Your correspondent Mr. Thomas Russell Potter inquires whether any descendants of the De Beauvoirs of Guernsey are still existing. The family was, at one time, so numerous in that island that there are few of the gentry who cannot claim a De Beauvoir among their ancestors; but the name itself became extinct there by the death of Osmond de Beauvoir, Esq., in 1810. Some few years later, the last of a branch of the family settled in England died, leaving a very large property, which was inherited by a Mr. Benyon, who assumed the name of De Beauvoir.
The name is also to be found in the Irish baronetcy; a baronet of the name of Brown having married the daughter and heiress of the Rev. Peter de Beauvoir, the widow I believe of an Admiral M‘Dougal, and thereupon taking up his wife's maiden name.
With respect to the pedigree which Mr. Potter quotes, and of which many copies exist in this island, it is without doubt one of the most impudent forgeries in that way ever perpetrated. From internal evidence, it was drawn up at the latter end of the reign of Elizabeth, or at the beginning
of the reign of James I., as the compiler speaks of Roger, Earl of Rutland, as being living. This nobleman succeeded to the title in 1588, and died in 1612. The pedigree ends in the Guernsey line with Henry de Beauvoir; whom we may therefore presume to have been still alive, or but recently deceased; and whose great-grandfather, according to the pedigree, was the first of the name in the island. Allowing three generations to a century, this would throw back the arrival of the first of the De Beauvoirs to some part of the sixteenth century; but we have proof that they were settled here long before that time. In an authentic document, preserved among the records of the island, the extent of the crown revenues drawn up by order of Edward III. in 1331, the names of Pierre and Guillaume de Beauvoir are found. Another Pierre de Beauvoir, apparently the great-grandson of the above-mentioned Pierre, was Bailiff of Guernsey from 1470 to 1480. As for the family of Harryes, no such I believe ever existed in Guernsey; but a gentleman of the name of Peter Henry, belonging to a family of very ancient standing in the island, bought property in Salisbury in the year 1551, where the name seems to have been Anglicised to Harrys or Harris; as the name of his son Andrew, who was a jurat of the Royal Court of Guernsey, appears as often on the records of the island in the one form as in the other. One of Peter Henry's or Harris's daughters was married at Salisbury to a Henry de Beauvoir; and I have no doubt this is the marriage with which the pedigree ends. If I am right, the Harryes' pedigree has no more claim to authenticity than the De Beauvoir. If Mr. Potter wishes for farther information, and will communicate with me, I shall be happy to answer his inquiries as far as I am able.
The pedigree itself, however, suggests two or three Queries which I should like to see answered.
The heading is signed Hamlet Sankye or Saukye. Is anything known of such a person?
The pedigree speaks of Sir Robert de Beauveir of Tarwell, Knt., now living. Was there ever a family of the name of De Beauveir, De Beauvoir, or Beaver, of Tarwell, in Nottinghamshire? And if there was, what arms did they bear?
If there was such a family, was it in any way connected with any of the early proprietors of Belvoir Castle?
Is anything known of a family of the name of Harryes or Harris of Orton, and what were their arms?
Edgar MacCulloch.