Sherman Family Reunion
New this year
Our Family Story
Every family carries names further back than memory reaches. Here's where ours begins.
The Sherman family is its own line — one couple, twelve children, and everyone who came after them. Their story starts in Bimini, Bahamas, and now reaches Florida, Panama, and beyond.
The family's own account of it was written down by Aubrey B. L. Sherman Sr., the fifth of Brooks and Melly's twelve children, at fourteen or fifteen years old — a school essay assignment that sent him to his grandfather for the full story, and that his grandfather had in turn carried since boyhood. He read it aloud at the very first Sherman family reunion, and it's been handed down at every one since.
In the late 1850s, an Irish sailor named George R. Sherman was the mate aboard a steamship running the main overseas trading route from Liverpool to Halifax and on to South America. On his second voyage through the Florida Straits, the ship was caught in a severe storm and wrecked north of North Bimini. George spent several days on the rocky shoreline before he was taken ashore — and not long after, he met and married Inez, “a fair damsel of Indian extraction,” as the family's own account puts it.
George and Inez had two sons. The elder, George Richard, became industrious and built up considerable landholdings on Bimini. The younger, Charles Eugene, moved to Andros Island, where he amassed huge parcels in the Lowe Sound and Conch Sound area; he never married, but the children born to him and the women he gathered there soon outnumbered the Shermans of Bimini itself. George Richard married Ellen Jane Basden of Turks Island, and together they had eight children — five sons (Brooks Sr., Eugene, Charles, Arthur, and George Jr.) and three daughters, among them Maude “Titty” Weech.
Brooks Sr., the oldest son, married Melvenia “Melly” A. Saunders, and the two of them raised twelve children of their own: six sons (Arlington, Walter, Curtis, Harry, Aubrey Sr., and Brooks Jr.) and six daughters (Alma, Merle, Aileen, Maria, Sybil, and Olga) — the founders of every branch gathered on this site. Grandpa George lived to 98. Grandma Ellen lived to 89. Papa Brooks Sr. lived to 94. Mama Melly lived longest of all: 99 years and 10 months.
Aubrey Sr. closed his own telling of it this way: “So you see out of evil can come good! And out of a tragedy as a shipwreck can come the birth of the ‘Sherman Family in Bimini.’”
George R. Sherman & Inez
An Irish sailor wrecked ashore on North Bimini, and the woman he married soon after — the first Sherman generation on the island. Their son George Richard carried the name forward; their son Charles Eugene carried it to Andros.
George Richard Sherman & Ellen Jane Basden
Eight children, among them Brooks Sherman Sr. — the oldest son, and the one whose own marriage founded the branch gathered here today.
Brooks Sherman Sr. & Melvenia “Melly” A. Saunders
Brooks (2 May 1892 – 20 Sept 1986) and Melly (10 Feb 1894 – 7 Dec 1993) married on 31 August 1912 in Bimini, Bahamas, and raised twelve children — the founders of the branch gathered here today. Papa Brooks was laid to rest after a Requiem Mass at Our Lady & St. Stephen’s Anglican Church in Alice Town, Bimini, on 4 October 1986.
Olga (Sherman) Wilchcombe
The last surviving of Brooks and Melvenia's twelve children. We lost her on 13 September 2026, in Freeport, Grand Bahama, Bahamas, at 97 — this page, and this whole branch of the family story, is for her as much as for the eleven siblings who came before.
The Sherman descendants
Now gathering from Florida, the Bahamas, and Panama — the third and fourth generations carrying Brooks and Melly's family forward.
Twelve children, and counting
The Generations After
Brooks and Melly's twelve children went on to have children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of their own — more than any one person has fully traced, and almost all of them still living. That's exactly the part of a family tree that shouldn't be public. Below are all twelve, in birth order, shown the way this section works on a real family site: the person is public, their living descendants are not.
Arlington Sherman
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Walter Sherman
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Curtis Sherman
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Harry Sherman
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Aubrey B. L. Sherman
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Alma Inez (Sherman) Sawyer
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Merle (Sherman) Roberts
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
1924 – 2022
Aileen “Aunt Leen” (Sherman) Bell
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Maria Sherman
Did not survive infancy.
1927 – 2001
Sybil Yvonne “Grammy” (Sherman) Black
✓ Shared by the family
This is my own direct line — Sybil is my great-grandmother. One branch, followed all the way down to me, my sisters, and our kids.
Read the full story ↓
1929 – 2026
Olga (Sherman) Wilchcombe
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Benjamin Brooks Sherman Jr.
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Descendants' names, photos & contact info — example placeholders, visible only to signed-in family.
Aunt Leen and Aunt Olga
This is the feature, not a limitation: your family's site shows exactly this — who someone was, publicly, and who came after them, privately. Family members sign in to see real names, photos, and how everyone connects.
