Weaver is a relatively common surname, and like many surnames that are derived from occupations (Smiths, Bakers, Fletchers etc) it can be found throughout the country, in Europe, as Weber or Wewer, and further afield. I can trace my forebears back eight generations to Weavers living in Herefordshire and the Welsh border in the mid seventeenth century [Family Tree 1].
Past members of my family have claimed descent to as far back as the reign of King Edward III (1327-1377) when Joanne de Bohun married Walter Weaver [Family Tree 2]. The link between Richard Weaver (1575-1642) M.P. for Hereford five times between 1620 and 1640, and Richard Weaver (1701-1771) and his second wife Mary Griffiths (b. 1708), who produced Thomas Weaver (1743-1822), the father of the painter, Thomas Weaver (1775-1844) [Family Tree 3] remains unsubstantiated, despite the efforts of whoever drew up Family Tree 2 in the nineteenth century.
For upwardly mobile Victorians to belong to an ‘ancient family’ – one that could trace its ancestry back to ‘ancient times’ – particularly to titled and landed forbears, and to sport a coat of arms, could only augment social status and the advantages that might bring. For twenty-first century families, ‘ancestry’ is all about discovering ‘where we have come from’ and seeking long-lost cousins. I suppose I belong to that later group.
The family trees displayed here are a heterogeneous collection of genealogies that have hitherto lain rolled-up in cardboard tubes and dusty boxes, or been compiled and inscribed for publications, public display, private record or family amusement. This webpage offers an opportunity to bring them all together and preserve them in this accessible digital repository for easy viewing.