Colonial Chesapeake Families: British Origins and Descendants 2Nd Edition: Volume 1

By Harrison Dwight Cavanagh

Colonial Chesapeake Families: British Origins and Descendants

Harrison Dwight Cavanagh

The first edition was awarded the Sumner A. Parker Prize by the Maryland Historical Society in 2014.

The second edition of this work features all descendants of Thomas Gantt I (b. Bullwick, N. Hants; to Md. 1654; d. Calvert County, 1692) and Ann Fielder (b. ca. 1662 Hants; d. Prince Georges County, 1726) in the first six to ten generations.

Ann Fielder is an important new addition to American colonial Gateway ancestors. Her parents, Capt. William Fielder (ca. 16201679) of Burrough Court Manor and Marjorie Cole (16281699) of Lyss Abbey, Hants, have proven multiple royal and Magna Carta ancestral lines; sixty extensive British pedigrees are documented in these volumes. The name Fielder has been inherited in multiple generations of the Beall, Belt, Berry, Bowie, Calvert, Clagett, Denwood, Dorsett, Gantt, Jones (Somerset County), Parker (Calvert County), Smallwood, Smith (Calvert County), and Wight (White) Maryland families.

In addition, this second edition contains important new research findings on the British origins of the Hatton-Domville and Brooke-Darnall families, as well as revealing the two lost Ann Bradfords of Prince Georges County.

Colonial Chesapeake Families details the pedigrees of eighty-eight families, historical illustrations, portraits, documents, and coats of arms (where proven) are included.

The publication of these volumes has been subsidized to make them more widely available to the thousands of descendants listed in their pages. And thanks to print on demand, Colonial Chesapeake Families will never go out of print.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Apr 18, 2017
• ISBN: 9781524575366

Harrison Dwight Cavanagh

Harrison Dwight Cavanagh, M.D., attended MIT and went on to complete his A.B. and M.D. degrees at Johns Hopkins University, and Ph.D. at Harvard University. During a career spanning more than 46 years as an eye surgeon, visual scientist, and educator, Dr. Cavanagh has served on the medical faculties of Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Emory, Georgetown, and the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center. He currently lives with his wife Lynn Gantt Cavanagh in Dallas, Texas, and Hilton Head Island, South Carolina. Dr. Cavanagh has a lifelong interest in colonial history, genealogy, poetry, philosophy, Japanese culture, and Zen.

Book preview

COLONIAL CHESAPEAKE

FAMILIES

British Origins and Descendants

2nd Edition

image001.jpg

COLONIAL CHESAPEAKE

FAMILIES

British Origins and Descendants

Volume 1

2nd Edition

Harrison Dwight Cavanagh

Copyright © 2017 by Harrison Dwight Cavanagh.

Library of Congress Control Number:   2017900306

ISBN:               Hardcover                978-1-5245-7538-0

                         Softcover                 978-1-5245-7537-3

                         eBook                       978-1-5245-7536-6

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Rev. date: 04/18/2017

Xlibris

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COLONIAL CHESAPEAKE FAMILIES

British Origins and Descendants

Vol. 1

Winner of the 2014 Sumner A.

Parker Prize (Maryland Historical Society)

Harrison Dwight Cavanagh

Second Edition 2017

FRONTISPIECE LEGEND

The fifth prerevolutionary Convention of the Provisional Government of Maryland met in Annapolis from 26 July to 14 August 1775, and the 110 delegates from all of the counties unanimously adopted and published the Declaration of the Association of Maryland on 26 July 1775. Signing from Calvert County was Capt. Edward³ Gantt (1720–ca. 1778; Thos. ², Thos.¹), and from Prince George’s County, his nephew Thomas⁴ Gantt (1736–1808; Thos.¹–³) signed with his two brothers-in-law: Dr. Richard⁴ Brooke (1716–1783), who had married his sister Rachel⁴ (Thos.¹–³) on 1 November 1767, and Osborn Sprigg (ca. 1741–1815), who had married their half sister Sarah⁴ Gantt (Thos.¹–³; second marriage). Adopting this declaration three months after the Battles of Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts and nearly a year before the Declaration of Independence by the Continental Congress on 4 July 1776 in Philadelphia was a very courageous act by these dedicated patriots. If the British had successfully suppressed the patriot cause, the signees would all almost certainly have been executed for treason to the Crown.Dedication

CONTENTS

a.   Dedication

b.   Commonly Used Abbreviations

c.   Preface To The Second Edition

d.   Preface To The First Edition

e.   Introduction

f.   References

Chapter 1.   English Origins: The Gantts Of Bulwick, Northamptonshire

Chapter 2.   Thomas Gantt I And His Darwinian Chesapeake World

Chapter 3.   Thomas Gantt I: The Maryland Years—1654–92

Chapter 4.   Matriarch: Ann Fielder—Her New World Life And English Ancestry

Chapter 5.   Ancestry Of Marjory Cole (1628–1699) And The Cole And Dering Families Of Liss Abbey, Hampshire

Chapter 6.   The Founders’ Children

Chapter 7.   The Founders’ Grandchildren

Chapter 8.   The Founders’ Great-Grandchildren

Chapter 9.   Great-Great-Grandchildren Of The Founders

Chapter 10.   Later Descendants

To my four Gantts:

Lynn, Cate, Page Claiborne,

and Brooke Cabell

With love

and

to the memory of their

father, grandfather, and great-grandfather,

Col. Henry Perkins Gantt

(1894–1983) (USMA, August 1917)

of

Holly Rod, Gloucester Point, Virginia,

who exemplified his Gantt heritage:

Duty… Honor… Country

COMMONLY USED ABBREVIATIONS

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION

The author acknowledges with gratitude the award of the 2014 Sumner A. Parker Prize by the Maryland Historical Society for the first edition of this two-volume work.

A second edition is being published at this time to place on the record important new information documenting definitively that Anne (Fielder) Gantt was a Fielder of Burrough Court Manor, Hampshire, who has recently been accepted as a MD/USA Gateway ancestor qualifying her thousands of descendants for membership in various lineage societies, including Americans of Royal Descent and Charlemagne or Magna Carta descendants. This new information not only has further confirmed that Anne’s mother, Marjory Cole (1628–1699) of Liss Abbey, Hampshire, has such proven multiple lines of descent but also has revealed that her father, Capt. William Fielder (ca. 1620–1679) of Burrough Court Manor, does as well. And despite ongoing diligent searches, the author has not yet been able to find another colonial American immigrant with proven lines of royal descent in both paternal and maternal lines.

