The Ten Tribes of David Stiles
In 55 BC the Roman General, Julius Caesar, invaded England and found it to be peopled with Celts. The Romans fought and conquered these Celtic people and made England a colony of the Roman Empire. After 400 years of Roman rule, the Roman government began to have problems elsewhere and they withdrew their troops and their support from England. This left the Celtic people without the military strength they needed to be able to defend themselves from people who came from Denmark, Norway and other areas of Northwestern Europe. Those invaders, mostly pirates, were probably our ancestors. The Engles, the Saxons, and the Jutes, or Vikings.
The King Arthur stories are tales of the wars that took place. King Arthur, who was probably a fictional character, was of mixed ancestry. The stories about him are legends, but more than likely represent a warlord or warlords who actually did fight in the battles atrributed to the one person. He was part Roman and part Celtic, and the tales about him combine stories of war and the conflict between his Christian heritage and his Celtic Druid heritage. Fortunately for us, King Arthur lost.
Our ancestors came to England, found the countryside to be productive and became farmers. They took over the Eastern shores of England which became known as the "Saxon Shores". Of course they were not terribly popular with the people who lived there at the time, thus we tend to be sympathetic with King Arthur and his knights and not terribly sympathetic with those Vikings who pillage and killed. But, once they had found a toe hold in that part of England, they established a form of government and made laws.
Those laws are used in America even now. Our lawyers refer to them as “Common Law”. The Anglo-Saxons, as they became known, settled in the South Eastern corner of England, divided up the land into six different cooperative kingdoms and prospered. After years of a government that functioned that way, they decided that they needed to be more united, so they eventually crowned a king over the whole of their territory. Milbrooke in Bedfordshire, from whence the four Stiles brothers that became American settlers came, is in that area of England. The Anglo-Saxons probably prospered too well, in fact, because their lands began to look so good, that they were noticed by another group of people, the Normans.
The Normans had invaded and taken over a part of France called Normandy. Normandy is across the English Channel from the part of England that had become the homeland of the Anglo-Saxons. In October 1066 William the Conqueror, a Norman, invaded England and defeated King Harold, the ruling king, at the Battle of Hastings, thus putting our Anglo-Saxon ancestors under a Norman rule. It was a harsh rule. He took away their lands and made them serfs on the lands that they had once owned. He and his successors conquered the land, but were so influenced by the people that were there that they adopted the laws that were already in place, and even gave up their French language and began to speak English. Times were very very harsh for the inhabitants of Eastern England under the Norman rule.
Another fictional character familiar to most of us is Robin Hood. The story of Robin Hood is about a "thane" or an owner of a large amount of property who had his lands taken from him by the king. Rather than give in and become a serf on what had been his own lands, he chose to become an outlaw. He gathered a band of people who had similar backgrounds and they hid out in the forests, robbing the nobles and using the proceeds to take care of the families that had been forced into poverty by the king. Usually legends have a basis in fact. I would imagine that the family of which we are the descendants took their land away from the inhabitants of England that were disorganized and without leaders after the withdrawal of the Roman Empire, established themselves as farmers, and became serfs on that same land after the Norman Conquest.
Because the Norman rulers were so influenced by the Anglo-Saxon people and their laws and systems of government they established royal courts and had a system of jury trials, unlike the all-powerful kingships that had been their way of government. But, in spite of that concession, the king was the king and sometimes they were cruel. One such king was King John, of Robin Hood fame. King John ruled while his brother, Richard the Lion Hearted, was off on the Crusades then became king himself after Richard’s death in 1199. He made enemies of the land owners and of the church officials. He was so treacherous and cruel that a group of barons and church officials drew up a document called the Magna Carta. They raised an army and demanded that King John either sign the document or they would overpower him and take control of the government. He signed the document in 1215.
The Magna Carta actually did not help peasants but it was the basis for our ideals. It granted the church freedom from royal interference. It stated that the king must seek the advise and consent of the Barons in all matters important to the kingdom. It said that no taxes could be raised without the consent of the Barons. It said that no freeman shall be imprisoned, deprived of property, sent out of the country or destroyed except by lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land. It’s easy to see that a lot of power was given to the Barons, who were titled, but it is also easy to see the beginnings of a government made up of representatives of the people and a beginning of the philosophy of religious freedom or separation of church and state. It is also easy to see the beginnings of our own terribly important "due process."
Members of the Stiles family have been part of a lot of important history. We have been conquerors and we have been conquered. We have been fair-minded people, so much so that we have taken on the King at least on four different times in history – first when we took over England, secondly when we were either present or represented in the Battle of Hastings, third when we were willing to sacrifice everything to have a document signed that assured individual freedom and fourth when we were willing to fight King George for our independence from England. We were part of a people who believed that individuals should obey a just law but basically should be left alone to farm the soil or to do whatever it is that we want to do as long as in doing it we would not be intruding on other’s freedom.
We are pioneers. We left our homeland to invade England. We left England to invade America. We left the comfort of the established colonies to cross the Alleghenies and invade the frontier. Some of us left Kentucky and went to Missouri, Oklahoma and even as far west as we could possibly go - Oregon and Washington state. We are ambitious, not afraid to work hard or even fight hard if that is what is required of us. We love and revere the land of our heritage but aren’t afraid to face the future and take on things that are new. We have a right to be proud of our family and of who we are.
Science tells us that we are the product of the genes that were given to us by our parents. The scientists can even trace genes through generations and generations. So, when I look in the mirror I am looking at a unique person unlike any other person in the world but then I am looking at all the ancestors that contributed to the uniqueness of me. I am looking at the invaders of England. I am looking at farmers. I am looking at warriors. I am looking at pioneers. And I am looking at a small town pharmacist who is a wife and a mother of seven; who wants desperately to remember everyone who contributed to who is me.
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