At 10:08 AM 5/18/01 -0400, you wrote: >Would appreciate information/clues concerning the five years that Robert Payne (d. abt. 1675) went by a "borrowed" name of Davies/Davis. Does anyone know the reasons? Dear John, One possible answer, and one that is supported by numerous examples of like individuals, is that Robert assumed this alias after having been apprenticed out to a man by the name of Davies and simply adopting the surname. However, I think there may be another answer in this case. Firstly, if we are to go strictly by the document whereby his alias is revealed to the Rappahannock County Vestry, we must assume that he only used the alias during his term as Clerk (1662-1666), or a period of about "five yeares." If that were so, then it would seem to suggest that he had used the alias to hide his identity ONLY for that purpose for some unknowable reason. In this case, the real question would be- Why would he want to hide the name of PAYNE? To answer that, I'd suggest looking at what was happening in the region during that period- politically and religously. Or it is also possible that he just wanted to disassociate himself from the name PAYNE for a more personal reason. Perhaps some falling out with the family? In that case, perhaps there are clues to be found in published texts on the family. Secondly, there were some documented incidents where sons of prominent families used aliases during their indentures or apprenticeships- at least during that time. In Robert's case, he was certainly not among those men during the period of 1662-1666. However, he may have been apprenticed or indentured to a man by the name of Davies earlier in his life and adopted the name as a convenience while a member of the vestry. Again, this would suggest some reason for wanting to hide the name of PAYNE. Robert, as I recall, was well up in years by this time, dying a few years later. Yet he married a young girl, Elizabeth Lawson, who would have otherwise been orphaned. Given his age at the time, and the typical age of indenture or apprenticeship was roughly 16 years, we can assume that if Robert had in fact been in those circumstances during his youth, that it would have occured sometime in the 1620s. I have his estimated birth date as 1604, giving his age at death 71. Robert counted among his friends, Archdale Combs, Abraham Combs and John Meader. In at least the case of Abraham Combs, we know his birth date occurred during that time frame. I bring this all up because of something that I brought up a few years ago that I can't let go of. In the 1621 will of John Rolfe (husband of Pocahontas), said to have been a Norfolk man, he names a servant by the name of Robert DAVIES. This may have been innocent enough when taken by itself, but then consider that in 1626 a William PAYNE was writing to Lord Edward Conway in England asking for his support with a petition to the King regarding several "inventions" he had developed for use in Virginia. One of these "inventions" had been a method of producing tobacco to equal the quality of the Spanish variety. The SAME invention (in almost identical wording) attributed to John Rolfe. Now it starts to become more than innocent coincidence in my book. There are other reasons why I believe the door is open to the possibility that Robert Payne was this Robert Davies, but I'll spare them for now as this is going to be long enough as it is. But if your agreeable to consider the possibility for a moment, then we still have to ask, why the name of DAVIES was chosen? This is obviously speculation on my part (and I know how that is frowned upon by some- but how else do we discover things if we don't consider the possibilities?), but in searching out information on the Davies family and possible connections with the Paynes, this is what I've discovered:- There was a John and a Robert Davies involved in the early settlements in America. Namely, the Popham Colony founded in 1607 along the Kennebec River in what is now Maine. They were mariners, associated with other great mariner names from the area of Devonshire. One man of the name, Sir John DAVIE(S) (1612-1678) of Creedy, Devon., married Amy, daughter of Edward Parker of Boringdon, Plympton, Devon. Amy married, after the death of Sir John, Sir Nicholas SLANNING (1641-1693) of Maristow, Tamerton Foliot, Devon. Slannings 1st wife, married on 4 Nov 1662, had been Anne, daughter of Sir George and Elizabeth de CARTERET. Her father was later elevated to title of Baron Carteret, and he was given the Charters for New Jersey and North Carolina, of which, his family maintained possession until the Revolutionary War. Anne de CARTERET'S brother, Philip, married Jemimah, daughter of Edward MONTAGU, 1st Earl of Sandwich, who had been the boss of Sir George Carteret in the Admiralty. The marriage between Philip and Jemimah had been arranged by Samuel PEPYS, Treasurer of the Admiralty under Lord MONTAGU and also a close friend of Sir George CARTERET. Now here is the key which would tie all of this together and perhaps give us what we need to identify Robert PAYNE alias DAVIES. Sir Robert PAYNE of St. Neots, Hunts. had been the protege of Edward Montagu, Earl of Sandwich according to at least two reputable sources- "Victorias History of the Counties of England- Huntingdonshire," and "The King and the Gentleman," Derek Wilson, a well-known, if not fully reliable English biographer. But it seems certain in this case that Sir Robert and his family did in fact maintain a close relationship with the Montagu family as well as with the RUSSELL'S and CROMWELL'S. Records also show that the Paynes of Hunts. had held land there of the Earl of Sandwich. Sir George Carteret's family was from Jersey in the Channel Islands where his family had intermarried