THOMAS RIX, BRANCASTER, ENGLAND

The Family of Thomas Rix
of Brancaster, Norfolk County, England

By Susan M. Rix Sinclair Green Grady,
Alexandria, Virginia
March 17, 2001

    On September 29, 2000, my husband, Dr. A. Dane Bowen, and I visited the small village of Brancaster, Norfolk County, England, where the Rix family originates. Northeast of London, it faces a western arm of the North Sea called "The Wash" or "The German Sea" in memory of the Saxon invasions of England in the 5th Century A.D. Directly across from Brancaster on the western side of "The Wash" is Boston, England. Just southwest of Brancaster is King's Lynn or Lynn, England. On the eastern side of Norfolk County, facing the North Sea, is Great Yarmouth. These place names were brought to Massachusetts. The towns with these names in Massachusetts were settled between 1630 and 1640 during "The Great Migration" by Puritans from Norfolk County and Suffolk County, England.

    Our ancestor, Thomas Rix, a barber surgeon, was born in Brancaster in 1622. He went from Brancaster to London, England and from there he went to Salem Seaport, Massachusetts Bay Colony, in 1649. He was a member of the First Church [Congregational Church] of Salem. According to the town records of Salem, he participated actively in the civic life of Salem, but then something happened to him. He became indebted to the town of Salem (I have been unable to discover how or why this occurred.) and had to sell his house and shop. He moved with his son James Rix, who was a shipwright, to Preston, Connecticut. Preston is in eastern Connecticut just east of Norwich (Norwich, England is the county seat of Norfolk County, England). Thomas Rix died October 31, 1718, in Preston. The Rix family is buried in the Rixtown Cemetery in Griswold, which is near Preston. In September 1998 my parents, husband, and I visited the cemetery. There are three graves together of Thomas, James and James' son, Thomas. The only legible tombstone is that of James' son Thomas, who died in 1771.

    Much of the information we have about the Rix family comes from a book History and Genealogy of the Rix Family of America by Guy S. Rix of Concord, New Hampshire. It was published in New York City by the Grafton Press in 1906. This book is available in the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.  In 1868 a Mrs. H.L.M. Fry of Washington, D.C. visited Brancaster. She gave Mr. Rix much false information about the Rix family in Brancaster. As a result of our visit, I have proven the following information she gave to be false:

1. She states that there was a Rix family castle in Brancaster. There never was one. A Roman fort, Branodunum, was built there around 250 A.D. Its soldiers came from Dalmatia in Yugoslavia. The stones were carried away in the 19th century to build a malthouse in the nearby town of Brancaster-Staithe. This large structure existed from 1797 to 1878. Barley was wetted with water and put on the floor of the malthouse. The water softened the barley which caused it to germinate. This germinated barley was called malt. It was used to brew beer and distill whiskey. The site of the fort is on the eastern edge of Brancaster near the sea on public land. You can walk in to look at the fields where it stood. There is a historical marker telling about the fort.

2. She states that in the Church of St. Mary the Virgin in Brancaster there are panels, on the walls and on the floor, that show the Rix family name and coat of arms. There are no such panels in that church. The present church was built in the 14th century A.D. Its tower was built in the 15th century A.D.

3. The Rix family was supposed to have lived on two estates: Canninghall (Kenninghall) and Offord (Orford). These two places are not near Brancaster and have nothing to do with the Rix family. Kenninghall is in the southeastern part of Norfolk County between Bury St. Edmunds and Norwich. Orford is in Suffolk County. It faces the North Sea and is just north of Ipswich. There is no old castle or estate in Kenninghall, but there is a castle in Orford. Today there is a massive castle keep and three towers that form a polygon of eighteen sides. The keep was built by King Henry II in 1165 to 1166. He was the father of King Richard I (Richard Lionheart) and King John.

4. There was an Earl of Orford who lived at Houghton Hall northwest of Fakenham, which is just southwest of Brancaster. The Earldom of Orford was not created until the 17th century (the 1600's A.D.) according to officials at Westminster Abbey in London, England. The first Earl of Orford was    Sir Robert Walpole, a famous British politician who was born in 1676 and died in 1745.  He was Prime Minister of England from 1721 to 1742. His son, Horace Walpole, was the fourth Earl of Orford. A writer, he invented the Gothic novel. He was born in 1717 and died in 1797. He never married.

 

    Mrs. Fry also states that our ancestor, Sir John Rix, Earl of Offord, was beheaded on the orders of King Henry VIII in 1536 because he was a friend of the parents of Anne Boleyn, King Henry's second wife. King Henry had Anne executed because she did not give him a son who lived. Her son died shortly after being born. Her daughter, Elizabeth, became Queen Elizabeth I of England. In those days there was the law of primogeniture saying that the eldest son inherited everything from his parents. It was felt that only the son of a king could succeed him on the throne, so a king had to have a male heir to succeed him so there would be no civil unrest in the country.