Importantly, the new edition also documents and reports on the lives and descendants of the two forgotten/lost Ann Bradfords of Prince George’s County. The first is Ann Darnall, a heretofore undocumented third daughter of Henry Darnall II and his wife, Ann Digges, who married ca. 1727 John Bradford Jr., son of Col. John Bradford (d. 1726 testate) of Prince George’s County and his wife, Ann² Gantt, daughter of Thomas Gantt I (d. 1692 testate) and his second wife, Ann Fielder (d. 1726 testate). Their daughter, the second Ann Bradford, married Jesse Wharton of Notley Hall, St. Mary’s County. Their eldest son was the Reverend Henry Wharton, SJ (b. 1748), whose published conversion to the Protestant Episcopal Church in 1794 became a matter of great public controversy.

Also included in the updated volume 2 of the new edition is a section on the Dorsett family of Prince George’s County. This information establishes the identity of the four wives of Col. Fielder Dorsett of PG County, including his first marriage in England previously unreported, as well as a multigenerational genealogy of this family.

Additionally, the author has added very important new findings establishing the English origins of the early Maryland settlers, the Hattons of Lymm Cheshire reported by Mr. Robert Good. The Lymm Hattons intermarried with the old Norman family of Leigh-Domville, which has a proven descent from Edward I of England previously verified by Mr. Douglas Richardson. Eleanor Hatton (1640–1725), who emigrated with her mother in 1649 and married firstly in 1658 Major Thomas Brooke (1632–1676) and secondly, ca. 1677, Col. Henry Darnall (1645–1710), became the great-grandmother of Thomas Gantt III (1686–1765) and an important matriarch of many other Southern Maryland Colonial families.

Chapter 12 includes a new pedigree documenting the descent of Ann Fielder from Margaret of Scotland (eleventh century) through the Litton (Lytton) and Borlase families. Sections on the Haut family and Pluckley-Surrenden have also been updated.

The author also expresses his sincere thanks to Ms. Marcia Mattingly, indefatigable researcher of the Bradford-Lancaster lines, for much new and valuable information now included in the second edition, with similar thanks to Mr. Robert Lumsden for important information on the later generations of descendants of James⁴ Gantt (George³, Thos.¹–²), which is also included.

Very special thanks are also due to Mr. Nathan Murphy for his invaluable contributions to the revised and expanded chapter four in volume one, and Mrs. Felecia Sowels for her help with the volumes’ manuscript preparation. Final thanks are extended to Ms. Jennifer Roemer for her inestimable help as manuscript editor for both volumes of the second edition.

Discerning readers will note that the author has subsidized both editions. This allows the cost for purchase of the e-book, softcover, and hardcover volumes to remain as low as possible for all descendants who wish to learn of their distinguished heritage. Also, publication by Xlibris through print-on-demand ensures that both volumes will never go out of print, or become unavailable.

Finally, since the author will not be undertaking any further new editions, he again reaffirms his sincere gratitude and thanks to all who contributed to either or both publications. Ave atque vale.

H. Dwight Cavanagh, MD, PhD

July 22, 2016 (76th natal day)

Dallas, Texas

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION

This history began as a small pedigree assembled as a birthday gift for my late father-in-law, Col. Henry Perkins Gantt (1894–1983) of Holly Rod, Gloucester Point, Virginia, on his seventy-second birthday, 29 April 1966. With continued research over the past forty-seven years, it has grown to encompass the history of nearly the complete descendants of Thomas Gantt (ca. 1634–1692), transported to Maryland in 1654, and his second wife, Ann Fielder (ca. 1662–1726), through at least the first six generations, and, in many lines, extending down through the eighth and succeeding ones as well. In a project of this enormous size and scope, there are bound to be errors and omissions, which the author leaves to future historians of the family to correct, as well as to extend and continue the narrative. Where critical, probative information is sourced to original archives, but the sheer volume of data makes this by necessity incomplete.

Because of the unexpected but highly robust royal antecedents of Ann Fielder, the author has documented her ancestry as comprehensively as possible for the benefit of her many thousands of descendants.

This work, as all such projects, would be impossible without the help of many others over the years. To paraphrase the esteemed nineteenth-century French scientist Prof. Claude Bernard, l’art c’est moi; la science (genealogy) c’est nous. Special thanks (alphabetically) go to the following individuals who supplied information and valuable advice:

Mr. Robert Barnes; Christine Bergen (Mrs. Russell J.); Mr. Lloyd Bockstruck; Mr. Michael C. F. Bullen, Esq.; Ms. Pamela Buttrey; Mr. Brice M. Claggett, Esq.; Ms. Sharon Doliante; Eleanor Lewis Ebert (Mrs. James B.); Faern Cabell Ferneyhough (Mrs. Rev. James); Ms. M. J. P. Grundy; William Andrew⁹ Horsley Gantt II; Mr. Richard⁹ Gantt, Esq.; Mrs. Donovan Hall; Mrs. Frances P. Hauser (Fielder³ Gantt); Mr. Stephen Hoffman; Mr. Andrew Keller; Mrs. Leroy A. Keller (Price⁷ P. Gantt); Ms. Sarah A. Lewis; Ms. Jane W. McWilliams; Ms. Mary K. Meyer; Ms. Joanne Lovelance Nance; Mr. Richard L. Nicholas, Esq. (Albermarle Gantts); Mr. George Ely Russell; Mr. William Franklin Smith (Highlands, Calvert Co.); Mrs. P. N. Snyder (Priscilla⁵ Belt); Ms. Emily Stanton (historian and archivist, Jefferson Co., West Virginia); Judge Charles Stein Jr., Esq.; Mr. Aubrey Warsask; Dr. Rachel Weems; and Ms. Shirley Wilcox (a fellow founding member of the PG Co. Genealogical Society).

Deep appreciation and thanks also go to the author’s English researchers: Henry E. Paston-Bedingfield, Esq., York Herald, Royal College of Arms, London (Fielder and Cole families); Dr. Alison M. Deveson (historian), Whitchurch, Hampshire (the Fielders and Coles of Hampshire); Mrs. G. M. Turner (archivist, PRO, Hampshire) and her assistant, Rhian Light (Fielder, Cole); Ms. Sarah Bridges (archivist, PRO, Northamptonshire) and her assistants, Elinor Winyard and A. Norton (Gantts); and Ms. Susan Campbell (archivist, Worcester, PRO, Worcestershire) and her assistant, Ms. Victoria Harrison (Gaunts of Highfield, Leeke, Rowley Regis, and Old Swinford Parishes).

The author also acknowledges with great thanks the inestimable help of Ms. Cynthia Jenkins in preparing this manuscript.

Needless to say, any errors in interpretations of their contributions are the responsibility of the author.

Perhaps the most unexpected and certainly interesting finding in this family history is the origin of the name Fielder or Feilder, which has pervasively infiltrated so many Southern Maryland colonial families. Certainly every experienced Maryland genealogist must have wondered at some time where this unusual name originated and why it so proliferated (Gantts, Wightts, Claggetts/Clagetts, Dorsets, Bowies, Bealls, Jones, Smiths, Calverts, etc.) to the present day without clear explanation of its significance in any of the old families’ published records. Of even greater interest, however, is the striking antecedent history of the Fielders of the Manors of Burrough Court and Polling, Hampshire, which connects through the Dering-Cole families of Liss Abbey, Hampshire, via the bar sinister to the founder of the Tudor dynasty himself and thence back to most of the great medieval English houses as well as to (at least) four separate Plantagenet lines through the de la Warre-West and Cotton of Combermere Abbey (Chester Co.) pedigrees.

