It Ain't Necessarily So As the Song Goes. Even the Best Researchers Can

It ain’t necessarily so as the song goes. Even the best researchers can make mistakes. My family and others were caught in a web that still persists today in believing what other researchers had published long ago was fact. As a youngster, the glorious fairy tale began with Humphrey le Eyre, a knight, who came with Duke William to conquer England in 1066. Years later after a decade of research on that English Eyre family, I went on a genealogical trip to England in 1993. Excitement mounted as I looked forward to spending several days in Salisbury, Wiltshire, visiting the ancestral site to learn the history of St. Thomas church and its connection with my Ayer family. As I gazed at the dusty fractured dark oak stained alabaster memorials in Our Lady Chapel of Thomas Eyre, his wife, Elizabeth Rogers, and their fifteen children and the separate one of his son, Christopher, a wealthy London merchant adventurer who paid for these memorials, I wondered which figure was John Ayer who had settled in Massachusetts along the Merrimac River. The initial building on the church site was a small wooden chapel constructed as a place of worship for the men working on the new Salisbury Cathedral which was dedicated to St. Thomas Becket about 1220. The chapel was replaced by a small stone church which has undergone numerous changes. Our Lady Chapel evolved from the reconstructed St. Stephen’s Chapel which was destroyed in 1447. The Eyre memorials were moved to Our Lady’s Chapel from their original site in the chancel. Despite their condition they are still impressive pieces of carving. Mostly any Eyre family member would love to claim this family as theirs. In visiting the nearby village of Whiteparish on a Sunday side trip from Salisbury, we attended church services at All Saints Church. In conversing with the vicar’s wife she said that a descendant of Giles Eyre, a younger brother of John Eyre, still resided in the Giles’ home called Brickworth. A brass plaque on an outer wall in the church is dedicated to Giles. A well known landmark, the Pepperbox, was built by Giles Eyre in 1606. It was on high ground northwest of Whiteparish village and used by his lady friends to watch hunting parties. This was also the church where some of my Pike ancestors were christened and married. As I did further English research on the Eyre family, several things began to perplex me about John Ayer who settled lastly in Haverhill, Massachusetts. The spelling of the family of Eyre changed little, if any, over the centuries in English records. And why was there no Christening for John recorded in St. Thomas’ church records supposedly born in Sep 1582? Their records date from 1570. Why was there nothing recorded in the Chrysom books where wives gave a chysom offering after the birth of a child? Why was there no contact between John Ayer and the notable Rev. Charles Chauncey in Massachusetts, since Chauncey had married a daughter of the eldest son, Robert Eyre? What was the source of the birth date of John Ayer? Lastly, why the spelling change? So I researched Eyre family wills and found that each Eyre male had carefully named his siblings, male and female, and other family members in them. The most common source cited for that family came from Hoare’s Modern Wiltshire, Volume V published in 1837.1 There are three references in Hoare’s massive two volumes that are vital here. Volume V had two pedigree charts for the Eyre family. One is a two page insert between pages 56 and 57. It was noted as taken from the Visitation of 1623, published family documents and papers, and parish registers. A John was listed as baptized on 20 Sep 1582. This pedigree was inserted in an article on the Giles Eyre family of the Hundred of Frustfield in Whiteparish. Another pedigree was entered on page 107 and taken from the College of Arms, Wills, Parish Registers and other evidences. Only twelve of the fifteen children were named and no John was among them. The third and most important reference is contained in Volume VI, in the Appendix on page 835. Noted is the following on the Eyre’s Charity, Parish of St. Thomas. John Eyre, son of Thomas and Elizabeth (Rogers) Eyre, died in July 1599 as established by his will and other sources.2 John Eyre, by will dated Jul 13, 1599, gave for the use of the poor people of the parish of St. 1 Sir Richard Colt Hoare, Modern Wiltshire, Old and New Sarum or Salisbury, (London, John Bowyer Nichols & son, 25 Parliament St., Vol.V 1837) 2 Hoare, Vol.VI, 1843 313.

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