with Payns since the 1300s and the two families had maintained relationships right up through the 17th-century. I suspect that it was this tie between the Paynes of Hunts. and the Payns of Jersey that has been the source of the confusion regarding the Paynes of Virginia's claim to a coat-of-arms that was granted to a descendant of the Jersey family- Ralph Payne, Lord Lavington. Sir Robert's arms were completely different- but this in NO WAY excludes the possibility of a relationship between the two families I might add. In any case, here is one possible explanation for the use of the alias DAVIES that makes some sense. A search of shipping records from the early 17th-century often shows the names of Payne and Davies together and it would appear that there may have been some Payne involvement at Fort St. George, Pophams Colony- although I am still pulling this data together. Additionally, it would fit the scenario well if Robert had been a son of Sir Robert Payne of Hunts. and wanted to disguise the fact during his apprenticeship under some merchant or mariner associated with his father (an adventurer in the London Company himself, who appears to have been involved in the tobacco trade if he was the man licensed to sell tobacco in Bedfordshire and Gloucestershire). But to return to John Rolfe, it is important for us to also know that he had a KNOWN affiliation with the Payne family long before his death. In 1609, Rolfe had been a passenger aboard the famous SEAVENTURE bound for Virginia when it was shipwrecked on the coast of Bermuda during a "Tempest." This story parcipatated Shakespeares play "The Tempest." On the voyage, Rolfe had been a member of the camp belonging to Sir Thomas Gates, another Norfolk man, and 1st Governor of Virginia. Another member of his camp with Rolfe had been a "gentleman" by the name of Henry Payne, whom I suspect had also been a Norfolk man. There were some 140 total passengers and the "camp's" were divided between that of Sir Thomas Gates and that of Sir George Somers. If we half the numbers between them, we're looking at roughly 70 men per camp. Given that Henry Payne and John Rolfe were gentleman of the camp, we can narrow down further that given their status it would have been next to impossible for the men not to have at least known each other. The same can be said for another passenger aboard- Stephen Hopkins, who was along on the trip as an assistant minister. Surely, ministers in that day did a much better job than they do today when it comes to knowing their congregations! Hopkins returned to England before returning to America, with a different wife, as a Pilgrim aboard the MAYFLOWER in 1620. He settled in Massachusetts where his granddaughter, Mary Snow, married Thomas PAYNE, a member of the Suffolk branch of the Payne family that had settled there and became proprietors of the iron works at Lynn on the Saugus River- a family well-connected to the WINTHROP'S of the Massachusetts Bay Colony founded by them in 1630 (as opposed to Hopkins, a member of the Plymouth Colony 1620). Sir Thomas Gates was the son of Peter Gates of High Easter, Essex by his wife Mary JOSSELYN of Oakington, Cambridgeshire. They appear to have settled in Norwich, Norfolk, where they were married in 1573. They were descended from Geoffrey Gates of Walton or Waltham, Essex, by his wife Elizabeth, daughter of William WALSINGHAM and Joyce DENNY. Upon the death of Geoffrey Gates in 1553, his widow Elizabeth (nee Walsingham) Gates married Peter WENTWORTH, the son of Sir Nicholas Wentworth of Lillingstone Lovell, Oxon., and Jane JOSSELYN of Hyde Hall, Sawbridgeworth, Herts. The first wife of Peter Wentworth had been Lettice, daughter of Sir Ralph LANE of Orlingbury, Northants., by his wife Maud, daughter of William, 1st Baron PARR, of Horton. Lettice's brother, Capt. Ralph LANE, had been the Gov. Virginia 1585-6, during the time of Sir Walter RALEGH'S colony at ROANOKE, where, on the 1587 muster, we find Henry and Rose PAYNE. Sources on the Roanoke Colony are fairly unanimous in concluding that the members of the 1587 colony had been almost exclusively friends and relatives of one another (something else to consider entirely). However, another brother of Lettice and Capt. Ralph Lane, Robert Lane, 1st married Catherine, daughter of Sir Roger COPELEY of Gatton, and Elizabeth SHELLEY, and the sister of Bridget Copeley, who married Sir Richard SOUTHWELL, alias DARCY, the son of Sir Richard Southwell of London and Wood Rising, Norf., and Mary Darcy. Significantly, Sir Richard had been married previously to Thomasine, daughter of Roger DARCY and Elizabeth WENTWORTH, the aunt of Nicholas Wentworth who married Jane Josselyn. More significantly, for our purposes anyway, Thomasine Darcy was the sister of Thomas, 1st Baron Darcy, who married first, Audrey RAINSFORD, sister of Julian Rainsford, who married William, son of George WALDEGRAVE by his wife, Anna, daughter of Sir Robert DRURY and Anne CALTHORPE. Sir Robert Drury had been the prior owner of the "Ellesmere" manuscript of Geoffrey Chaucer's "The Canterbury Tales" which afterwards was owned by Henry PAYNE, Esq., Lord of the Manor of Nowton, Suffolk, son of William Payne, bailiff of Hengrave to the 3rd Duke of Buckingham, and the grandson of Thomas Payne of Market Bosworth, Leicestershire. This is important to us because the Paynes of Suffolk had been close with the DRURY family. On the death of Henry Payne in 1568, he willed his Chaucer manuscript to Sir Giles Alington, the grandson of Ursula Drury, daughter of Sir Robert Drury named above. Anna Drury's husband, George, had been the son of William Waldegrave by Margery Wentworth, the sister of Dorothy Wentworth, whose husband, John SPRING, was the brother of Annie Spring, mother of Elizabeth