Unfortunately, there also may be much herein that will not be welcome findings to past chroniclers of the Gantt family. There is no Grahame of Claverhouse connection and no missing Edward father of Thomas II. The family did not originate in the English midlands but from the tiny village of Bulwick in Northamptonshire. There is no probable connection to the arms of the earls of Lincoln, but ironically, there is a proven line from the founding matriarch, Ann Fielder, to Gilbertus de Gant of Flanders, nephew of William the Conqueror. Ann³ Gantt, daughter of Thomas II, did not marry John Brome IV (1703–1749) of Calvert Co.; she married Dr. Thomas Denwood (ca. 1705–1763) of Somerset Co. Her sister Priscilla³, who has lamentably been left out of all published accounts to date, married firstly Capt. William Finch Jr., mariner, and their daughter Phoebe married Mordicai Smith of Highlands, Calvert Co.; Priscilla married secondly Allen Bowie and became an unrecognized major early ancestress of that notable family, bringing with her the Fielder name to both lines. George³ Gantt (Thomas²) did not have a daughter Ann; his stepdaughter Ann Whyte married Thomas Harwood. Henry⁵ Wright Gantt (ca. 1762–1837) (John⁴, Thomas ¹-³) did not marry and bury four successive Weems wives (the Weems Bluebeard); he married only three and left children by each of them. One Gantt died in St. Elizabeth’s Hospital for the Insane in Washington, D.C.; another was a real eighteenth-century stand and deliver highwayman, while another was a Lasker Medical Prize awardee nominated for a Nobel Prize, and yet others had notable military careers:

Col. Thomas⁵ Tasker Gantt, adjutant general, Army of the Potomac; Col. Henry⁷ Perkins Gantt, CSA, who led the Nineteenth Virginia Infantry in Pickett’s Charge on the third day at Gettysburg and lost his eye and teeth; Lt. Levi⁶ Gantt, who was KIA in the Mexican-American War (1847) and stormed the fortress of Chapultepec in Mexico City; Col. Frederick⁷ Hay Plantagenet Gantt, CSA, who – serving with his two brothers⁷– commanded the Eleventh SC Infantry, Hagood’s brigade, Lee’s army of Northern Virginia; Brig. Gen. Edward⁶ Williams Gantt (born ca. 1826 in Columbia, Tenn.; d. 1872 in Little Rock, Ark.) commanded the Arkansas Brigade (Eleventh and Twelfth Arkansas Infantries); and Col. Henry⁸ Perkins Gantt (1894–1983; USMA 1917 of Holly Rod, Gloucester Point, Va.), who served his country for forty years in two world wars. Many Gantts have also been the bulwark of the Anglican and later Protestant Episcopal Church in Maryland: Thomas John Claggett (1743–1816), first bishop consecrated in the United States at Trinity Church in New York City in 1792 and buried with his wife, Mary Gantt (Edward³, Thos.¹-²) in the Bethlehem Chapel crypt of the National Cathedral; the Reverend Edward⁵ Gantt (Thos.⁴ ye³rd, Edward³, Thomas ¹–²), rector of All Saints and Christ Church, Calvert Co.; the Reverend/MD Edward⁴ Gantt (1742–1837; MD Leyden, Holland 1767 [Thos.¹–³], chaplain of the Senate [1801–1806], the first White House physician); Rev. John Gibson Gantt (1855–1933); Rev. Chesley Gantt (1884–1908); and Rev. John Hamilton Chew (d. 1885), rector of St. Albans Church, Washington, D.C.

In addition to the Gantt family, there are numerous other important Southern Maryland and Virginia colonial families that (and individuals who) became closely allied with the Gantts and also among themselves during the past four hundred years. Some of these (Weems, Greenfields, Stodderts, Cavanaghs, Williams⁸) have not yet been published, while for others (Brookes, Cabell-Horsleys, Lee-Fearns), there is new research information available, particularly concerning their British origins. For others such as the prominent Parker families of Calvert County, there has been confusion about their different branches and generational assignments, resulting in currently inaccurate published histories. The pedigrees of all these eleven families are given at length herein, inclusive of (at least) the first four generations; and, where possible and appropriate, portraits and coats of arms are also illustrated. Accompanying these longer pedigrees are those of sixty-eight other Chesapeake colonial families, tracing from their original settlers and back (where known) to their British origins: Alexander, Bland, Beall, Berry, Blake, Bocock, Bond, Bonderant, Boone, Bowie, Bradford, Broome, Boyd, Butler, Cadwalader, Carroll, Chapman-Pearson, Clagett, Claiborne, Compton, Cullen, Denwood-Covington, Dorsey, Dunscomb, DuVal, Eltonhead, Elzey, Eversfield, Ewell, Gittings, Glover, Graves, Hall, Hay, Heighe, Hilleary, Holdsworth, Keene, King, Lewis, Mackall, Moore-Weems, Nelson, Parrott, Perkins, Reynolds, Roberts, Semmes, Skinner, Smith of Highlands, Sprigg, Stoughton-Sloss, Tasker, Tryon, Waring, Wheeler, Wight (White), Winder, Wright, Wortham, Worthington, Wood, and Young-Smith (Halls Creek).

There is also significant new information concerning the later generational migrations of these Chesapeake colonial families, which should be of interest to those researching these lines, such as the heretofore undocumented Maryland colony in Hickman and Maury counties, Tennessee, consisting of a mini Who’s Who of Southern Maryland family descendants in the fourth or fifth generations (Gantts, Clagetts, Tylers, Stodderts, Dents, Greenfields, Primms, Weems, and others), who settled there in the early nineteenth century (1810–1820).

Finally, chapter 12 exposits a comprehensive compilation of fifty-seven ancestral British pedigrees of theCole, Dering, and Fielder families, with sourcing to the English records that collectively document the royal and other antecedent ancestors of Ann Fielder, matriarch of so many Southern Maryland and later Virginia colonial families.

The author hopes that each descendant of whatever colonial family will enjoy the lively cavalcade through the centuries of the histories of their ancestors and recall the excellent maxim of the noted English statesman and parliamentarian Mr. Edward Burke: "A worthy ancestry is a stimulus to a worthy life."

