Pioneers of St. Clair County, Michigan - Person Sheet
Pioneers of St. Clair County, Michigan - Person Sheet
NameMary WYRALL 
Birthabt 1569, Loversall, Yorkshire, England2772, p 3; date only,2650
Death17 Apr 1627, Plymouth, Plymouth, Massachusetts2619, p 389,2643,2859, p 7 Age: 58
FlagsEarliest Immigrant, Mayflower Passenger
FatherThomas WYRALL (~1540-)
MotherFrances MALLORY (~1545-)
Individual Notes
• Genealogist John G. Hunt noted the clues pointing to Mary Wentworth, but later concluded that they were not convincing. In unpublished research which he generously shared with this writer, he suggests that William [Brewster] may have married Mary Wyrrall (sometimes spelled Worrall), daughter of another prominent local family. (Her pedigree, incidentally, also goes back to King Edward I.) Mr. Hunt cites the registered will dated 1600 of Sampson Mallorie (or Mallory), who left bequests to a nephew Edmund Worrall, and to two married nieces Elizabeth Savell and Marie Butho. The original will no longer exists but was copied long ago into the York register, with the likelihood of errors that copying always entails. (York Registry, vol. 28, fo. 207, 208; available in microfilm reproduced by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.) Mr. Hunt suggests that Marie Worrall Butho was actually Mary Worrall Brewster. He believes that the copyist was writing from dictation, and that the person dictating distorted the name either because of carelessness or a speech defect. Mr. Hunt notes that he has not found the name “Butho” in any Yorkshire indices of the period, and that the will contains several other obvious errors (Morrall for Worrall in one instance; the phrase “I, the said Francis Mallorie” midway through the text of the will of Sampson Mallorie). Mr. Hunt adds that Mary Worrall (or Wyrrall) had an older half brother, Gervis, who was a first cousin of Mary Wentworth.2868, p 86
• In a booklet, published in 1984, John G. Hunt presents convincing evidence that William Brewster married Mary Wyrall of Loversall (near Doncaster) England; daughter of Thomas Wyrall and Frances Mallory. The gentle ancestry of Mary is then examined and developed. In 1970, the same author presented an extensive article in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register developing convincing evidence as to the identity and ancestry of the mother of Elder William.2615, p Title1
• A privately published pamphlet by John G. Hunt, “Of Mary Brewster, Wife of William Brewster of the Mayflower, from Plymouth, England to New Plymouth, New England” (1985), suggests that William Brewster’s wife was named Mary Wyrall of Loversall, near Doncaster. This has yet to be proved.2616, p 5
• Did Mary [Wentworth] marry William Brewster? Some historians think so. Without marriage and birth dates, however, it cannot be proved.2869
• No record has been found to authenticate the surname of his wife, Mary.2772, p 2
• Nearly everything about Mary Brewster can only be inferred. She shared her husband’s growing interest in religion; she shared his ability to adjust to radical changes. Her health was apparently good for many years; she lived through the dreadful first winter at Plymouth, and she survived the births of at least six children at a time when many women died in childbirth. She managed when William was in prison or hunted by the authorities. She must have been a capable, well-loved mother.2868
• William Brewster of the Mayflower had a wife named Mary. There is no evidence she is Mary Wentworth or Mary Wyrrall, both which have been claimed as his wife, and both of which have royal ancestry.2709, p 1
• Her surname and parentage have not yet been proven.2616, p 1
• In a booklet, published in 1984, John G. Hunt presents convincing evidence that William Brewster married Mary Wyrall of Loversall (near Doncaster) England; daughter of Thomas Wyrall and Frances Mallory. The gentle ancestry of Mary is then examined and developed. In 1970, the same author presented an extensive article in the New England Historical and Genealogical Register developing convincing evidence as to the identity and ancestry of the mother of Elder William.2615, p Title1
• A privately published pamphlet by John G. Hunt, “Of Mary Brewster, Wife of William Brewster of the Mayflower, from Plymouth, England to New Plymouth, New England” (1985), suggests that William Brewster’s wife was named Mary Wyrall of Loversall, near Doncaster. This has yet to be proved.2616, p 5
• Did Mary [Wentworth] marry William Brewster? Some historians think so. Without marriage and birth dates, however, it cannot be proved.2869
