tell us a bit about your journey along the Trace.

--- Jim Boyce                                                         
 james.e.boyce@wanadoo.fr
                                                         December 2004