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Tracing the First name Catalina back and the Spanish Connection

 

I have known for some time that Jonathan Catlow's mother Grace Pickford was the daughter John Pickford and Catalina Brewster. Confusingly, accounts referred to Catalina as of Elston. However the marriage took place on 8th May 1692 at Bromley, and Catalina was baptised there on 23rd April 1673.

Her parents were Edward Brewster, an apothecary and citizen of London, and Dorothy Neesham. They married on the 24th May 1654 at St Martin's Ludgate in London. Catalina was the youngest of 9 children, 2 had died before she was born. See Brewster Page for more information.

Dorothy Neesham was daughter of Rev Thomas Neesham, Rector of Stoke D'Abernon in Surrey and his wife Catalina. For more on the Neeshams see here. Now my interest was really piqued. Catalina was apparently a foreign name - where did it come from? With some difficulty, I located a record in an index to parish records at St Martin's Vintry in London. This was between Omas Neesham and Catiline Johnson. To find the image - these were in poor condition I had to browse through these page by page, putting the images into Photoshop to enhance them. I found the record for a marriage in November 1628 between T_omas Nesham and Catiline Johnsō. The latter clearly represented Johnson. Now for some time I tried to find a baptism or other records for a Catalina Johnson, without any success. Eventually I tried Googling and found a will of a Roger Cole in a copy of Genealogical Gleanings  where he left legacies to his daughter Catalina Johnson. This will can be seen here. Now further Googling found an Genealogical Gleanings a pedigree based on the Visitations of Surrey 1623 - see the Cole Page - where Roger Cole's parents are William Cole of Sudbury in Suffolk and Catalina de Gallegos of Spain. Catalina was daughter of Ferdinando de Gallegos of Spanish Nobility. (This naming of her father was not present on the Harleian Society transcription of the Visitation, bu does appear on some early pedigrees)

I have also located the will of John Johnson, written and proved in 1627 (see here) which gives John's family, he was of Chart next Sutton Valence in Kent, and indicated that Catalina was with child at the time of writing of the will. (This was Stehen Johnson shwn from his grandfather's will)

Now earlier researchers have attempted to link this to the family that later became the Marquises of Gallego. The book Nobiliario de los Reinos y Señorios de España - volume V contains a section entitled Reseña Histórica De Los Marqueses De Gallegos En Estremadura.

This volume commences with Alonso Lopez de Tejeda who was grandmaster of Santiago at the time of King Don Pedro of Castile (ruled 1350 to 1369), and traces the family. There are few dates so the references to Kings are the best way to follow a time-line. 

I started to translate this but with partial translation, it was clear that there was no direct link from the family in this document.

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