Cheshire. from That County Radial Migrations Can Be Distinctly Traced to Neighboring Counties and to Southern England
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FELLOWS, FALLOWES, FELLOW AND LIKE NAMES Fellows Ance~try in New England and Old England With Data on English Origins of Fallowes, Fellowes, Followes, Fellow, Followe, Faleyse, Pallas, Felice, Felix, Fells, Fell, Fylot, Fylowe, Valeys, Goodfellow, Longfellow I½ LOUIS DOW SCISCO TOBIAS A. WRIGHT FRINTER AND PlJBLISHER NEW YORK CONTENTS PAGE Foreword 5 Fellows in New England 9 Fellowes in Old England 24 Fellowes in southern England 25 Fellowes in central England 29 Fallowes 32 Fall owes in central England 33 Fallowes in northern England 40 Fallowes in southern England 41 Felagh-Felawe-Fellow . 44 Fellow in western England . 45 Fellow in central England . 52 Fellow in eastern England . 57 Fellow miscellany 69 Compounded surnames 72 De Faleyse . 76 Fallas . 84 Felice and Felys . 87 Felix 95 Fells 98 Followe . 106 Filiot and Fylot . • 108 3 FOREWORD In modern life the place of the ancient bard who sang the glories of family lines has been taken over by the genealogist, who records more prosaically, but doubtless more truthfully, the memory of the forefathers of the race. Few of the earlier families of New England are now without something in the way of printed record of their descent, which all may read. The Fellows family, in this respect, has been unfortunate. But if so, it is not because there have been no students of its kinships. One of the earliest of American genealogists was Elnathan Fellows of Connecticut. At some time about the close of the eighteenth century he brought together a fairly complete re cord of the Connecticut descendants of William Fellows of Ipswich, among whose numbers he was included. He was said to have been deeply interested in his quest. In his day, however, family histories were not being published, and his work never reached a printed page. Perhaps his collections are still treasured in some old Connecticut home. Years later a grandnephew of Elnathan Fellows felt the spirit of research descend upon him. Gideon E. S. Fellows, a native of New York state, born in 1808, obtained access to the records of Elnathan Fellows and copied largely from them. Thereafter, for many years, he added to the material by cor respondence. In early manhood he made his home in southern Wisconsin and there spent the rest of his life. In that home, the present writer, his grandnephew, was privileged many years ago to examine his collections and to draft from them some notes about Fellows ancestors. Gideon Fellows never prepared his material for publication. His collections were pre served by him until his death in 1884; then they were put in 5 storage for some years while the widow was living. Of their ultimate fate the writer has not been able to obtain informa tion. Other hands of another generation next essayed the task of building Fellows genealogy. Charles Sumner Fellows, de scendant of Samuel of Salisbury, a native of :Maine but, in middle life and later, a resident of Minnesota, began many years ago to collect data of family descent and kindred. A little later the same line of research was taken up by George Marshall Fellows, descendant of William of Ipswich, native to New Hampshire but resident at Boston. These two worked separately for some years, but eventually their paths crossed, as was inevitable. Both were intensely interested in their sub ject, but neither saw fit to attempt publication, looking forward to completeness of results before announcement. Burdened by advancing years and ill health Charles S. Fellows about 1913 presented his collections to his contemporary worker and ceased further effort. He died in 1922 at Minneapolis. In his home at Boston, George M. Fellows arranged the combined collections and added to them as he could, but he, too, was near the end of active life. He died in 1917. After his death his family placed the collections in the custody of a genealogical society to await the hand of some future editor. The present writer desires here, as his own brief personal tribute, to express his grateful appreciation of friendly courtesies extended to hi_m in past years by both these gentlemen. The author of this booklet does not attempt a history of the Fellows family in America or elsewhere, but in anticipa tion of the day when some other hand shall prepare for print the future Fellows genealogy he offers the present material as a preface to that future work. It owes its existence to an argument many years ago in which the present writer ques tioned, and another defended, the reputed deriYation of the Fellows name from the word "fellow". In these pages have been assembled, with something of analysis and interpreta- 6 tion, such data as could be found concerning the history of the surname. :Moreover, it