John SPENCER

                   Source includes, but is not limited to:
The American Genealogist.
Automated Archives, Inc. Source files
The Spencers of Bedfordshire by Reverend John Holding, M.A.
The International Genealogical Index, LDS Church The AncestralFile, LDS
Church
The Ancestral File of Oliver Cowdrey, Apostle, Church of Jesus Christof
Latter Day Saints.
New England Historical and Genealogical Register.
Genealogical Gleanings in England (1901).
Bedfordshire Parish Registers Series.
Families of Early Hartford by Barbour.
See also;
Ancestral File and the IGI, International Genealogical Index,both
resource systems developed and solely owned by The Church of JesusChrist of
Latter Day Saints.
John was called senior at burial. The recorder in entering theburial of Ann
Spencer, widow, paid her respect by the following tribute:
the good hospitallity keeper; and she did give to the township ofEdworth 11
of her best bease [beasts] to be lett to ii pore folks in the townefor iii s.
a cow & the parson & churchwarden to have the letting of them & the
distributing of the money to the poore & to se the stock meinteinedetch of
them to have iiii d, of the vi s. for ther paynes to se this trulydone
acording to her last will.
Her will, dated 13 June 1560, proved 21 Apr. 1561, calls her Widow,in
Edworth, Beds., and names her son Gerard (aged 17); son Michael, tohave the
chest that was his brother John's; John Spencer, son Michael's childto have
20 pounds;Elizabeth Lymer, to have 4 pounds at marriage; Alice Aystin,to have
a calf; servants; for the mending of London Brygge waye, 10shillings.;
brother Edward's children, to have the 1 pound that her borrowed ofher, and
the barley he gave her sons to his children; Nicholas Merryll and JohnMerryll
his brother, to have the barley their father gave her sons (doesn'tmake sense
by gender but the copy is exact,ed.); and the poor of Edworth, to havethe
gift already mentioned.
Michael Spencer was a witness.
From all this will we gain the impression that our Spencer family atthat
period was of the yeoman class, and somewhat better off than theaverage
village family of the time and place.
Whether they were in origin a younger branch of an older gentryfamily, or a
more humble clan which by industry and good fortune had improved itslot, we
are not in a position to prove the parentage and more remote ancestryof John
Spencer, Sr., by documentary evidence, before claiming any specificconnection
with the other Spencer in England.
From the terms of the Will, it would seem that Anne's brother wasEdward
Merryll or Merrill, and that this was her maiden name. A search ofMerrill
Wills might confirm this conjecture.(JFN)