JERMYN, who married Thomas PLAYTERS of Sotterley, Suffolk. You might recall that Anthony PAYNE, son of John PAYNE and Frances SPRING, had married an Alice, daughter of William PLAYTERS, Esq., also of Sotterley, Suffolk. We've covered some ground here, but we still have a long way to go! To summarize, I have attempted to show, whether you interpret it as fantasy or not, how Robert Payne, alias Davies, had been associated with Sir Robert Payne of St. Neots, Hunts. (who did in fact have a son Robert born in 1604), and have gone on to associate them with the Paynes of Suffolk (who settled in Mass.), and of Jersey (who later settled in the West Indies after a period in Devon.). In addition, I've included some details about the Paynes of Leicestershire from whom the branch in Suffolk descended. That is a quick summary... I want to close this with something a bit more solid though. Thomas, 1st Baron Darcy, married again after his marriage with Audrey Rainsford. His 2nd wife was Elizabeth, daughter of John de VERE, 15th Earl of Oxford (a family also associated with the Paynes of Leicestershire), and by her Lord Darcy was the grandfather of Sir Henry Darcy, who had conveyed his lands in Medloe, Hunts., to one Robert Payne in the early 16th-century. I believe this Robert was one of the elder sons of Sir Thomas Payne of Market Bosworth. Why? Consider this: Sir Henry Darcy's 2nd wife had been Catherine, daughter of Sir John FERMOR of Easton Neston, Northamptonshire, by Maud VAUX, daughter of Nicholas, 1st Lord Vaux of Great Harrowden, Northants. Catherine Fermor had been a widow when she married Sir Henry Darcy. Her first husband had been Michael PULTENEY of Misterton, Leicestershire, and it might be remembered that Sir Thomas Payne of that county had married Margaret, daughter of Sir Thomas PULTENEY, also of Misterton, Leicestershire... I currently have over 250 pages detailing these and a host of like connections bringing the following PAYNE branches together quite nicely: Leicestershire; Suffolk (later Mass.); Huntingdonshire (later Va.?); Norfolk (later Mass. and Md.?); Jersey (later St. Kitts and Va.?); Gloucestershire (later Va.?); Herefordshire (later Mass.); and Berkshire (later Mass. and Va.?). Admittedly, my research has been, by necessity, one of mostly secondary nature. However, I have managed to conduct some primary research as well in the two trips I've managed to finance to England. While it by no means can be considered "fact" just yet, it certainly looks very promising as I hope I have been able to briefly demonstrate here. I have not mentioned many of the great finds, such as finding William Payne of the iron works in Mass. involved with the friends and relatives of John Payne in Virginia! I am dedicating a chapter to each of the branches named above beginning in England and then devoting chapters to the colonies. I also hope to reprint J. Bertrand Paynes "An Armorial of Jersey," as it pertains to the Payne family there. I hope to accomplish three things with this work:- 1) Awaken a new-found interest in Payne research from the earliest times in both England and America. 2) open the door to continued research bringing the branches together. 3) initiating a cooperative effort among researchers everywhere by forming a research Society (yes- based on membership dues!) in order to finance the costly primary research remaining. Individually, we can only accomplish so much. Unless we happen to be independently wealthy enough to invest potentially tens of thousands of $$$ because we are consumed with knowing the truth, then we don't have much choice than to combine our efforts under a structured effort. It has been over 70 years since any work of real magnitude has been produced on the Payne family. Yet in that 70 years, very little progress has been made. We may be filling some holes in our family trees, but by and large, we are missing the real meat and potatoes of the legacy left to us. For us to conclude that these families "bore no relationship whatsoever" (to quote from nearly every published Payne genealogy to date), simply because they don't reach out to one another in records as we'd like, is to turn our back on our history. If it can be shown that time-and-time again, Paynes were linked through common social circles, business and other sources, would it not benefit us to explore them in detail? Is it not conceivable that, given the times, politics, religion, distance and difference, might account for the lack of contact between the branches, despite a relationship between them? When was the last time you contacted your 1st cousin (or brother/sister for that matter)? Is he (or she) mentioned in your will? If that relative cheated you in business, fought against you and your friends on issues of politics or religion, would you associate yourself with them? These are some of the same issues that our ancestors had to deal with that I think we have overlooked. Many other families have been organized into societies for a long time now with great success. The Montagu, Shirley and Palgrave families come to mind. Their subscribers make it possible to fund primary research by hiring professionals to do the leg work or make it possible for appointed members to undertake it. Think how much more BOOST Don Payne would have if he had an organization behind him in negotiating with the LDS regarding the files of Brooke Payne for example. When I think of all the investment of time and money I've put in over just a few brief years, I would gladly spend the equivalent of one book purchase to contribute to an organized effort. It's an investment with much greater potential return to me than any NASDAQ stock. Certainly more satisfying... Regards, Patrick Payne the new Payne on the Neck of Virginia :-)