This information was sent to me by an aunt years ago..... Titled "The Family of Barnes." I just copied the first part the rest follows the lines of Thomas, Charles and William Barnes who came to the US from England.... Just thought since we are discussing the country of origin for Barnes would pass this along... Regards, Patricia Barnes Zielinski C.W. Bardsley and others writing books on surnames state that the name Barnes was a local place-name in Suffolk and Surrey, or that it came from “Bernard,” or that it came from the farmstead structure. However, in tracing the family lineage, and checking with Doomsday book, it has been found that the family lived in the town of Bernieres, near Falaise, in France, that the family name was thus spelled, until they came to England with William the Conqueror in 1066, and then the name was Anglicized to Barnes. For their service with William the men were granted estates in Middlesex, Essex, Norfolk, and Cambridgeshire. Hugo de Bernieres, according to Doomsday book, held lands in Euresdon, Cambridgeshire, in the 11th century. In the “ visitation,” or census, in the XVI century, the heralds confirmed the Arms, then in the possession of Henry Barnes, the “eldest sonne,” whose brother Richard became Lord Bishop Durham. In this country, in “Marriages before 1699” we find the name Barnes in Mass., Conn., New Jersey, Philadelphia, and Maryland. In the Revolution there were soldiers from Mass., Conn., Vermont, New Hampshire, New York, Virginia, Maryland, and the Carolinas.