Paging all Long Sutton Terrys (Long Sutton, Hampshire UK)

Question

Hey everyone.

So I just learned the year before last, at the age of 49, that I'm a Terry, the son of a long line of Terrys going back to Stephen Terry, who shipped over from England in 1630. His grandfather, also Stephen Terry, lived in Long Sutton, Hampshire, England, which is about midway between Aldershot and Basingstoke if you pull up Google Maps.

So I got some yDNA testing done, and the testing indicates that my haplogroup is R-M173. Which is all well and good, but it doesn't match the vast majority of Terrys, especially the Irish Terrys of Cork and Waterford, who are mostly R-M269. So, evidence seems to indicate either that Stephen Terry was an R-M173, or that he was an R-M269 who had an R-M173 hired hand. Or, lots of other possibilities, but you get the idea.

So I'm hoping to look up some other Long Sutton Terrys so I can compare notes. Please drop me a line if you would.

EDIT: This Terry clan also had members in Crondall, Church Crookham, Dummer, and possibly southern Berkshire, not to mention at least one son who made a fortune in London as a goldsmith. If any of this rings a bell, please contact me.

-Aaron

Comments

It looks like the immigrant ancestor in your lineage who was named Terry  is https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Terry-637

---

Yes, that's the one. He was born in Stockton, Wiltshire, but his father the Reverend John Terry was born in Long Sutton in northern Hampshire, where *his* father (also Stephen Terry) built the Tudor house known as Hydegate.

---

Hey, what an exciting find!  Please keep us updated as your research continues. :))

---

Interestingly, the Reverend John Terry, Rector of Stockton, married Mary White, big sister to the Reverend John White, a fellow Oxford man, Rector of Dorchester, and prime mover behind the Dorchester Company and later the Massachusetts Bay company. Reverend White is sometimes referred to as the "Patriarch of Dorchester." He put together the 'Mary and John' voyage of 1630.

---

Fascinating.  I have a relative who may have come over on the Mary and John voyage of 1630.

Then way, way down in my tree I have a Rosa Bell Sutton (born in 1873) who married Joseph Conant on 19 Feb 1896 in Athens, Ohio.  Haven't even been able to find her parents.  But have pictures of them.

Yep, both Massachusetts Bay Company and Dorchester are very familiar to me.  Actually, since I live on the North Shore of Boston, Dorchester is in my back yard.

Keep telling me more!!

 

 

---

Stephen's brother Josiah  was a 'hat haberdasher' in Dorchester (England) He was a burgess and served as mayor in 1648.
He was elected again as Mayor, post restoration in 1661 .Surprisingly he was  one of only 3, out of 11, members of the corporation to remain in office after the purge in 1662 (to remain a member of the corporation of a town,  he would have had to taken the oaths of allegiance and supremacy repudiate Parliament's 1643 oath and swear that it was always illegal to take up arms against the king)
His wife Margaret however hadn't conformed. She left money to dissenters in her will.
(I'm not a relative, I live locally and am fascinated by the people of the town in the turbulent 17th C.)

---

Fascinating stuff, Helen Ford.

Stephen's father, the Reverend John Terry, died in 1625 when Stephen was 17. When John passed away the family would have had to move... they had been living in the rectory, and the house went with the job. Interestingly, at that time Stephen moved in with his uncle John White. This would have been during the time that Reverend John White was traveling around Dorset and nearby counties to recruit Puritan families to emigrate to the new colony. No doubt Stephen was heavily influenced by his uncle. He certainly got on the boat.

Both Johns (White and Terry) were graduates of New College, Oxford, which was cranking out nonconformist ministers by the cartload at the time. I wish sometimes that I could have been a fly on the wall at some of the lectures they heard.

If you live locally, have you been to Stockton and seen Reverend John's memorial inside the chapel?

---

No, locally is Dorchester (I'm actually at the archives, answering this).If you are interested in a good book about the town in the period, which was of course hugely influenced by John White.  I recommend Fire from Heaven by David Underdown.

---

Hello Helen!

I'm having the time of my life following this thread.  Thanks for the book recommendation and wish you the best in all your research.

---

I have wondered quite a bit about how influential Rev. John Terry's book was... was it just a footnote, or was it widely read? That book would be "The Triall of Truth" (title abridged somewhat). I have a reproduction edition of it, and it's a lengthy exposition of Protestant theology set in contrast to Catholicism. Published about 1600 if I recall.

He wrote two sequels to that, and at least one other book, but I get no sense of how important they were at the time.

---

So I got hold of a copy of the Underdown book and read it, cover to cover. It was illuminating. It helped me to see how the social environment of Dorchester, UK led to the social environment of Boston, Massachusetts, and to the perspective of many of the Congregationalist churches salted across New England. Brilliant stuff... I only wish that Doctor Underdown were still alive for me to pester him relentlessly about it.

Because I'm rather like that sometimes.

---

I went to purchase a copy of the book--absolutely first-tier reviews.  But the price stopped me dead in my tracks.  So I either wait till my piggy bank is fat with nickles or go to the library.  The later, I hope!

---

Oh, I wouldn't pay the Amazon price either. I believe I found my used copy on e-Bay... either that or ABE Books, I forget. But it wasn't bad. Under $20, if I recall.

---

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=m570.l1313&_nkw=Underdown+fire+from+heaven&_sacat=267&LH_TitleDesc=0&_osacat=267&_odkw=Underdown

---

Thanks!  I shall seek and find . . .

---

Any luck finding the Underdown book?

---

Not yet, but will stay in the searching process.

---

I finally got a breakthrough on this.

I was able to connect through Family Tree DNA with a Terry from New Zealand whose immigrant ancestor was a transportee back in the mid-19th century. His yDNA is a match for mine with a genetic distance of 1.

As a practical matter, though, it's highly unlikely that he and I share a common ancestor later than 1630, which is when my immigrant ancestor arrived in the North American colonies. This makes it much more likely that the Long Sutton Terrys were R-M173, like I am, and rules out the possibility that I'm R-M173 because my immigrant ancestor had an R-M173 farmhand.

---

Congratulations on this progress, Aaron!

---

And I got confirmation on the Berkshire Terrys... definitely family.

---

An update:

A big shout-out to Lou Ann Terry of Indiana, who has populated an entire town's worth of relatives I didn't even know existed prior to her work here. They all link back to Simsbury, same as mine, and their most recent common anscestor with me is John Terry Jr. (or rather John Terry III; I have proposed a merger as these two are plainly the same person).

---

Your welcome.  Its nice seeing folks coming together this way.  I will share, my brother Daniel L. and my Uncle Donald Terry has their DNA results on Ancestry.com.  

Hoping to plan a trip to Simsbury in the near future.

L.A.

Answer 1

I wish I had got an answer to this... apparently we Long Sutton Terrys are something of a rare breed.