H. Dwight Cavanagh, MD, PhD

June 25, 2013

Dallas, Texas

St. William’s Day

Birthday of

William Edwards Cavanagh

(1905–1991), my father

INTRODUCTION

Various accounts of the Gantt-Gaunt family in England and Southern Maryland have appeared over the past two centuries.¹–¹⁵ The most comprehensive of these is the two-volume typewritten manuscript written by the late Charles Stewart Gantt of Baltimore in the 1930s.⁸ Copies of his research are deposited in the collections of the Maryland Historical Society and the Enoch Pratt Free Library of the same city. His account was largely based upon direct correspondence with then-living seventh- or eighth-generation descendants, as well as upon the series of newspaper articles with follow-up Letters to the Editor published in the Baltimore Sun in 1903 and 1905 compiled by the then-noted Maryland genealogist Ms. Emily Emerson Lanz in her weekly genealogy and heraldry column at the turn of the twentieth century.⁶ Unfortunately, all of these accounts contain either serious errors or omissions, and the author has therefore chosen to go directly to original British and American source records to discover and document the true story of this remarkable American colonial family. The history that emerges is quite different from all previous reports. Specifically, all but one of the prior accounts of the English origins of the Maryland immigrant Thomas Gantt I have advanced two quite incompatible claims: (1) the immigrant was of royal descent from John of Gaunt (born in Ghent, Flanders, third son of King Edward III) or (2) the immigrant originated from the ancient family of Gaunt long seated in the English midland counties: Worcestershire (parishes of Old Swinford and Hales Own), Staffordshire (Rowley Regis or Leek), or medieval Lincolnshire and Leicestershire. In the late eighteenth century, the Old Swinford Rowley Regis/Leek Gaunts successfully alleged to the Royal College of Arms armigerous descent from Baron Gilbert de Gant (Gaunt), ca. 1040–1095, son of Baldwin, Count of Flanders, who arrived in England with his maternal uncle William the Conqueror in 1066 and whose later descendant was created Earl of Lincoln until that family line and title lapsed in 1298.¹–³ The first claim is obvious historical nonsense but has been proudly and ubiquitously expounded by every Gantt the author has ever personally met in the last forty-plus years, whether related to the Southern Maryland Gantts or not. The West Point Military Academy 1917 class ring of my late father-in-law, Col. Henry Perkins Gantt (1894–1983) of Hollyrod, Gloucester Point, Virginia, was emblazoned with the quartered Royal Plantagenet Arms, as were our wedding invitations of 1964. This romantic claim has persisted through the generations on both sides of the Atlantic, and later descendant branches from Thomas Gantt I have proudly if inaccurately restored their names to Gauntt or named children Plantagenet, viz. Col. Frederick Hay Plantagenet Gantt (CSA) of South Carolina.

As to the second claim, it appears to have originated from Ms. Lanz’s articles and from inquiries made in England by the Reverend John Gibson Gantt (1855–1933), priest of the Protestant Episcopal Church (USA), whose tomb in All Saints churchyard, Calvert County, Maryland, bears the ancient arms of the Gantts/Gaunts of Lincoln: barry of six or and azure with a bend gules (arms) and a wolf’s head or gorged with a collar vair. As noted above, in the late eighteenth to early nineteenth century, the Gaunts of Highfield and Leek, County Stafford, successfully claimed the right to use these ancient arms², ³ with differencing; and apparently, Reverend Gantt believed (with unfortunately no evidence provided) that there was a connection between this family and the Maryland Gantt immigrant. Fortunately, there is an excellent account of the Worcester-Staffordshire branches of the Gaunt family written for Charles Frederick Gaunt, a sword manufacturer of Birmingham, County Stafford, by Thomas A. C. Attwood dated 25 March 1916, deposited at the Society of Genealogists in London¹⁶, which sheds much useful light and general perspective on the English origins of the Gaunt/Gant family with relevance (by distinct omission) to the Maryland Gantts³:

General Note, among the papers belonging to my father, the late T. Aurelius Attwood was a pedigree on vellum dated 1 June 1848, of the Gaunts of Rowley Regis, County Stafford, of which his great-grandmother, Rachel Maria, Mrs. Attwood of Hawne, was a member. It consists of three sheets: the first comprises a pedigree of the extinct House of Gande, Gant or Gaunt, Earls of Lincoln(1); the second a pedigree of the Gaunts of Rowley; and third an account to date of the descendants of the above-named Rachel Maria Gaunt (Mrs. Attwood of Hawne). These sheets are not signed by the compiler, but appear to have been drawn out for the use of my great uncle George Attwood of Hawne, High Bailiff of Birmingham in 1827. Of the first of these sheets, I can say nothing, not having made any inquiries into the matter; the second is full of mistakes; and the third, though correct in the main, is sketchy and wanting in details. These pedigrees, however, aroused my interest early in life, and I used to try, as a child, to piece together pedigrees which have really no connecting point at all. Later on I entered into correspondence with the late Hylton Dyer Longstaffe of Gateshead, who was also a descendant from the Gaunts of Rowley. He, in conjunction with the late Matthew Gaunt of Highfield and Leek, and Thomas Sidaway of Reddal Hill House, Rowley (also a connection), had given much time and attention to tracking the Gaunt descent. But at that time one of the oldest register books of Rowley was missing (it was subsequently found and restored to the church), and now has been burnt with the rest,¹⁷ and Mr. Sidaway misread some crumbling tombstones and caused thereby, a great deal of confusion. This has now been corrected. Such members of the family as arrived at a position in which the use of armorial bearings is customary universally used those of the Earls of Lincoln and the Wolf’s head crest, yet, with amusing inconsistency, they often asserted that their family sprang from John of Gaunt, without understanding what such a claim would imply. Nowadays, it is evident that the Gaunts of Rowley sprang from a family resident in the Parish of Old Swinford in Worcestershire, but the earliest registers of that parish previously to 1602 are missing and the Wills at Worcester afford no help, so I see little hope of being able to carry the pedigree higher than is now done, unless the Wills in the P.C.C. (which have not been thoroughly searched) afford some help.¹⁷