• No record has been found to authenticate the surname of his wife, Mary.2772, p 2
• Nearly everything about Mary Brewster can only be inferred. She shared her husband’s growing interest in religion; she shared his ability to adjust to radical changes. Her health was apparently good for many years; she lived through the dreadful first winter at Plymouth, and she survived the births of at least six children at a time when many women died in childbirth. She managed when William was in prison or hunted by the authorities. She must have been a capable, well-loved mother.2868
• William Brewster of the Mayflower had a wife named Mary. There is no evidence she is Mary Wentworth or Mary Wyrrall, both which have been claimed as his wife, and both of which have royal ancestry.2709, p 1
• Her surname and parentage have not yet been proven.2616, p 1
Spouses
1Elder William BREWSTER 
, MCS-04
, MCS-04Birthabt 1567, Doncaster, Yorkshire, England2643,2867, p 218,2616, p 1
Death10 Apr 1644, Plymouth, Plymouth, Massachusetts2619, p 387; year only,2643,2859, p 7 Age: 77
EducationCambridge University2618, p 3
FlagsMayflower Compact Signer, Mayflower Passenger
FatherWilliam BREWSTER (~1535-1590)
MotherMary SMYTHE (~1545->1566)
Individual Notes
• Elder William Brewster...was born during the last half of the year 1566 or the first half of 1567. The date of his birth is determined by an affidavit made at Leyden, June 25, 1609, in which he, his wife Mary and son Jonathan declare their ages to be respectively 42, 40 and 16 years (N. E. Register, xviii, 18-20). The place of his birth is not known, but is supposed to have been Scrooby in Nottinghamshire, England.2618, p 3
• That he drafted the Compact of November 21, 1620, in the cabin of the Mayflower seems almost certain. That he was the moral, religious and spiritual leader of the Colony during its first years of peril and struggle and its chief civil adviser and trusted guide until the time of his death is quite certain. But for his ecclesiastical position he would have been Governor of the Colony.2618, p 49
• BREWSTER, WILLIAM - For all that we know about him, there is much more that we do not know; for example, we do not know the dates of his birth and death. Various accounts differ showing birthdates in 1559, 1560, 1563, 1564, or 1566-67, and death dates ca. 18 April 1643, or ca. 16 April 1644. Dexter, The True Date of the Birth and Death of Elder Brewster, NEHGR 18:18, gives good reasons for believing he was born in 1566 or 1567, and that he died in April 1644. John G. Hunt, "The Mother of Elder William Brewster of the Mayflower," NEHGR 124:250, makes a good case that his parents were William and Mary (Smythe) (Simkinson) Brewster of Scrooby, Nottinghamshire. He entered Peterhouse, Cambridge University, on 3 December 1580, but apparently did not graduate. He became an assistant to William Davison, one of Queen Elizabeth's Secretaries of State, and he went to Holland with Davison in 1585 on a diplomatic mission. When Davison was imprisoned by Queen Elizabeth as a scapegoat for the execution of Mary Queen of Scots, Brewster returned to Scrooby and subsequently was appointed to his father's old post there as postmaster, holding that position until 1607. He was imprisoned as the result of the betrayal of a ship's master when he was leading a group of Separatists fleeing England for Holland. On being released, he went to Holland, where he became ruling elder of the separatist church, supporting himself and his family by running a printing business (Lucy Hall Greenlaw, Early Generations of the Brewster Family, NEHGR 53:109; Bradford (Ford) 2:342-50).
William Brewster arrived at Plymouth on the 1620 Mayflower accompanied by his wife Mary and their sons Love and Wrestling. He continued as ruling elder of the Plymouth Church until he died. Bradford summed up his work: “He would labour with his hands in the fields as long as he was able; yet when the church had no other minister, he taught twise every Saboth, and both powerfully and profitably, to the great contentment of the hearers, and their comfortable edification. He did more in this behalfe in a year, then many that have their hundreds a year doe in all the lives.... He had a singular good gift in prayer, both publick and private, in ripping up the hart and conscience before God in Christ for the pardon of same” (Bradford [Ford] 2:348-50). His inventory (MD 3:15) shows a private library of hundreds of books, mostly religious, but displaying a considerabe breadth of interest for a man of his times.
