Heirology

Ancestors

Joan Hurst

1568-1621 · Henlow, England
Born 1568, Henlow, Bedfordshire, England
Died 1621
Father: William Hurst
Mother: Rose Marshe
Children include Elizabeth

Joan Hurst was baptized at Henlow, a village in Bedfordshire, on 13 March 1568. The parish register reads "Joan d Wm HURST." Until 1597 the Henlow clerk named only the father at a baptism. An older sister, also Joan, had been baptized in May 1563 and evidently died young, since the name was given again. Her brother Henry was baptized in 1561 and her sister Agnes in 1565. A brother John was buried in October 1565.

Her father, William Hurst, made his will in June 1570 and was dead by January 1572, when it was proved. Joan was then a small child. Her mother Rose was his executrix. On 4 February 1572 the register records the marriage of "Jn Rushe" and "Rose Hurst, wid." Joan grew up in John Rushe's household at Henlow, with five Rushe half-brothers and half-sisters born between 1574 and 1582. Her mother died in July 1601.

On 18 June 1593 Joan married Thomas Rogers at Henlow. Their daughter Joan Rogers was baptized there on 26 May 1594. Thomas Rogers died before September 1596. His burial is not in the Henlow register. This Thomas Rogers was not the Mayflower passenger of the same name.

On 20 September 1596 the widow married John Tilley at Henlow. The register entry reads "Jn Tylly" and "Joan Rogers." John was a husbandman, the son of Robert Tilley, a Henlow yeoman. They had five children baptized at Henlow: Rose in October 1597, who died young; John in August 1599; a second Rose in February 1602; Robert in November 1604; and Elizabeth on 30 August 1607. From 1597 the register named both parents, and Elizabeth's entry reads "Eliz d Jn & Joan TILLY."

In 1620 Joan and John Tilley sailed on the Mayflower with their youngest child, Elizabeth, then about thirteen. John's brother Edward Tilley and his wife came too. The older children stayed in England. Robert, the younger son, was later a tailor at Bedford, and Joan's daughter Joan Rogers married Edward Hawkins at St Paul's, Bedford, in June 1620.

Joan did not survive the first winter at Plymouth. William Bradford wrote: "John Tillie and his wife both dyed a litle after they came ashore; and their daughter Elizabeth maried with John Howland." Bradford did not record her name. It comes from the Henlow register, where Elizabeth's baptism names her mother. In 1989 the Pilgrim John Howland Society placed a memorial plaque in St Mary's church, Henlow, to "John and Joan Tilley of this parish" and their daughter Elizabeth.

Sources

F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, p. A1.
F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, p. A2.
F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, p. A4.
F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, p. A5.
F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, p. A25.
F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, p. A26.
F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, p. A41.
Find a Grave memorial 16539001, photograph of the plaque in St Mary's church, Henlow.
F. G. Emmison, ed., Bedfordshire Parish Registers, vol. 26: Henlow, Upper Stondon and Astwick (Bedford, 1942), archive.org bedfordshirepari26bedf, pp. A1-A5, A25, A26, A39-A41; William Bradford, History of Plymouth Plantation, ed. William T. Davis (New York, 1908), archive.org bradfords00brad, p. 412; Robert Leigh Ward, "English Ancestry of Seven Mayflower Passengers: Tilley, Sampson and Cooper", The American Genealogist, vol. 52 (1976), pp. 198-208, as quoted on WikiTree; Eugene Cole Zubrinsky, "A Fresh Look at the Parentage of Mayflower Passenger Joan (Hurst) (Rogers) Tilley", The American Genealogist, vol. 85 (2011), pp. 1-8, as quoted on WikiTree (Marshe-3); will of William Hurst, 1570, transcribed on WikiTree Hurst-27; Find a Grave memorial 16539001 (Henlow plaque).

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Cite: Heirology, "Joan Hurst (1568-1621)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/joan-hurst-1568-1621-76f0bf.