I have been doing a one-name study on my married name of Neobard/Neb(b)ard for some 30 years. The name nowadays is exceedingly rare and has been through a number of changes. I am now confident that it is a corruption of the name Nevard, and nearly all Neobards/Nebbards that I have found appear to stem from a Samuel Nebard/Nevard who was born around 1665 or so. He was a yoeman farmer who settled in Eye, Suffolk, England.

Despite many years of searching I don't know where Samuel was born, however I know that there is a large concentration of Nevards on the Suffolk/Essex border. Many Nevards appear to be weavers (not sure what they were weaving).

My father-in-law (now passed away) maintained that the family were descended from Huguenots - he said this was mentioned to him by another family member. He also mentioned King Henri of Navarre, and felt that there could be a connection between Nevard and Navarre. But this of course is probably a red herring.

I've had a scout around on line, but don't seem to be able to find any Essex Huguenot surname lists. Has anyone come across Nevard (or similar variation) as a huguenot surname or able to point me in the direction on any resources that may help (I realise it may mean a trip to the Huguenot society).

Many thanks

Toni Neobard

I find the surname NIVARD in several Huguenot databases. However the documented dating of NEVARD in Essex in 1578 means that almost any chronologically subsequent (post 1600) arrivals are generally irrelevant to your investigation.

http://www.familysearch.org/eng/default.asp

How early can you date NEVARD ancestry in Essex or Suffolk? If you find that you can date back in England before the historical origin and spread of Calvinism, then I guess that would be the answer to that question. History still leaves a span of several decades to be investigated, but not that many.

Regards,
KA

Let's try to pinpoint this a bit.

Toni, there is no database of Essex Huguenots as such but the Hug Soc of GB & I have published some of the records of the Huguenot/Walloon communities in Essex.

I have their records, including some I have published myself and about 25 other volumes on my personal data base and I've had a look through that.

I wouldn't dismiss the Huguenot connection at all. There is some evidence of the NEVARD name being associated with the old Walloon Church at Colchester (where they still lived as late as 1893) and one of the NEVARD family were apprenticed (recorded in the Court Records of The Weaver's Company)as a weaver. And the name is cross referenced with NIVARD - of which there are more references - in the records of the NEVARDS, linked to the community in Thorpe le Soken in Essex.

Hope this helps.

Contact me privately if you want any of this information.

Regards

Tony Fuller
24220 Berbiguieres
France

Excellent information - thank you both Korvis and Tony for all your information it is very much appreciated.

I will keep the potential Huguenot connection in miind, but I think I really need to make that link to a specific Nevard family first. Using the IGI and other sources I have searched a number of parish records where there seem to be concentrations of Nevards in the hope of turning up Samuel's baptism entry including Dedham, Mile End(Mylend) and other nearby parishes . However, this hasn't yet included Thorpe le Soken, so I will try there next.

It may be I am never able to find the connection, but remain hopeful that as more sources are indexed and are published on-line, that one day I will make that link.

Thank you also Tony for your offer of information - depending on what I find I may well take you up on it.

Regards

Toni

Hi Toni

Pleased to help but you need to bear in mind that no more Hug Soc of GB information will be put onto Family Search and that some of that material wouldn't fit into their search parameters.

And otyher of the material is in private hands and again, is not available on the internet nor will it be.

Regards

Tony Fuller

From the IGIs for NEVARD:
Christenings in 1563, 1564, 1567 and 1571 at Frating. Also 1575 and 1578 at Great Bently amd 1587 at Epping in Essex.
Plus a 1563 christening at Stratford St. Mary in Suffolk.
And a 1580 marriage at Mistley in Essex

For NEVERD a marriage in 1562 at Frating. John NEVERD married Marjerie HEEKFORD.

These and some of the other listings from Essex and Suffolk before 1600 are transcribed from the local parish registers of the Church of England.

Regards,
KA

My husband's middle name is "Neverd" and we've never really known anything about it, his father and his grandfather share the same middle name. We worked out a couple of years ago that it was an old surname and figured one day it would turn up in the family tree. Only today we found that his ancestor, Thomas Rivett, married Rhoda Neobard both from Sky, Suffolk ... and that is likely where "Neverd" came from. I have been told when researching Hugoenot lines on my side (Cushway/Cushois) that "Rivett" was also likely to be Huguenot ... and now this connection? I'd be interested with what you think.

cheers,
Keryn.