Without claiming to have made any special investigations, even among printed sources of information, the earliest mention at the name of Gaunt I have met with so far, at or near Rowley, is in 1474, when a certain John Gaunt of Rowley, yeoman is mentioned in the De Banco Rolls (as published in the William Salt Society) in Michaelmas, 13 Edward IV. In the Book of the Guild of Knowle the name occurs twice in 1514 and 1515. On the former date a certain Thomas Gawnt de Yardley is mentioned and on the latter Elynore Gawnt, with no address. In Burke’s Landed Gentry for 1853 is a pedigree of the Gaunts of Leek.² It seems mostly early-Victorian nonsense. Of the Reverend John Gaunt of Dudley, with whom it begins, I can find no trace; legitimate descent from him would be impossible. William Gande Gent, (said to be his son), is a misreading of Sands and Roger Gaunt (stated to be grandson of the Reverend John Gaunt), though the true ancestor of the existing Gaunts, never had a first wife, and nothing is known of the ancestry of his (only) wife Ann Colborne, though that name was a very ancient one in the district, and she may very well have been of good blood. From J. Amphlett’s History of Clent (1890) it appears, however, that a certain Reverend Thomas Gaunt, the nominee of John (Dudley), Duke of Northumberland, was appointed Vicar of Clent and Rowley (now very distinct places) on or about 8 October 1549 succeeding William Hampton, the last Vicar appointed by the Monks of Halesowen Abbey. While the Vicarage was held by Thomas Gaunt it was estimated to be worth 8 pounds, 16 shillings, 5 ½ pence a year! The Reverend Thomas Gaunt held the living till 1556, when on 17 March Roger Chaunce was presented to the living by the Crown. Of course, no descent from the Reverend Thomas Gaunt can be claimed, but that some relationship existed between him and the subsequent Gaunts seems at least probable, and the probability seems somewhat strengthened by the fact that the Gaunts were for many years almost hereditary Parish Clerks of Rowley, a much more important post in those days than now, and one not unlikely to be bestowed on relatives of a former vicar. From their earliest establishment in Rowley the descent of the Gaunt family flows on in an unbroken stream, some rising above and some falling beneath the ordinary level of moderate prosperity the family as a rule enjoyed. It is somewhat curious that comparatively few males of the family married in their own parish, and the Christian names of their wives can therefore only be ascertained. The family has long been divided into three main branches: the Gaunts of Leek (for a good deal of information about whom I am indebted to Sleigh’s History of that town); the Gaunts of Worcestershire; and the Gaunts of Rowley and Birmingham. I must not close this note without stating how much I am indebted to Mrs. Smith of Heworth, York, and to her son Ronald Smith for the loan of many letters and memoranda relating to the Gaunts, collected by Mrs. Smith’s father, the late Hylton Dyer Longstaffe, about 1850. I am also particularly indebted to Mrs. Daulish, wife of the present Vicar of Rowley, for the great interest she has shown in helping me to trace the Gaunt pedigree and the invaluable assistance she has rendered.

Thomas A. C. Attwood, 25 March 1916.

Unfortunately, neither this extensive pedigree nor modern searches of the early Wills of Worcester and Stafford or the published parish registers of Rowley Regis (Stafford) or Old Swinford (Worcester) or searches of the Wills of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury (PCC) have yet yielded evidence connecting the Maryland immigrant to this family.

By contrast, the immigrant Thomas Gantt I unmistakably indicated his natal parish of origin in England by naming the only estate he obtained by letters patent from Lord Baltimore (1688) as Bullwick, a practice commonplace among the early Maryland planters. It is thus to the records of Bulwick Parish in Northamptonshire that the search for the settler’s origins has been redirected. Furthermore, the original Maryland Archive Records reveal a first marriage by 1666 for the immigrant to JOANE (Jone, Joan) ROBINSON (no children recorded) and, by the early 1680s, a second marriage to ANN FIELDER (ca. 1660–1726), who survived her husband by thirty-four years. This latter lady was truly an extraordinary individual referred to as Madam Ann Wight in contemporary records. She married secondly, at least by 1696, John Wight, gentleman justice and member of the lower house of Calvert and Prince George’s County, Maryland, and had children by both marriages.

Ann Fielder was the daughter of Capt. William Fielder, gent. of Burrough Court Manor, Hampshire, and his wife, Marjory Cole (1628–1699), born at the manor of Liss Abbey, Hampshire. The Fielders can be traced to the late fifteenth century in Hampshire; and we will find that the Coles, through intermarriage with the Deerings of Liss Abbey, could legitimately display or quarter almost every notable medieval armigerous family in England, including, remarkably, a descent from Gilbert de Gant of Flanders. Nicholas Deering (ca. 1496–1557) was granted extensive manorial properties in the mid-sixteenth century by Henry VIII, his wife’s second cousin by illegitimate kinship through the Owen-Tudor family; and the Deerings emblazoned no fewer than twenty-two different armorial quarterings in the 1533 and 1574 visitations of Kent, Sussex, and Hampshire. With this background, it is important to note that, like Thomas Gant I, Ann Fielder Wight was literate; and in an age where even upper-class women were rarely educated and were not allowed to own or inherit property except through their husbands or manage their own legal affairs, she did so from the death intestate of John Wight in 1705 until her own death in 1726. She wrote her own will (original in Box 3, Folder 46, Prince George’s County Wills) and signed it, affixing a perfect heraldic wax seal of the Wights of the Isle of Wight, Hampshire, and London. Through the children of both marriages, she passed the unusual Fielder name down the centuries in Maryland, in the Gantts, Bealls, Bowies, Smiths of Highland, Calvert County, and many others. It is thus no accident that this remarkable lady was able to arrange a hugely advantageous marriage for her son Thomas Gantt II (1686–1765) with Priscilla Brooke, daughter of Col. Thomas Brooke (1659–1730) of Brookfield, Prince George’s County. The Brooke family, perhaps the most notable and politically well-connected in Colonial Southern Maryland in the second half of the seventeenth century, originated from Whitchurch Parish in Hampshire, located only a few miles from Liss Abbey and Burrough Court. Through this connection, Thomas Gantt II became part of the ruling circles in the province in both royal and proprietary periods, a gentleman justice of the quorum in Prince George’s County, a member of the lower house, and one of the most prominent men of his time until his death in 1765 at age seventy-nine.

As to format, this account of the ancestral antecedents and descendants of Thomas Gantt I and Ann Fielder will be given chronologically and, where possible, in the form of individual biosketches, with references listed within or at the conclusion of each minibiography or section.

After more than forty years of research, I hope that the reader will enjoy the story of this remarkable family and its remarkable and fascinating descendants over the past four centuries.

Harrison Dwight Cavanagh, MD, PhD

Dallas, Texas

June 16, 2013

REFERENCES

1. Banks, T. C., Esq. The Dormant and Extinct Baronage of England to the Year 1806–1807. Volume 1: 313–319. Printed by T. Bensley, Bolt Court for J. White, Horace’s Head, Fleetstreat, London.

2. Burke, Sir John Bernard. Burke’s Landed Gentry (1853), page 461: Gaunt of Highfield.

3. Ibid. The General Armory of England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales—1884 London, page 391. Gaunt (Highfield and Leek), County Stafford; descended from John Gaunt, Esq. of Rowley, County Stafford, b. 1670, grandson of Roger Gaunt, Esq. of Rowley, descended of a family who by long tradition claimed descent from the ancient Earls of Lincoln. Arms: "Barry of six (sometimes of eight) or and azure a bend gules crest: a wolf’s head or gorged with a collar vair."

4. Atwood, Thomas A. C. Manuscript: Pedigree of the Family of Gaunt, sometime of Rowley Regis and of Leek in the County of Stafford: of Halesowen in the County of Worcester, dated 1 June 1848, and updated and filed 25 March 1916 in the library of the Society of Genealogists (London), March 25, 1916.

