Dear Madam,
I am emailing you as I have looked at your Cary website on the internet. I am a member of the Museum Committee here in Castle Cary in Somerset. As you will not be surprised to learn we frequently receive requests from people searching their Cary ancestors. Many of them take their line back to Adam de Kari as he is recorded in many books as being the Lord of Castle Cary in Somerset.
However we have never been able to find any evidence that this is so and I note that you do mention the uncertainly of this connection. Now recently we have undertaken a detailed search of all the known sources and we can say that he was in fact based in a Castle Cary in the Tamar Valley in Devon and that the connection to Castle Cary in Somerset is an error based on a manuscript written in 1630. Unfortunately this error has then been repeated in some of the subsequent publications.
Further the records show that the lords of the manor here were the families of Perceval/Lovel, St Maur, Zouches and Willoughbys. No Cary has ever been the lord of the manor here. If you would like a more detailed explanation of all this please feel free to ask and I will happily email it to you,
Yours sincerely
Chris Hicks
For Castle Cary Museum
Chris Hicks* Bookbinder
Tor View, Cary Hill
Castle Cary
Somerset BA7 7HL
01963 359019
chrishicksbookbinder@btinternet.com
www.book-binder.co.uk
Dear Lisa,
Many thanks for your reply. To enlarge on the information in my last email I am attaching a two page summary of the research carried out recently in an attempt to resolve the confusion over this man. So far as a credit is concerned in this respect I am Vice Chairman of the Committee at the Castle Cary Museum in Somerset,
Yours
Chris
Chris Hicks* Bookbinder
Tor View, Cary Hill
Castle Cary
Somerset BA7 7HL
01963 359019
Adam de Kari: Was he the Lord of Castle Cary?
This is frequently asked when people are researching
their family history and are able to take their line
back to this man. This
paper tries to answer that question.
The name of the river that rises in Castle Cary and
flows out onto the Somerset Levels is Celtic in origin
and simply means ‘pleasant stream’ although some
authorities also suggest it means a rocky place by a
stream. It therefore predates the Saxons who were
here before the Norman invasion.
Cary as a family name is also fairly common but the
earliest occurrence of it in the Castle Cary records is
in 1588 when the baptism of an Edward Cary is recorded
in the parish register. Then over the years many
people with this name have lived in the town but there
is nothing to suggest that this is more than a simple
coincidence. Various families with the name Cary
have come and gone, none of them having any connection
to the Manor. That someone moving away could then have
been called ‘of Cary’- is certainly likely but as there
are other places which include the word Cary in their
name both in this area and elsewhere it would be
impossible to draw more than very general conclusions
from this.
The Lords of Castle Cary in Somerset
The names of the lords of Castle Cary are recorded in
The Domesday Book and other documentary sources.[1] The first owner
of what can be called the manor of Cary in Somerset was
a Saxon thegn named Elsi or Alfsi. He was displaced by
William the Conqueror after the Norman invasion and the
lands given to Walter of Douai.
When his male line moved elsewhere the lordship
was given to Robert Perceval de Breherval. He was
succeeded by his son Ascelin Gouell de Perceval who
acquired the nickname ‘Lupus’ and this became the
surname of the family changing to Lovel. During the next
few centuries, mainly by descent and marriage, the
estate passed successively through the hands of the
Lovels, the St Maurs (Seymour) the Zouches and the
Willoughbys. Eventually Edward, Duke of Somerset
purchased it and then in 1684 it was sold again and the
estate broken up. Later
the Lordship of the Manor was purchased by the Hoare
family of Stourhead in Wiltshire.
No person with
the name Cary has ever been lord of the manor in the
town.
Adam de Kari first appears in the “Heralds Visitation of
Devon of 1620” there being no mention of him in earlier
visitations.[2]
A much later
visitation then states that Adam was lord of Castle Cary
in 1198. Although useful the visitations must be treated
with some caution as the information was often supplied
by the families in question so it is unclear how
reliable this might be. The then head of the family was
Sir William Cary and in referring to Adam de Kari he was
going back up to twelve generations and four hundred
years. Concerning Castle Cary the pedigree explicitly
places it in Devon thus; “Sir John Cary…had landes in three sundrie shires, Devon, Dorset and
Somerset…at Hoke in Dorset, at Castle Cary in Devon.”
However this warning has been clearly been missed or
ignored by later writers and several books published on
the Cary family continue to state that Adam de Kari was
the Lord of Castle Cary in Somerset in 1198. In some
books later generations are listed as born in Castle
Cary Somerset whilst in others the family is immediately
removed back to a place in Devon with the same name.[5]
There are now also at least a dozen family
history pages online which perpetuate the story and
simply quote extracts from these books.
It is now clear that the Cary family was based in Devon
and no evidence of any connection with Castle Cary in
Somerset has been found. They held lands in two areas.
Firstly in Torbay, the Manor of Cockington which they
held from 1374 until 1654 and also Torre Abbey. In St
Marychurch there is a nineteenth century
pseudo-mediaeval house built by a branch of the family
and called Cary Castle.
This similarity of name has caused additional
confusion with the assumption that Cary Castle and
Castle Cary are one and the same thing
Conclusion
The list of the lords of Castle Cary in Somerset shows
that the Perceval/Lovel family were the lords here from
before 1120 until 1330. The family of Adam de Kari was
firmly located in Devon and any suggestion that he was
the Lord of Castle Cary in Somerset in 1198 is
unsustainable.
[1]
Victoria
County History of Somerset, Vol X Castle Cary
and the
Brue-Cary Watershed, ed Mary Siraut,
2010,
Hershon, Cyril P.
The
Castles of Cary, Pavalas Press Bristol, 1990
[2]
St.George, Sir Henry & Lennard, Sampson.
The Visitation of the County of Devon in 1620, ed F T Colby,
Harleian Society, 1872
[3]
Westcote, Thomas.
A View of
Devonshire in 1630 with
a pedigree of most of its gentry, ed
G Oliver & P Jones, Exeter,1845
[4] cf;
Pole, Sir William.
Collections towards a description of the County
of Devon, 1701.
Izacke, Richard.
An
Alphabetical Register of divers persons…of the
county of Devon, 1736
[5] cf;
Cary, Henry Grosvenor.
The Cary
Family in England, Boston, 1906
[6] Gerard,
Thomas.
Particular Description of the County of Somerset
1633, ed E H Bates, Somerset Record Soc,
1900
Harrison, Fairfax.
The Devon
Carys, New York, 1920
Ellis, Arthur Charles.
An Historical Survey of Torquay, Exeter,
1930