His children were Jonathan, Patience (who married Thomas Prence), Fear (who married Isaac Allerton), Love, Wrestling, and a child that died in Leiden. Wrestling, Patience, and Fear predeceased him, the two daughters having had children, and Wrestling dying without issue. An excellent short account of Brewster's life is given in Dawes-Gates 2:143-56, and, in a footnote on p. 151, documented information in included to support the good possibility that Brewster had had some interest in the Virginia settlement, and that he might have been the father of the Capt. Edward Brewster who was a resident of that settlement and who returned to England in 1618. A contemporary, Nathaniel Brewster of Brookhaven, Long Island, in spite of claims to the contrary, has been shown most likely not to have been related to Elder Brewster's family (Donald Lines Jacobus, The Family of Rev. Nathaniel Brewster, TAG 12:199). The most comprehensive family history to date is Emma C. Jones, The Brewster Genealogy, 2 vols. (1908), which is good, but with some errors. A fully documented account of Brewster's first five generations is being prepared for the General Society of Mayflower Descendants by its Historian General, Barbara Lambert Merrick.2694
• That he drafted the Compact of November 21, 1620, in the cabin of the Mayflower seems almost certain. That he was the moral, religious and spiritual leader of the Colony during its first years of peril and struggle and its chief civil adviser and trusted guide until the time of his death is quite certain. But for his ecclesiastical position he would have been Governor of the Colony.2618, p 49
• BREWSTER, WILLIAM - For all that we know about him, there is much more that we do not know; for example, we do not know the dates of his birth and death. Various accounts differ showing birthdates in 1559, 1560, 1563, 1564, or 1566-67, and death dates ca. 18 April 1643, or ca. 16 April 1644. Dexter, The True Date of the Birth and Death of Elder Brewster, NEHGR 18:18, gives good reasons for believing he was born in 1566 or 1567, and that he died in April 1644. John G. Hunt, "The Mother of Elder William Brewster of the Mayflower," NEHGR 124:250, makes a good case that his parents were William and Mary (Smythe) (Simkinson) Brewster of Scrooby, Nottinghamshire. He entered Peterhouse, Cambridge University, on 3 December 1580, but apparently did not graduate. He became an assistant to William Davison, one of Queen Elizabeth's Secretaries of State, and he went to Holland with Davison in 1585 on a diplomatic mission. When Davison was imprisoned by Queen Elizabeth as a scapegoat for the execution of Mary Queen of Scots, Brewster returned to Scrooby and subsequently was appointed to his father's old post there as postmaster, holding that position until 1607. He was imprisoned as the result of the betrayal of a ship's master when he was leading a group of Separatists fleeing England for Holland. On being released, he went to Holland, where he became ruling elder of the separatist church, supporting himself and his family by running a printing business (Lucy Hall Greenlaw, Early Generations of the Brewster Family, NEHGR 53:109; Bradford (Ford) 2:342-50).
William Brewster arrived at Plymouth on the 1620 Mayflower accompanied by his wife Mary and their sons Love and Wrestling. He continued as ruling elder of the Plymouth Church until he died. Bradford summed up his work: “He would labour with his hands in the fields as long as he was able; yet when the church had no other minister, he taught twise every Saboth, and both powerfully and profitably, to the great contentment of the hearers, and their comfortable edification. He did more in this behalfe in a year, then many that have their hundreds a year doe in all the lives.... He had a singular good gift in prayer, both publick and private, in ripping up the hart and conscience before God in Christ for the pardon of same” (Bradford [Ford] 2:348-50). His inventory (MD 3:15) shows a private library of hundreds of books, mostly religious, but displaying a considerabe breadth of interest for a man of his times.
His children were Jonathan, Patience (who married Thomas Prence), Fear (who married Isaac Allerton), Love, Wrestling, and a child that died in Leiden. Wrestling, Patience, and Fear predeceased him, the two daughters having had children, and Wrestling dying without issue. An excellent short account of Brewster's life is given in Dawes-Gates 2:143-56, and, in a footnote on p. 151, documented information in included to support the good possibility that Brewster had had some interest in the Virginia settlement, and that he might have been the father of the Capt. Edward Brewster who was a resident of that settlement and who returned to England in 1618. A contemporary, Nathaniel Brewster of Brookhaven, Long Island, in spite of claims to the contrary, has been shown most likely not to have been related to Elder Brewster's family (Donald Lines Jacobus, The Family of Rev. Nathaniel Brewster, TAG 12:199). The most comprehensive family history to date is Emma C. Jones, The Brewster Genealogy, 2 vols. (1908), which is good, but with some errors. A fully documented account of Brewster's first five generations is being prepared for the General Society of Mayflower Descendants by its Historian General, Barbara Lambert Merrick.2694
Marriageabt 1590, England2447, p 96,2615, p 1
Family Notes
• mr William Brewster. Mary, his wife, with .2. sons, whose names were Love, & Wrasling. and a boy was put to him called Richard More; and another of his brothers the rest of his childeren were left behind & came over afterwards.2687, p 9