5. Gantt, James Lawrence. Genealogy of the Gantt Family. Privately printed pamphlet, Little Cote, Colleton County, South Carolina, January 26, 1884. Copy incorporated into Reference 9.

6. Dictionary of National Biography (England). 1890, Volume 21, London, Gaunt.

7. Lantz, Ms. Emily Emerson. Maryland Heraldry: History of Distinguished Families and Personages. The Baltimore Sun Newspaper: October 1 and 8 issues (1905), and Letters to the Editor: issues of October 29 (2 letters) and December 3 (1905) and March 8, 1908.

8. MacKenzie, George Norbury. Colonial Families of the United States of America. 7 volumes; 1907–1919, Baltimore, Maryland, Reprint 1995, Genealogical Publishing Company, Baltimore, Maryland. Volume I: 186–189, Gantt.

9. Gantt, Charles Steuart. The Genealogy of the Gantt Family. Two volumes of typewritten manuscript dated 1937. Copies donated to the Maryland Historical Society and Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, Maryland.

10. Stein, Charles Francis, Esq. A History of Calvert County, Maryland. Published by the author in cooperation with the Calvert County Historical Society (1st edition 1960). Gantt Family, pp. 262–263.

11. Hutchins, Ailene W. Address to the Prince George’s County Maryland Genealogical Society, October, 1970: The Gantt Family of Calvert County.

12. Papenfuse, Edward C., Day, Alan F., Jorden, David W., and Stiverson. A Biographical Dictionary of the Maryland Legislature, 1635–1789. Two volumes. Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979; Volume 1: 339–344: Gantt listings.

13. O’Brien, Mildred Bowen, Gantt. Calvert County Maryland Genealogy Newsletter, Sunderland, Maryland (1995). Library of Congress #0895-8939.

14. Barnes, Robert W. Colonial Families of Maryland: Bound and Determined to Succeed. Printed for the Clearfield Company by the Genealogical Publishing Company, Baltimore, Maryland (2007). The Thomas Gantt Family: pp. 96–98.

15. Johnson, Christopher. Manuscript Chart of the Gantt Family. (nondated). Christopher Johnson Collection, Baltimore, Maryland Historical Society.

16. Charles Frederick Gaunt of Birmingham, Sword Manufacturer, was born 1 May 1864 in London; Alderman of the City of Birmingham. The Birmingham Gaunts were issued a patent of arms by the Royal College of London that was a variant of the ancient Gaunt Arms of Lincoln: barry of six or and azure, on a bend gules a sword between two bezants, all argent. Crest: Wolf’s head or with sword vertical in mouth, argent. Motto: Dum Spiro Spero.

17. Fortunately the Rowley Registers were transcribed and published in a printed edition. The Peabody Library, Baltimore, Maryland, has a copy that was consulted for this research.

18. Unfortunately, modern searches of the Gaunt sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Wills in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury from Stafford or Worcestershire have not yielded information pertinent to the origins of the Maryland Gantt Immigrant.

19. Lewis, Samuel. Topographical Dictionary of England. 7th edition in 4 volumes. 1849; Volume I: 430, Bulwick, Northamptonshire.

20. Page, William, ed. The Victorian History of the Counties of England: A History of Northamptonshire. 5 volumes, 1906; Volume II: (map section) University of London; reprinted 1970 by Folkestone and London.

21. Registers of Bulwick Parish, Northamptonshire, begin 1564, Oundle Parish (1625); All Saints Parish Aldwinckle (1653); and St. Peter’s Parish Aldwinckle (1563).

22. Original Parish Registers Old Swinford, County Worcestershire, Worcester Record Office, City Centerbranch of Trinity Street, Worcester. WR1 2PW, England, listings given verified by Search Archivist Ms. Susan Campbell.

CHAPTER 1

ENGLISH ORIGINS:

THE GANTTS OF BULWICK, NORTHAMPTONSHIRE

The surname Gant or Gaunt is derived unambiguously from the ancient city of Ghent, Flanders, part of the modern country of Belgium. The city has various linguistic spellings: Ghent (English, French), Gand (Flemish), and Gent (Dutch). In the old records, the surname can thus be spelled as follows: Gantt, Gant, Gante, Gaunt, Gaunte, Gand, Gande, Gawnt, Gawnte, Gauwnte, Gent, Gente, Ghant, Ghent, de Gand, Gant, etc. Even when given as Gaunt in writing, it was always pronounced as Gant (rhymes with cant) in spoken English. This affectation can also be found in other English families: Cholmondeley, pronounced Chum-lee; Beauchamp, Beech-ham; Taliaferro, Toliver; or Brougham, Broom. The name is not at all a common one, and with the exception of the multigenerational Gaunts of Rowley Regis, Leek, and Birmingham, only a few clusters of widely scattered family units are found in the late medieval English records countrywide (registers, probate, land, county histories, etc.).

The tiny hamlet and agricultural parish of Bulwick (established 1295, St. Nicholas Church) lies in the northern division of the County of Northamptonshire (N. Hants), in the Union of Oundle and hundred of Corby¹⁹ (about halfway between Stamford and Kettering). Bulwick is located about eight miles west southwest from the town of Wansford, six miles northwest from Oundle, nine miles north northwest from Aldwinckle, and twelve miles (northeast) of Kettering.²⁰ Including the extraparochial Bulwick-Short-Leys, the village possessed a mere 487 inhabitants in 1849¹⁹ and comprised about 2,000 acres of land; the census of 2001 showed only 152 people living there. In the mid-nineteenth century, the living of St. Nicholas Church consisted of a rectory valued in the king’s books as 18 pounds, 7 shillings, and 6 pence with a net income of 366 pounds per annum. The local patron of the church in 1849 was Thomas Tryon, Esq. of Bulwick Hall. The church, with a glebe house, is partly in the decorated later English style, with a finely proportioned tower and spire. It contains three stone stalls and some fine screen work and was restored in 1705 by Charles Tryon, Esq. of Bulwick Hall, who bequeathed 200 pounds, which in 1805 were invested in the English consol funds to establish a permanent endowment for the benefit of the church and a related school. The Tryon family purchased Bulwick Hall and the neighboring Manor of Harringworth in 1619. Unfortunately, neither the antiquarian charms of Bulwick nor the fame of the local families were deemed to be important enough to merit even a mere mention in the Victorian County History of Northamptonshire.²⁰

image002.jpg

St. Nicholas Church

Bulwick Parish, Northamptonshire

(twelfth century with eighteenth- and nineteenth-century additions).

Thomas Gantt (d. 1659), presumed father of the immigrant,

was churchwarden for St. Nicholas in 1651. Judith Tryon

(Tryon family local gentry and memorialized in St. Nicholas)

was the aunt by marriage to Ann Fielder,

second wife of the immigrant in Maryland.

Memorials in the church chancel show that the Reverend John Nobles (d. 1692) was rector of Bulwick from 1650 to 1692, and he was succeeded by the Reverend Charles Nettleton (d. 1719), who was rector for twenty-six years. There are also important early-eighteenth- to twentieth-century memorials to the Tryon family.

