G2G: Did This person exist?: Luther Holley b 29 Oct 1556, Shoreditch St Leonard, Middlesex, England

Question

I'm trying to find out if there is any record of a Dr. Luther Halley (or Holley) b Shoreditch St. Leonards, Middlesex, England, he is supposedly an ancestor of the Holley's of Stamford, CT.  According to the History of Stamford: "The family number among their ancestry in England, Dr. Luther Halley who was born Oct. 29, 1556, in St. Leonard's parish, Shordith, London."

I'm suspicious as I found this account regarding Dr. Edmond Halley (astronomer) referring to claims that he was born Oct 29, 1656 in Hagerstown.  His family I believe, was from Shoreditch, Middlesex.  The dates seem to similar to be a coincidence.

https://archive.org/details/surveyoflondon08londuoft/page/38/mode/2up?q=Halley

Comments

I've written up a discussion of the various histories from 1828 to 1897 that mention him as Luther or Edmond in his profile.

[[Holly-215 | Luther Holly]].

Would appreciate critiques or additions.

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Thanks for doing that.  I think it looks great.  I added the Uncertain Existence template and changed the wording to reflect that the profile was no longer attached as a parent.

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Thanks @Mike Dobson for doing this. Very much appreciated.

Answer 1

M, I agree with your suspicions that this person is of uncertain existence.

The parish registers for St Leonard, Shoreditch start in 1560, so 4 years after this Luther Holly/Holley is said to have been born. (they are beautifully imaged on Ancestry and have clear handwriting - baptisms from image 286 of the first St Leonard register) There are no other Holly or Holley baptisms for 20 years after this date for this parish indexed by Ancestry. 

I can only find this Luther Holly/Holley in unsourced family trees on Ancestry and Geni. There were Luther Holly/Holleys in the US in more recent times.

Of the two sources quoted on the profile, the first links to a full text book, but it looks as though the John Holly family (page 274) has been taken from the book quoted in the second source.

The second is a Genweb page, but the text has been copied from this book: A Discourse on the Genius and Character of the Rev. Horace Holley, LL. D.: Late President of Transylvania University by Charles Caldwell, 1828

"Luther Holley was descended in a direct line from Edmund Halley a celebrated English philosopher born the 29th of October 1556, in St Leonard's parish, Shoreditch, London". 

But this is not the same Luther Holly/Holley as the profile for Holly-215. And Edmund Halley (Fellow of the Royal Society, Halley's comet fame) was born exactly 100 years later. 

Comments

https://books.google.com/books?id=lxARAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA145&lpg=PA145&dq=luther+holly+born+1556&source=bl&ots=KmmIsK88FA&sig=ACfU3U1_WCoBjKSqiKAfD5b83bmkUEOa3Q&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjdtZP339ruAhVMHM0KHdHCDXsQ6AEwCHoECAgQAg#v=onepage&q=luther%20holly%20born%201556&f=false

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Hi Eddie! Thanks for that - I'm only getting a snippet view which doesn't include the phrase about Luther Holly - and I can't manipulate the search terms to view it. Can you see what it says about him?

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Did you click the "read now" icon? That brought up the page.

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Found it full text on FamilySearch Books! Here

It's on image 239. To quote:

"he [John Holly] came of a distinguished family in England, one of whom, Dr. Luther Holly was born in St Leonard's parish, Shoredith [sic] London Oct. 29 1559"

Unfortunately - no sources.

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@Mike Dobson - perhaps it's an US / UK thing, but in the UK I'm only offered a snippet view or to find the print book. Thanks for looking too though!

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Luther's supposed to be mentioned in

https://archive.org/details/historyofstamfor00hunt/page/n1/mode/2up

dunno - I'm at work using phone to internet - can't read book, very tiny LOL

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That is just a history written years later with no sources so cannot be considered reliable.

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Slight digression to explain why Google Books is difficult if you aren't from the USA.

Their copyright policy in USA is basically everything published before 1922 is available in full-text, but for the rest of the world the policy is much more conservative, and the cut-off is about 1880.  So anything published 1880-1922 anyone from rest of the world apart from USA will only see a snippet view.

So usually, like Jo had to do, we have to find the book elsewhere.  Internet Archive books is good, or FamilySearch.  HathiTrust generally follows the same restrictions as Google Books.

I like the The Online Books Page from the University of Pennsylvania and it will specifically note if something is "access from the US only".

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Thanks @John, that's great information, and good to know that there is such a cut-off on Google books.