MARYLAND HISTORICAL MAGAZINE Vol. XVI. MARCH, 1921. No. 1 COLONEL GERARD FOWKE GERARD FOWKE, St. Louis, Mo. Family tradition, usually unreliable, asserts that the Fowkes are descended from Fulk, Count of Anjou, France, in the ninth century. This belief is probably based on similarity of name, and the occurrence of the fleur-de-lis on the coat of arms. It is also believed that the first of the name came to England with Richard Cour de Lion. But the name appears on the Battle . Abbey roll, so they were here as early as William the Conqueror. Others came long afterward; for there is a record of a family springing from Sir Orlando Fowke who migrated from Spain to England in the time of Queen Elizabeth. In 1885 there was living in Oshawa county, Canada, a Fowke family descended from a French Huguenot who went from France to England in the eighteenth century. In various records and documents, unmistakably relating to this same family, the name is spelled in such divers ways as Fowke, Foulk, Foulke, Foulkes, Fowkes, Fookes, Fooks, Fowlke, Fowlkes, Foulque, Foulques, and at least once in England, Fok. There is also Fouque in France and Fouke in Holland and America. The German word Foulque means a “ back water hen.” In one record in England the name appears in three consecutive generations, grandfather, father, and son, as Fulk, Foulke, and Fowke. Difficulty also appears in the pronunciation of the name. In Virginia and Maryland, descendants in the female line who have never known any one possessing the original name, called it “Foake.” Some in England also call ” it “Foake." In eastern Virginia it was often called Fooke or Fookes, with the "00" as in either “root” or “ book.” All of those whom it has been my fortune to meet in Maryland, Virginia, Georgia, South Carolina, Kentucky, and Missouri, to whom the name belongs and who know how it was pronounced by their ancestors, call it Fowke, with the “ow" as in “now" or “how,” the same sound as “ou” in “ about." In England the name is still represented by various estates in several counties. The records are very full and complete in the British Museum and in the various homes, and several of them have been published. Only one is given here; it is from • Leicester Pedigrees and Royal Descents.” Its accuracy is undoubted. The following pedigree was drawn up in the year 1765 by Joseph Edmondson: Sir Richard Fowke. ried Isabel, daughter of Sir John West. Sir Henry Fowke, 1189, married Mabella, daughter of Sir Ralph Cole. Sir William Fowke, Knight. Thomas Fowke, 1247, married Alice, daughter of Sir Bald win de Vere. Sir John Fowke, 1266, married Dorothy, daughter of Sir John Brown. Sir Richard Fowke, 1333, slain in the battle of Haledon Hill; married Arabella, daughter of John Beauchamp. Sir Henry Fowke, 1369, married Mirabell, daughter of Sir John Harrison of Cumberland. Sir Richard Fowke, married Anne, daughter of Sir John Allen of Suffolk. William Fowke of Brewood, married Anne Eyton. John Fowke, second son, 1524, married Agnes, daughter of John Newman. Roger Fowke of Gunston, married Cassandra, daughter of William Humphristone. John Fowke of Gunston, 1547, married Anne, daughter of John Bradshaw of Windly and Isabel Kinnersley. Francis Fowke, second son, married Jane, daughter of John Raynsford of Tew. John Fowke, married Dorothy, daughter of John Cupper of Glimpston. Roger Fowke, third son, married Mary, daughter of William Bayley of Lea” (See “G” below.) The Virginia line, as descended from Col. Gerard Fowke, had its original home in Staffordshire, where in the seventeenth century and earlier their estate was known as Brewoode (pronounced Broode with the long sound of the “00”) and Gunston, a modern rendition of the ancient Braywoode or Breywoode and Gonstone. Two mottoes appear :-“ Optimum est frui aliena insania” (“it is best to profit by, or to make use of, the folly of others ”), and “ Arma tuenter pacem (“Arms promote peace ”). Burton, in his " Anatomy of Melancholy," rather freely translates the first motto “ It is an excellent thing to make ourselves merry with other men's obliquities.” Mr. Frank Rede Fowke of London furnished me with the following information: “A.-William Fowke, living in 1403 and 1438, married Ann Eyton of county Salop. Their son ston, county Stafford. Their son a C.-Roger (third son) married Cassandra Humphristone. Their only son shaw, daughter of John and Isabel (Kynnersley) Bradshaw. Their son also Jane Rainsford. Their only son Dorothy Cupper. His eldest and fifth sons, respec tively, were Bailey, of county Stafford; and before 1643/4. He had several sons; three of them, Robert, John, and Talbot, went to Virginia.' It is probable that these three, Robert, John and Talbot, left descendants; or that others of the family came to Virginia; for in various records and on tombstones are the names of certain Fowkes of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries whose connections can not be traced, but who are certainly not descended from Col. Gerard Fowke. Frank Rede Fowke says, further, Roger Fowke (marked 'G'above] had nineteen children: one was a son, John of Gunston, of Oxford, and of the Tower of London. He (John) married Joyce, daughter of Richard March, Gentleman, Usher to Kings Charles I and II. Now there is a Gerard Fowke who in some pedigrees is said to be the son of this John and Joyce, whilst in others he is said to have been his brother and [in others ?] to have been the son of John Fowke and Dorothy Cupper. Anyway, this Gerard married Ann, daughter of and relict of Job Chandler of Port Maryland, Island of Tobago. By her he had two sons, Gerard and Adam, and two daughters, Mary and Elizabeth. This Elizabeth married William Dent of Maryland.” 1 It is plain from this abstract that an attempt was made in England to preserve the family record of the Virginia branch; and that the transcriber became confused over the different Gerards, as he did over the locality: “Port Maryland, Isle of Tobago” manifestly being a mistake for “Port Tobacco, Province of Maryland.” All the early Virginia writers agree in saying that the ancestor of the Virginia and Maryland Fowkes was Gerard, the sixth son of Roger Fowke of Brewoode and Gunston, Staffordshire, and Mary, his wife.” They, say further, that he married Anne Chandler, the widow of Job Chandler of Maryland (though some by error call her daughter instead of widow), and that " he had two sons, Adam and Gerard, and two daughters, Mary and Elizabeth, the latter marrying William Dent.” This Anne Chandler was a daughter of Adam Thoroughgood. Job Chandler was appointed Receiver-General of Maryland, and Member of the Council, June 9, 1651; and was a Member of the Council, 1651-1654 and 1656-1659, his last appearance being on 4 June 1659. He died the same year. In relation to the Thoroughgoods, the following is taken from “ Colonial Families of the United States” (Rhoades), page 76, vol. 7. “Adam Thoroughgood, builder of the oldest Colonial home in America; Commander of a Royal Troop; member of the King's Council; First Judge of lower Norfolk, Va.; b. 1602; d. 1641; came to Virginia 1621; he was the son of William and Ann (Edwards) Thoroughgood, who was the brother of Sir John and Sir Edward Thoroughgood, of Gunston, England. He m. Sarah Offiley, dau. of Robert Offley, merchant of Grace street, London, England, and his wife, Ann Osborne, dau. of Sir Edward Osborne, Knight, Lord Mayor of London, 1583, whose wife was Ann Hewitt, dau. of William Hewitt, Lord Mayor of London, 1559. Sarah Offley, bapt. 16th April, 1609; m. 18th July, 1627, at Saint Ann's, Black Friars, England, to Adam Thoroughgood; |