The earliest register of St. Nicholas (Bulwick) dates from 1564 and remarkably shows clear and unambiguous evidence of a family of the name of Gaunt (Gant) in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, although there are severe gaps in coverage and no Gaunt entries are listed before 1649. As with all early registers, there are a few faded and illegible entries, but overall the condition of the existing documents and their legibility are satisfactory. It is common to find such gaps in the coverage of early registers, and the Bulwick register contains no baptism records from May 1609 to July 1615 and between November 1619 and April 1621. No baptisms also appear for 1626, and there is the usual suggestion of civil war disruption, especially in 1642 and 1643. Burial records are also absent for May 1609–May 1615, for June 1615–April 1618, and for April 1641–May 1646. Gaps in marriage records are more difficult to assess, since it is quite possible that in some years no marriages took place in the small village. However, no marriages at all appear from January 1608/09 to May 1618, and there is only a single marriage entry (1640) recorded in the extensive period November 1627–April 1858. Searches in this register (1564–1720) also revealed a clearly separate and unrelated family of CANT living in the Parish. Unfortunately, the Bulwick Parish collection is disappointingly slight in comparison with that of other Northamptonshire registers—the survival of such material varies from parish to parish—and apart from the registers, there are no other Bulwick documents available in the Northamptonshire Record Office before the early nineteenth century. Despite these limitations, however, the register records allow a clear and unambiguous, if abbreviated, reconstruction of four generations of the Gaunts of Bulwick from 1649 to 1720.

1. Thomas¹ Gaunt (d. 1658/59). A very faded but legible signature of "Tho: Gant" appears on the bottom of the page of the register covering the period 1651/52. As confirmed by Ms. Sarah Bridges, the archivist of the Northamptonshire Public Records Office, this entry indicates that Thomas Gant was a churchwarden and signed the register in that capacity. Griffin Cant’s signature as churchwarden likewise appears at the bottom of the page of the register covering the period of 1694–1695. Thomas Gaunt was buried 15 January 1658/59 in the churchyard of St. Nicholas Church.

By 1648, Thomas¹ Gaunt had married (probably as second wife) Elizabeth—, who was buried at Bulwick 17 December 1657.

Issue:

Thomas¹ Gaunt married next Alice Pitts at Bulwick 27 April 1658 (no posthumous issue recorded); Thomas Gaunt was buried 15 January 1659.

2. Edward² Gaunt (Thomas¹), son of Thomas Gaunt, baptized 2 September 1653 at Bulwick and buried there 6 November 1715. Married first by 1671: Elizabeth—, who was buried 26 (?) October 1672. He paid a single hearth tax at Bulwick in 1674, indicating a family of very modest means. Those in poverty were exempt from the tax, but the average yeoman farmer or tradesman usually paid taxes on two or three hearths.

Issue: (1)

By 1672, Edward Gaunt married second Sarah—, buried 16 March 1704/05 at Bulwick.

Issue: (2)

3. Thomas³ Gaunt (Thomas,¹ Edward²), Thomas son of Edward Gaunt, baptized 9 April 1676 and buried at Bulwick 31 December 1714. Married—by 1703. Issue recorded at Bulwick.

a. William⁴ Gaunt, son of Thomas Gaunt, baptized 28 May 1704, buried at Bulwick 24 May 1706

b. Anne⁴ Gaunt, baptized 26 April 1707

c. Henry⁴ Gaunt, baptized 29 June 1709

d. John⁴ Gaunt, baptized 21 December 1712; buried at Bulwick 25 December 1712

e. Thomas⁴ Gaunt, baptized 3 May 1715 (posthumous child), son of Thomas Gaunt deceased

During his lifetime in Maryland, the immigrant Thomas Gantt I purchased portions of two contiguous tracts of land already registered in the proprietary land office records: Marsham’s Rest, recorded May 20, 1664 (750 acres), by Richard Marsham (Liber 7 f56 SR7349), and Taylorton (800 acres), recorded 19 October 1653 by Robert Taylor; both tracts originally lay in Calvert County and then from 1696 in Prince George’s County, located along the west bank of the freshes of the Patuxente called Gantt’s Landing and, later, Wight’s Landing, directly opposite the town of Lower Marlboro renamed from Coxtowne to Lower Marlboro in 1705. He also acquired, by lawsuit judgment, 500 acres of Edlowe’s Shoire in Dorchester County on the Maryland eastern shore across the Chesapeake Bay. On 28 December 1688, Thomas Gaunt patented his only property, which he named Bullwick (213 acres) (Liber 25, f426; Liber 34, f. 23; SR7372), located in Piscataway Hundred on the west side of the Patuxent in the branches of Mattawoman Creek, assigned the land rights by John Wight, whose contiguous property, Hobson’s Choice (220 acres), was patented contemporaneously on 27 December 1688 (Liber 25: f426; Liber 34, f32). Patented tract names in seventeenth-century Maryland assume great genealogical significance, given the large proportion named for ancestral British streets, villages, towns, and counties by the early transported settlers and free immigrants who succeeded in rising economically to become part of the landed planter class. Since there is only one Bulwick in the British Isles¹⁹ (Bulwick Parish, N. Hants) that also has a Gantt (Gaunt) family, it would be reasonable to conclude that Thomas Gantt I originated from this village, being transported into the colony of Maryland in 1654 (Liber 6, f126). Another contemporary Northamptonshire immigrant and near neighbor in both Northamptonshire (Kettering) and Princes George’s County on the lower west bank of the Patuxent River was Thomas Sprigg (1630–1704), who arrived in Maryland from Virginia by 1658 as a free settler and clearly indicated his ancestral origins in his two patented tracts: Northampton (1673) (100 acres: Liber 15/f158; SR4327) and Kettering (1686) (325 acres; Liber 175Bi, folio 342, SR7270) (see SPRIGG FAMILY).

How then does Thomas Gaunt, the immigrant, fit into the Gaunt pedigree from the known Bulwick registers? Clearly, the "Tho: Gant" who signed the register in the 1651/52 period as churchwarden and died in 1658/59 was an elder village personage, who possibly, if not very probably, was the father of the immigrant by an earlier marriage, or at least a near relative.

According to modern demographic research on mid-seventeenth-century Maryland immigration, Thomas Gaunt I was most likely between sixteen and twenty-four years of age when he arrived in Maryland in 1654.¹ This would place his likely potential birth dates between 1630 and 1638. Since the earliest Gaunt family entry in the Bulwick registers is 1649, the question remains open whether either the immigrant or Thomas Gaunt, the churchwarden of Bulwick who died 1658/59, was born in that parish or moved there from another location. To shed light on this question, the original parish records of the adjacent towns of Oundle and Aldwinckle were searched, as well as the regional and local Wills and Administrations of N. Hants and the Prerogative Court of Canterbury. Unfortunately, the parish records of the neighboring village of Harringworth (St. John the Baptist) do not begin until 1673 and have no Gantt listings. Specifically consulted were (1) Northamptonshire and Rutland Wills (1510–1652), (2) Probate I Index (Northampton and Peterborough 1510–1710), (3) Northampton Arch Deaconry Wills (1660–1719), (4) Longden’s Index of Peterborough Wills (1541–1646), and (5) the PCC (1500–1720).