was found that the research was not a thing of simplicity, for there were other old English surnames which bore phonetic resemblance to that of Fellows, and which confused the search by that likeness. Hence the search was broadened to include others than the single surname which prompted it. To an extent therefore, this work is a con tribution also to the origins of a number of English families quite unrelated to that of Fellows. As a final word, it should perhaps be said plainly, that these notes assembled from English sources do not constitute pedi-. grees of the families concerned. They are exhibited here, as the evidence from which the writer draws the conclusions he has expressed. Quite naturally the genealogist always makes an effort to portray, in pedigree forni, the biological relation of individuals, _where it can be learned. The ancient yeoman families qf England, however, can rarely be recorded in such form. Source references to these family stocks are discon nected in the extreme. The modern genealogist finds such families shrouded in an obscurity from which at times indi viduals emerge in numbers sufficient to show the general existence of the family stocks, but not in numbers sufficient to establish pedigree connection. The writer, in this search of his for family origins, has perforce struggled with the problem of extracting genealogical conclusions from the disconnected data which cloak the history of yeoman stocks of former cen turies. In these notes he has worked out tentatively, a method of handling this troublesome material, which he offers as a suggestion to genealogists in general who deal with records re lating to family stocks existing before the year 1600. By this, or some like method, it will be found possible to obtain and marshall authentic facts in regard to the origin, social status, migrations, and vicissitudes of a family, without attempting the impossible feat of establishing a family pedigree. 7 FELLOWS IN NEW ENGLAND The English surname Fellowes almost invariably takes the form Fellows in the United States. In this it follows the pre cedent set nearly three centuries ago by the town clerk of Ipswich, Mass., when he recorded in that form the puritan colonist who first bore the name in America. Massachusetts and other New England colonies were founded by English puritans in dissent from the established church of England. During a period of years from 1630 onward, because of the re pressive policy of the ruling group in England, puritan emi gration poured from the mother country in a broad stream bearing English households by thousands to new homes under more friendly rule. In that stream the ancestors of the Fel lows family came to New England. Like most of the other colon ists of that time they were from the yeoman class of old Eng land. Like most of the others who came they quickly fitted themselves to the conditions of an undeveloped country and wrested from it the beginnings of a modest prosperity. There were three pioneers of the Fellows name who came to New England from homes in southern Leicestershire. The fir:st was William Fellows, who appeared in 1639 at Ipswich, Mass. The second was Samuel Felloes, who appeared in 1641, at Salisbury, Mass. The third was Richard Fellowes, who appeared in 1643 at Hartford, Conn. Their surname, it will be noted, was spelled differently ill! their several locations. Such variation would seem to be evidence against any close kinship between the three pioneers, and there is nowhere in the colony records any recognition of kinship to one another by any of the three men. Evidence from another source, howev~r, indicates that such kinship existed. 9 The Moricke wiU.-John Moricke was a colonist of Hing ham, :Mass., He first appears in 1637 as grantee of town lands. Nothing is known of his life unless it was he who, as John Merrick, was appointed by the General Court in 1646 to be a local magistrate at Hingham. He died in 1647 at Hingham, leaving a widow and a son, recorded as John Merrick. The widow, Elizabef1 Moricke, soon removed from Hingham to Roxbury, where she acquired land and was living in De cember, 1649, when she sold her Hingham lands. In March, 1649-50, she made her will, and on August 25, 1650, she died at Roxbury. The executors named by her were Leonard Fel lowes of Great Bowden in southern Leicestershire, and Robert Hull, of Boston, Mass., formerly of Market Harborough, in southern Leicestershire. Her three principal legatees were William, Richard, and Samuel Fellows, sharing equally. Next to them was William Healy, whose land at Roxbury touched that of the testatrix and who perhaps may have been kin as well as neighbor to her. The clear implications of the will are that Elizabeth Moricke herself came from southern Leicester shire and that the three Fellows men were her nearest kin, probably brothers or nephews.