Zib - as noted in my recent email I have decided to copy and paste what I wrote in that email so everyone can hopefully get a better idea of my thinking on this problem. I have also just looked at your recent post regarding the explanations by Christopher Harvey but, at least to me, they don't really help to explain anything at all ...... except maybe that some guesswork has gone into the marriage details for Francis Harvey!
So herewith the copy of the text of my recent email having received and viewed the 'Pedigree of Harvey of Maen in Cornwall':-
To me it just does not stack up at all.
1. Francis Harvey supposedly married at Phillack (I now see ‘about’) 1595 yet no marriage can be found in the Phillack Parish Register.
2. Francis supposedly had children Thomas (of Sennen), Anne, Elizabeth, Deborah (all mentioned in Will of Thomas in 1664), 2 children died in infancy (presumably Titus and Timothy bp. Breage 1599 and 1600) and son John (mentioned in Will of brother Thomas as deceased by 1665)
3. There is no mention of a daughter Mary whose baptism to ‘Mr Francis Harvey’ in 1592 is clearly written in the Phillack Parish Register.
4. If we include Mary that makes (I think) 8 children in about 14 years – certainly acceptable.
5. Francis died and was buried 1606/7 so ALL children must have been born by that time unless we allow the possibility of a posthumous child who would have to have been born in 1607.
6. Both Thomas and John Harvey appear in the 1641 Protestation Returns at Sennen which means that both had to have been born no later than 1623.
7. John Harvey was deceased by 20th December 1664 when brother Thomas wrote his Will naming John’s daughter Elizabeth.
8. With just the one child, Elizabeth, named for John it would suggest either she was the eldest child of a family of daughters or that she was an only child else a surviving son would surely have been mentioned.
9. By the time of his death Thomas appears to have had just two children (or at least just two suriving children) – daughter Joan and son John who is undoubtedly the John Harvey of Meane buried at Sennen in 1710.
I suspect this last John (most likely husband of Catherine and father of Katherine (m. Henry Penberthy 1705) and Christopher (m. Honour Roberts 1706)) was probably married in the mid to late 1660s or very early 1670s. Because daughter Katherine’s last child was baptized in 1715 she almost certainly had to have been born no earlier than 1667 else she would have been over age 48 when that child was born.
If we accept this to be a reasonable assumption then John son of Thomas Harvey was probably born sometime in the 1640s or, perhaps, late 1630s.
Now, returning to the Protestation Returns, we know Thomas and brother John Harvey must have been born no later than 1623 else they could not have signed those returns given the eligible age was 18. If they were, as suggested, sons of Francis Harvey of Breage then they had to have been born before 1606.
Although a few pages are more than a little ragged the Breage baptisms register is quite good right through the period up to the burial of Francis Harvey yet just two baptisms can be found – Timothy in 1599 and Titus in 1600. I have not found any Harvey (sic.) at Breage during this period so are Timothy and Titus the two supposedly deceased children mentioned in the Harvey documents?
Thomas and brother John are the main focus here so if they were born/baptized at Breage then why is there no record?
If Francis Harvey was the Vicar of Breage and he died there in 1606 then it is logical to expect that he would be servicing his Parish and therefore any further children might be baptized there and so recorded.
If Francis had a duel living incorporating Phillack then I could accept he might spend time in that Parish and perhaps baptize children there but again the records for that particular period are quite good and yet I can only find the 1592 baptism of daughter Mary??
I should also point out that a Bennett Harvye baptized three children at Phillack in 1572, 1579 and 1583 and in 1560 a William Harvey baptized a daughter in that Parish.
If Thomas and John Harvey were sons of Francis then they had to have been born prior to 1607 and the current evidence suggests that, if this were so, they must have been baptized in a Parish for which Registers are no longer extant or are now illegible. It also suggests the likelihood that said sons may have been born before 1600 in which case they would almost certainly have been at least in their 40s when married.
And if we are to believe that Thomas and John were indeed sons of Francis then, by virtue of their being mentioned in the 1664/5 Will of Thomas Harvey, Ann, Elizabeth and Deborah Harvey must also have been born prior to 1607.
And if we believe Ann, Elizabeth and Deborah Harvey were daughters of Francis then it follows they must have all been spinsters and almost certainly all in their 60s by the time brother Thomas wrote his Will!! (Thomas mentioned sister ‘Ann Harvye’ suggesting she was unmarried and bequeathed her ‘one ewe’. He later mentioned ‘sisters Debora and Elizabeth’ to each of whom he also bequeathed ‘one ewe’ although it is ambiguous as to whether or not they were married.)
Two final comments:-
1. If Thomas and John Harvey (along with known sisters Ann, Debora and Elizabeth) are connected to Francis Harvey of Breage then it makes much more sense that there is a generation missing and that they would be grandchildren rather than children.
2. With so many Harveys in the area of St Buryan (7 adult males signed the 1641 St Buryan Protestation Return) prior to 1641 and with
no actual evidence that I have seen that links Francis Harvey to the Land’s End area I cannot accept that Thomas Harvey and his siblings might be connected to Francis Harvey who was supposedly born in 1562 possibly in Devon, Somerset, Suffolk or Essex.
I also find it a little strange that the names Anthony and Francis make no appearance in the family or descendants of Francis Harvey!
CT