The obvious will of Thomas Gaunt (1623), cutter of Oundle (film 92, f. 163), was a dead end; there were no parish register entries for Gaunt in Oundle (six miles from Bulwick).

Likewise, all the other wills, including Richard Gaunt’s (1634) of St. Peter’s Parish, Aldwinckle N. Hants (nine miles from Bulwick) (film MM94, fol. 170; also Vol. F., fol. 4), failed to record information that could be connected to the Bulwick Gantt family; and unfortunately, the existing registers of Adlwinckle All Saints (1653–1726) and Aldwinckle St. Peter’s (1563–1711) were also unhelpful.

In light of the extensive Gaunt data found in Bulwick, N. Hants, an additional thorough reexamination of Rowley Regis Co. Staffs (1539–1700) and Old Swinford, Worcester (1602–1672), were made in search of any data that might reveal a link to the N. Hants Gaunt family or to Thomas Gantt I (to Md., 1654). Additionally, the extensive ATC Gaunt pedigree recorded at the Society of Genealogists, London, and the Wills of Stafford, Worcestershire, and the Prerogative Court of Canterbury were reexamined.

Early Gaunts of Rowley Regis (Stafford) and Old Swinford, Worcester

(1) JOHN¹ GAUNT of Old Swinford (OS) in the County of Worcester, temp. Queen Elizabeth, the existing registers of which parish do not begin until 1602. Born ca. 1565 and burial recorded at Old Swinford 23 March 1620/21. By JOANE, his wife, who was buried at Old Swinford 1 January 1620/21 he appears to have issue (at least):

(2) 1. WILLIAM² GAUNT (John¹) mar. at OS 15 June 1607 ANNE OSBORNE he was buried at OS 11 February 1657/58.

2. JOHN² GAUNT b. ca. 1590 at Old Swinford; later of Rowley Regis

(2) WILLIAM² GAUNT (John¹) mar. at OS 15 June 1607 ANNE OSBORNE; he was buried at OS 11 February 1657/58.

Issue:

(3) John² Gaunt (John¹) probably b. ca. 1585 mar. at OS 21 October 1610 to MARY THOMPSON and he was buried at Rowley Regis 1 May 1626. Issue.

(4) THOMAS³ GAUNT (John¹, William²) Thomas, son of William² Gaunt (wife not named) was baptized at Old Swinford on 23 March 1608/09. By a wife unnamed, he left descendants at Old Swinford (at least):

1. Isaccke⁴ Gaunt, son of Thomas Gaunt of OS, bap. 14 September 1640

2. Effrem⁴ Gaunt, son of Thomas Gaunt of OS, bap. 9 April 1643; bur. OS 30 November 1647

3. Steven⁴ Gaunt, son of Thomas Gaunt of OS, was bap. February 1648/1649. Because of the overlapping dates, this Thomas Gaunt could not have been the Thomas Gaunt of Bulwick, N. Hants.

(5) Roger³ Gaunt (John,¹ John²), bap. at Old Swinford, Co. Worcester 28 July 1616. Settled at Rowley Regis temp. James I. He seems to have died previous to 1656 when his widow remarried, but his place of burial has not been located. He married at Rowley Regis, Staffs, 21 February 1640/41, ANN, daughter of JOHN COLBORNE of Rowley Regis; she was bap. at Rowley 12 February 1613/1614; bur. there 2 May 1658 as wife of Richard Waterhouse: declared husband and wife at Hamstead, Co. Staff, May 26, 1656; Richard Waterhouse, Nayler of Rowley mar. Anne Gaunt, widow of Roger, 23 March 1655/56.

Issue:

(6) JOHN⁴ GAUNT of Rowley Regis, Co. Staff, Malster, son of Roger and Anne (Colborne) Gaunt was bap. at Rowley 19 December 1641. Entries in the register confirm that he succeeded William Whitehorn and served as parish clerk of Rowley in 1663, 1668, and 1676. His death is recorded on 1 June 1718, aet. 77, John Gaunt Sr., bur. 5 June at Rowley. He married c. 1669 Elizabeth (surname unknown) and by her left issue. Elizabeth, wife of John Gaunt, was bur. at Rowley 29 October 1717. Issue:

1. John⁵ Gaunt, bap. 4 June at Rowley; John Gaunt Jr., bur. at Rowley 10 June 1701, s.p.

2. Thomas⁵ Gaunt, bap. 26 November 1672, bur. at Rowley 17 January 1739/40

3. Elizabeth⁵ Gaunt, bap. 22 June 1675 at Rowley

4. Samuel⁵ Gaunt, b. 1678, d. 1754 at Rowley and left descendants there

5. Ann⁵ Gaunt, bap. 2 June 1680 at Rowley

6. Richard⁵ Gaunt, bap. 29 January 1683 at Rowley, further unknown

7. Sarah⁵ Gaunt, bap. Rowley 19 July 1685

8. Mary⁵ Gaunt, bap. at Rowley 24 November 1687

9. Jeremiah⁵ Gaunt, bap. 1690, d. 1769, parish clerk of Rowley; he left descendants there

10. William⁵ Gaunt, bap. 8 April 1693 at Rowley; William, son of John Gaunt, was bur. 23 January 1699 at Rowley and left descendants there

11. William⁵ Gaunt, bap. 23 January 1699 at Rowley and left descendants there

12. Joseph⁵ Gaunt of Hales Owen, Co. Worcester, apothecary (and surgeon according to the Attwood pedigree); bap. not found at Rowley; bur. at Hales Owen 22 February 1688; will proved at Worcester 11 May 1696

CONCLUSIONS:

English Origins of Thomas Gaunt (Gantt) I

The English philosopher-mage William of Occam (ca. 1300–49) coined a famous maxim for resolving disputed questions called Occam’s razor: Concepts and assumptions must not be multiplied beyond necessity in a search for truth. This may be restated as the simplest explanation that fits the known facts is the most likely to be correct. Thomas Gantt I clearly pointed to his natal origins in England in Bulwick Parish, N. Hants; and surprisingly according to the county archivist Ms. Bridges, although the name Gaunt (Gantt) is exceedingly rare in that county, there is a four-generation Gantt family unit in Bulwick Parish recorded in the registers of St. Nicholas Church from 1649. The earlier register records of Bulwick are clearly scanty with wide gaps, and unfortunately, alternative contemporary records are nonexistent. It is thus