Versions of Orphan George’s arrival in America through an ill-fated ocean crossing have come down through many lines of his descendants.
In the first one I encountered, the Ancestral Line of Nancy J. Overstreet (mimeographed, August 1957), compiler Glen C. Walker observes:
Geo. Hodgson (1701-1774) was the son of English Quakers. The family, consisting of the parents and three sons, sailed from an Irish port for America in 1710. And when the landing was made several weeks later at Philadelphia, nine-year-old George was the only surviving member.
Orphan George 