Hi Keryn,

My database of Neobards, turns up a Rhoda Neobard from Eye in Suffolk (I'm not aware of a 'Sky' in Suffolk so wonder if this is a mis-recording of the word Eye). This Rhoda was born around 1788. Feel free to contact me at toni@neobard.info if you want to know more.

I have good evidence that Neobard is a corruption of the surname Nevard - and all Neobard's seems to stem from Samuel Nevard/Nebard who settled in Eye around the end of the 17th century. The jury is still out on the Huguenot connection!

Regards

Toni Neobard

Hi Toni(and others):
I believe I mayhave emailed you once before about my Nevard(s) ancestors and reading these posts leads me to believe that we're definitely barking up the same tree.

I (and most North Americans Nevers family members) am descended from a Richard Nevard(s)/Never(s) who came to Massachusetts in 1665 and lived mostly in Woburn, outside Boston.

The earliest records of his listed him as Nevard(s) but over time that was corrupted to Nevers, and it continued as such through is descendants (although his son Samuel...yep, I'll get to that in a moment...was cited once as Nevards).

Given that his first-born son was Samuel, it's quite likely that his father was a Samuel, and, as you've mentioned, there are records of Samuels in Essex. I also found a Samuel marrying a woman whose surname was Richar in the early 1600s.

Interestingly, Richard was Baptist! That was the earliest period of Baptists in England, and he was a follower of Pastor Gould and his first Baptist church in the Boston area. In fact, Richard Nevards/Nevers was cited by the local authorities for "turning his back on the sacrament of ye baptisme" at church as he and his cohorts did not believe in infant baptism.

I have scoured through many records at the Essex Record Office looking for Richard's baptism and found nothing, but this might explain why. He was likely baptised as an adult in a Baptist church or some sort of even informal congregation.

So the Samuel I did find marrying Ms. Richar could have been his father. Or another Samuel...

I should also mention that the earliest mention of an Nevard in the Essex records database (available online) goes all the way back to the 1100's.

So, I'd say that the Nevards were weavers who came from Normandy (where there were many weavers) after Norman King, William the Conqueror, led the way after the Battle of Hastings in 1066.

That would lead me to believe they were not Huguenots, but rather Normans.

I am VERY interested in trying to determine where my Richard was from, with a probable father named Samuel. It would be a great discovery for all of us Nevers family members in North America, most of whom descend from this man.

Please keep up the research! I'll send whatever else you'd like to know.

Patrick Doherty (mother's maiden name - Nevers)
Seattle

Hi Patrick. Thanks for your very interesting post. It must be very frustrating for you to not be able to pinpoint your English roots.

I have found a few mentions of a Samuel Nevard in the Essex Quarter Session Rolls beween 1658 to 1668. This Samuel came from Dedham and the charges are for 'keeping the peace'; bastardy; or not paying excise duties. So it sounds like he was a colourful character and I have always hoped he may be among my husband's ancestors. I mention it in case you haven't already come across it and it is relevant to your lot.

Having considered further, primarily based on my findings and what others have written here, I think (like you) it is less likely that there is a huguenot connection with my line. This is mainly because of timing, the line I am seeking seems to have connections in England before the huguenots sought refuge here - but this is not to say that subsequent Nevards didn't come over who had huguenot links. You've got me thinking about the potential Norman link though - now how would we prove that!

Have you considered DNA testing. I recently had great success with this route. I had been corresponding with someone whose surname was Nubbert, whose ancestors all linked back to a Joseph Nubbert. She couldn't find where he came from and contacted me to see if I had a Joseph Nebbard who could be her missing link. I did have one about the right time who went missing from my tree, but we could not prove it on paper. Both of us independently submitted DNA samples and had 46 marker tests undertaken. To our extreme surprise we came back with a match - the most recent common ancestor being 10 generations back (which made it the Samuel Nevard/Nebard who is at the top of my tree), exactly as we had suspected. Amazing really as it relies on there being an unbroken male line i.e. no illegitimate offspring in the direct lineage of either party.

My husband's DNA results are stored on the ancestry.com database, so you may want to consider having the test and seeing whether my husband's family and yours is from the same source. Ancestry will automatically match the DNA against everyone in the database, so no need for special instructions.

Would be very pleased to hear from you again if you dig up anything else.

Kind regards

Toni