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The Holland genealogy traces back to ca 1400. For more detailed genealogy 1. Subscribe to Georgia Pioneers 2. Click on Login Menu 3. Click on Genealogy Vault The Holland lineage begins with Sir Thomas de Holande, Earl of Kent and Knight of the Royal Garter, who fought in the wars of France. He was married secretly to Joan Plantagenet, granddaughter of King Edward I. In the absence of Sir Thomas, however, the king married his granddaughter to another knight. When Sir Thomas returned and discovered this marriage, he took the matter to the Pope who was in Avon, France. The Black Plague was ongoing at the time and the Pope was in seclusion. About three years passed before the Pope declared marriage illegal. Sir Thomas and Joan had about six children, the eldest of whom, John Holland, eventually was next in line for the throne of England. (This was after the death of Sir Thomas and Joan had married Edward, the Black Prince and by him had a son, Richard II). Holland's step-brothers of Richard II were very protective of him and unpopular with the Yorkists, who eventually seized control of the throne of England. |
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![]() Several voyages to and from England are recorded for Gabriel. He was a member of the House of Burgess, and one event listed a trip to London to obtain from Parliament a law that would tax tobacco grown by the colonists, however, King Charles I was refusing to convene Parliament. He was in London at the time of the massacre of the colonists by the Powhatan confederation of Indians (less than 500 persons survived). Gabriel was married about 3 times. The first wife did not survive. About 1624, he married a widow woman, Mary Pinke whose husband William Pinke, alias William Jonas, was killed in the massacre and left her a tract of land. His last wife and the mother of his children was Rebecca. ![]() ![]() Richard Holland, a brother of Gabriel, chr. 8/11/1588 Westminster, St. Martin-in-the-Fields, London, came to Virginia in 1620 with Gabriel Holland. Richard was massacred by Indians at Berkeley's Hundred in 1622. The Massacre. The (Indian) Emperor Powhatan was dead; his brother had been displaced by Opencancanough, a powerful, strong-willed Indian. Opencancanough strongly professed his friendship for the English, yet all the while was craftily plotting his strategy to forever drive the invading Europeans from Indian lands. Perhaps the long, drought winter made the idea of an attack propitious. At eight o'clock on the morning of March 12, 1622, Good Friday, the redmen launched their full-scale attack on the peninsula. From Henrico to Hampton Roads (near Richmond to the southern tip of James City Island) the ruthless Indians attacked the poor, white settlers. Some had even arranged to be overnight guests in the settler's households, while others borrowed boats so that the settlers would be cut off from flight by water. Opencancanough's intent was clear - kill all white settlers! Suddenly, without warning, men, women, and children were butchered to death in the fields or at home. Thomas Holland, however, was reported as having been massacred by savages at Capt. Berkeley's plantation, which attack commenced at Falling Creek, some 66 miles from James City. Of more than four thousand settlers who were sent to Virginia during the years 1619 to 1624, less than twelve hundred survived. During the winter of 1622-1623, more than five hundred persons died in an epidemic. Also, vessels arriving from Europe often brought more ill persons than good ones, and periodically introduced new illnesses to the settlements. Chesterfield An Virginia County by Lutz, p. 42 cites: "Chesterfield's recovery from the devastating massacre was slow and it was some years before the area showed any real signs of being more than an outpost on the western fringe of the colony. Henrico and Bermuda Hundred could no longer be called towns and ceased to be a threat to Jamestown's supremacy. Indeed, Henrico in the time of Sir Thomas Smythe's government in 1623-1624 was reported 'quitted' with only a small church and one house remaining... Indian depredations continued in the Chesterfield area in spite of the stern measures taken to punish and eradicate the savages. Four of the men who had escaped death on the College lands and another at Jones Neck were slain by marauding Indians before the first anniversary of the massacre and in 1625 only eighteen homesteaders and three servants were reported in the locality while thirty-six others were seated at Bermuda Hundred. Fortunately, there were some intrepid individuals such as Thomas Baugh, William Harris, Thomas Osborne, Lieutenant Barckley, Thomas Morlett, and Gabriel Holland who refused to be deterred in taking up the abandoned buildings whose laboriously cleared garden plats were an incentive....Morlett and Holland were named burgesses for the area in 1624 by which time a few more hardy individuals had arrived...." |
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