George W Bush Family History

George Walker Bush was born on July 6th, 1946 to George and Barbara Bush in New Haven, Connecticut.  He grew up, however, in Texas (although his family did maintain a summer home in Kinnebunkport, Maine).

Prior to getting married in 1977, he struggled with alcohol abuse.  He has said that his wife had a stabilizing effect on him and he attributes her influence to his 1986 decision to give up alcohol.

George like his father entered Texas politics.  He ran and won the Texas Governorship race in 1994.

This provided a stepping stone for his US Presidential bid in 2000 which he won in a closely-fought and controversial contest.  His Presidential terms were marked by the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center and the US invasion of Iraq.

George W. Bush was US President for two terms.  After completing his second term in 2009, he returned to his ranch in Crawford, Texas and has subsequently maintained a relatively low public profile.

Reader Feedback: Even though I am related to him and lived in Buda and Austin, Texas, I do believe somebody at Slitterbaum, the amusement park, said that he does not own the ranch but borrowed the ranch for whatever reason. My paternal Nana was born in Kittery, Maine and probably knew the Bush family. I don’t really know. She never told me.  Dorothy Williams.

Early Bushes

The first Bush of a line that extended via Obadiah Bush in the early 19th century to President George W. Bush in the early 21st century was Richard Bush, a man who arrived in Rhode Island in the early 18th century.

The line of the early Bushes was as follows:

• Richard Bush the immigrant who died in Rhode Island in 1732
• Timothy Bush Sr who was a blacksmith in Connecticut, fought in the Revolutionary War and died in upstate New York in 1815
• Timothy Bush Jr, also a blacksmith, who was one of the first settlers in Penfield, New York and died in Rochester, New York in 1850
• and Obadiah Bush who was born in Penfield, New York in 1797.

According to the book The Faith of George W. Bush:  

“Obadiah left his home during the War of 1812, became a schoolmaster, then caught gold fever and left for California during the Gold Rush of 1849. Two years later he tried to return home to reclaim his family and take them west. He died in the attempt and was buried at sea, leaving his wife and seven children alone in Rochester, New York.”

So the Bushes stayed East and went to Yale instead. Prescott Bush served as Governor of Connecticut and both his son and grandson became American Presidents.

Prescott Bush

James Smith Bush, the eldest son of Obadiah and Hannah Bush, entered Yale University in 1841, starting what would become a long family tradition. He like succeeding Bushes down to President George W. Bush, were all Yale alumni and had all been members of the secretive and influential Skull and Bones student society.

James’s son Samuel served as an advisor to President Hoover in the 1920’s.

But it was his son Prescott Bush who can be described as the real founder of the Bush political dynasty.  He was a 6ft 4inch charmer with a rich singing voice.  He played varsity golf, football and baseball, and was president of the Yale Glee Club.  According to Skull and Bones lore at Yale, Prescott Bush was among a group of Bonesmen who dug up and removed the skull of Geronomo from his grave at Fort Sill, Oklahoma in 1918.

In 1924 his father-in-law helped set him up in business in New York with Averill Harriman.   He and Harriman were directors of the Union Banking Corporation, an investment bank controlled by the German Thyssen family. This relationship later had him and the bank suspected of holding gold for the Nazis.

Prescott Bush survived these accusations and went on to become the Republican Senator for Connecticut in 1952.  He served there for ten years.

And Later Bushes

Prescott’s son George H.W. Bush was born in Greenwich, Connecticut.  After World War Two he moved to Texas where the started an oil company.  But politics was in his blood.  He became a US Congressman in Texas in 1966 and was appointed Ambassador to the United Nations in 1971.

He later held other senior Washington positions before being chosen as Ronald Reagan’s running mate in the 1980 Presidential election.  He served two Vice Presidential terms under Reagan and then became the 41st President of the United States after his electoral win in 1988.

He and his wife Barbara have five surviving children, two of whom continued the Bush political tradition – George W. Bush as the 43rd President of the United States and Jeb Bush as the Governor of Florida (and one-time Presidential candidate).

George W Bush’s Family Tree

• Obadiah Bush (1797-1851) m. Harriet Smith (1800-1867) in 1821
• – Cornelia Bush (1823-1893)
• – James Bush ((1825-1889)
• – Elizabeth (Lizzie) Bush (1831-1905) m. William Raymond
• – William Bush (1836-1899)
• – Sanford Bush (1842-1867) m. Rachel Monroe

• Rev. James Bush (1825-1889) m. Harriet Fay (1829-1924) in 1859
• – James Bush ((1860-1913) m. Elizabeth Allen, rem. Mary Gorham
• – Samuel P. Bush (1863-1948)
• – Harold Bush (1871-1945)
• – Eleanor Bush (1872-1957) m. Robert Woods

• Samuel P. Bush m. Flora Sheldon (1872-1920) in 1894
• – Prescott Bush (1895-1972), US Senator
• – Mary Bush (1897-2001) m. Francis House
• – Margaret Bush (1899-1993) m. Stuart Clement
• – James Bush (1901-1978) m. Martha Carter

• Prescott Bush m. Dorothy Walker (1901-1992) in 1921
• – Prescott Bush (1922-2010) m. Beth Kauffman
• – George Herbert Bush (1924 -2018), 41st US President
• – Nancy Bush (1924-2021) m. Alexander Ellis
• – Jonathan Bush (1931-2021) m. Josephine Bradley

• George Herbert Bush m. Barbara Peirce (1925-2018) in 1945
• – George Walker Bush (b. 1946), 43rd US President
• – Jeb Bush (b. 1953) m. Columba Gallo
• – Neil Bush (b. 1955) m. Sharon Smith, rem. Maria Andrews
• – Marvin Bush (b. 1956) m. Margaret Molster
• – Dorothy (Doro) Bush (b. 1959) m. William LeBlond, rem. Robert Koch