     I wrote to Westminster Abbey in London, England concerning the Rix family and King Henry VIII. They consulted books about King Henry VIII and there was no mention in them about the Rix family. I looked in the book Anne Boleyn by Eric W. Ives published in 1986 by Basil Blackwell, N.Y., N.Y. It is a biography. On a genealogy chart in the front of the book it is shown that the father of Anne Boleyn, Thomas Boleyn, Earl of Ormonde and Wiltshire, died a natural death in 1539. Therefore, he was not executed. A member of the Rix family wrote to the College of Arms in London, England. They keep track of and issue coats of arms for noble families. Their representative said that the Rix family was never a member of the English nobility. Another member of the Rix family telephoned the Tower of London in London and asked if a person named Rix had been executed there. He was told that no one named Rix was executed there. I believe that the story stating that our ancestor, Sir John Rix, and Thomas Boleyn were executed is false.

     The persons who work at Westminster Abbey also informed me that they consulted the standard register of the Knights of England and there is no Sir John Rix listed.  I consulted the book Armorial Families, by Charles Fox-Davies, Vol. 2, published in 1970, by Charles E. Tuttle Company, Rutland, Vermont. It states that there was a Henry William Rix of The Grove, Thorpe Hamlet, Norwich, England. Norwich is the county seat of Norfolk County.  Brancaster is located in Norfolk County, England. He had a son, Reginald George Bertram Rix, Gentleman, born 1883 who lived at Pembroke Crescent, Hove, Sussex County, England. The rank of gentleman was one rank below the rank of nobility in the English class system. This Rix family is extinct. I believe that John Rix could be the great-great grandfather of Thomas Rix as it is shown in Mr. Guy S. Rix's book, even though John Rix was not a member of the nobility.

     Brancaster is a very small, picturesque village of old stone houses. A Romano-British Cemetery in the area has graves of Christians from the 4th to 5th centuries A.D.  It is near the Church of St. Mary the Virgin. Its population in 1999 was 935. There is an inn, a small grocery store and a post office, but no public library. During the time of King Henry VIII (King of England 1509-1547) Frenchmen and Scotsmen came in boats and raided Brancaster. In the 17th century Spanish marauders came by sea from the Netherlands (It was then part of Spain.) and raided Brancaster.  In order to avoid paying the English government taxes (customs duties) on imported items, people smuggled these items (brought them in by sea illegally). This smuggling continued in the Brancaster area up until the 1860s. Brancaster is mostly a farming community. Wheat, barley, oats, and root crops like potatoes and turnips are grown. Some fishing is done. Large boats used to go in the summer and fish off the coast of Iceland. The village of Brancaster exported wheat, barley, malt, wool from sheep and salted fish. The village imported fir, pine and oak planks, iron, pottery, wine, figs, raisins, spices, olive oil, soap, leather, and furs.

Sincerely,

Susan M. Rix Sinclair Green Grady
Alexandria, Virginia

Copyright © 2001 by Susan M. Rix Sinclair Green Grady,
all rights reserved.
Used by permission.

For your permission to use, contact the author, via email, through
Donald Milton Ricks

Thomas Rix, of Salem, Massachusetts, 1650 (excerpt added for further information)

Source: Ricks, The Descendants of Jonas Ricks and Other Ricks Families in America, (Dexter, MI: Thomas-Shore Inc., 1998, 52.

1. Thomas1 Rix. The Records of the First Church in Salem, Massachusetts, 1629-1736, contains
several references to the Thomas Rix family, beginning 14 February 1650. Thereafter, his son James
Rix appears in church records until 1703. In the following material, the record date is the approximate
date of birth: 1

Children of Thomas1 Rix and -?- :
2 i. Remember2 Rix, 29 August 1650.
3 ii. Sarah Rix, 29 August [?].
4 iii. Hester Rix, 5 May 1653.
5 iv. Thomas Rix, 26 June 1654.
+ 6 v. James Rix, 18 August 1657.

6. James2 Rix (Thomas1) was born about 18 August 1657 and evidently moved from the Salem
area after 8 June 1703:2 "then also the brethren of the church consented that our brother James Rix
and his wife should have letters of dismission and recommendation."

Children of James2 Rix and (possibly) Janet -?- Rix:3
+ 7 i. James3 Rix, 1685.
8 ii. Sara Rix [of Janet Rixe?], 1688.
9 iii. Thomas Rix, February 1693.
10 iv. Lydia Rix, 8 March 1696.
11 v. Mary Ricks, April 1699.
12 vi. Elizabeth Rix, 31 August 1701.
Children of George Rix and ---:
1. i. Theophilus Rix, 20 June 1665.

The record mentions another Rix child but does not provide a clue to her parents: "On Sacrament day [7 September 1689],
Samuel Phipeny, Sarah Horn, [and] Margaret Rix received to full Communion."4

The naming pattern for this family closely resembles that of other Ricks families of Surry, Prince George
and Isle of Wight Counties, Virginia.

End of this genealogy.
footnotes:
1. Richard D. Pierce, ed., The Records of the First Church in Salem, Massachusetts 1629-1736, (Salem, Mass.: Essex Institute), 1974, 23-25.
2. Ibid., p. 194.
3. Pierce, The Records of the First Church in Salem, Massachusetts 1629-1736, pp. 37-46.
4. Pierce, The Records of the First Church in Salem, Massachusetts 1629-1736, p. 170.

1