Family Ties Part 13: The Codd Family

For obvious reasons, it always helps when looking for your ancestors if you come across unusual names in your Family Tree. It’s much easier tracing back the line of a family with an unusual name than it is for tracing back those family names we nearly all come across in our trees, such as Smith, Davies, Williams and Jones!

In the summer of 2008, about six months after I had become seriously obsessed with family history, I was looking into my great, great, great grandparents William and Mary Davies. They were the parents of my great, great grandmother Ellen Morgans, nee Davies, whom I wrote about in my column outlining my Pembrokeshire roots. After weeks of looking into the Morgan(s) and Davies families, I was relieved to discover that Mary’s maiden name had been Raymond, an unusual name in my tree!

I soon discovered that Mary’s parents were Thomas and Elizabeth Raymond and went through the usual searches of looking for Census Records and a marriage record for them. That is when I discovered that Elizabeth’s maiden name before marriage had been Codd and my quest for the Codd family began!

Origins of the Codd Family

There seems to be quite a lot of speculation on the internet by descendents of the Codd family, who are many and are found in Wales, England, Ireland, the USA, Canada and Australia, as to where the family originally came from. I have read a few theories but the two most popular seem to be:

The Codds were Normans, and fought with Richard de Clare, the Earl of Pembroke, known as Strongbow, as part of his army. After the Irish King of Leinster, Dermot Macmurrough, was forced to flee from Dublin and his kingdom by an alliance of Irish enemies in 1166, he invited Strongbow and his army to invade Ireland and help him reclaim his lands. Shiploads of combined Norman, Welsh and Flemish mercenaries landed in County Wexford between 1167 and the early 1170’s. This combined force, along with Dermot’s Irish supporters, eventually led to Dermot successfully reclaiming his lands and even expanding his territory. As a token of his gratitude, he gave land to the Earls who had fought on his side. Some of the Welsh Normans settled in Ireland.
The Welsh Normans are known by some historians as Cambro Normans, Normans settled or born in Wales, to distinguish them from the English Normans. It was the Cambro Normans who fought in Ireland with Strongbow.
The Codds are descendants of six Swedish brothers, all millers, who left their homeland and settled in the St. Brides Bay area of Pembrokeshire in the 14th century. They settled in South Pembrokeshire and built mills in the area. Some people have pointed out that this theory does not work, as:

Scandinavians, to this day, do not have hereditary surnames.

It is highly unlikely in a time when the survival rate for children was quite low, that six sons would have survived and then left their family and homeland together, at the same time.

My Codd Ancestors

My great x4 grandmother Elizabeth Codd was born in Nolton, Pembrokeshire in 1793. She was the daughter of William and Elenor Codd, nee Saise. Elizabeth was baptised on October 6th 1793, so, taking into account the fact that in those days, babies were usually baptised within  days or, at most, a couple of weeks of their birth, I would guess that Elizabeth was born sometime during the last weeks of September or the first week in October, in 1793.

Elizabeth was the youngest of six children, as far as I know. Her mother Elenor had given birth to two boys and four girls between 1773, when Elizabeth’s eldest sibling, a brother named Tobias, was born and 1793, the year of Elizabeth’s birth. Out of the six children, five reached adulthood, living into their seventies. One sibling, also named Elizabeth, was born in 1785 and died as a young child in 1788. The other siblings were Mary, born in 1776, Jennet, born in 1780 and William, born in 1787. All six children were born in the village of Nolton, in Pembrokeshire.

Elizabeth married my great x4 grandfather Thomas Raymond in Nolton on 24th March 1815. They had nine children, including my great x3 grandmother Mary Davies, nee Raymond. Elizabeth died in Nolton in 1869.

Elizabeth’s parents, William and Elenor, were married in Nolton on the tenth of January 1773, at the ages of about twenty five and twenty two.

I have not found any record of William’s occupation.

I have found a direct line back to my tenth great grandfather, David Codd born in Pembrokeshire in 1590. I have not verified this line personally. I found it on the tree of a distant cousin of mine, whom I contacted in my search for the Codd family. This cousin had research done by the staff at the Records Office in Haverfordwest. They traced her Codd line in Pembrokeshire and drew up a Codd Family Tree. This is the tree that goes back to David Codd, born in 1590 and who died in 1626. I have verified my Codd line as far back as my great x7 grandfather Tobias Codd, born in Roch in 1670 and his first wife Mary. Tobias was the great grandson of David. When Tobias died in 1735 at his farm called Folkeston, in Roch, he left a will. On the advice of my cousin, I found the will at the National Library of Wales.

Tobias was a farmer. By the time of his death in 1735, he was a widower. His first wife, my great x7 grandmother Mary, had died back in 1708. He apparently remarried a woman named Martha, to whom he bequeathed an annual sum of six pounds, for the rest of her natural life. We have not found a record for the marriage between Tobias and Martha. All of Tobias’ children, sons Evan, David, Thomas and John and daughter Mary, were from his marriage to his first wife Mary. His will lists the cash bequests he made to his children, including the one he left to his son Thomas, my great x6 grandfather. Thomas and Tobias were the father and grandfather of my x5 great grandfather, William, father of Elizabeth Raymond, nee Codd. The will also lists the assets of Tobias’ estate, including farm animals and crops.

Another interesting collection of documents held at the National Library of Wales is the Crime and Punishment section. When I searched for anyone with the surname Codd, from Pembrokeshire in this section, I had some interesting results. Seven names, all with the Codd surname, appeared as a result of my search and two of them seem to be from my line of Codds, judging by the names, dates and locations.

The first was Evan Codd, possibly the eldest son of Tobias Codd of Folkeston, Roch. He was accused of breaking into a house on the 20th December 1750, by breaking a window and carrying away a door! He was found guilty and fined 6d!

The second item appearing to involve someone from my side of the Codd line dealt with the more serious charge of murder. Thomas Codd, who is described as being a blacksmith and Yeoman from Nolton, was accused of the murder of a thirteen year old servant girl, named Lettice Woolcock, in Roch on the 1st June 1789. Apparently, Lettice’s employer, Thomas Nicholas, had broken his leg the previous year and had to have his leg amputated. To help pay for the surgery, he had organised a shoot. It states in the court papers that “the girl crossed the prisoner’s path whilst he fired the gun”. Thomas was found not guilty and released. I do not know for sure if the Thomas Codd mentioned is related to me but both were farmers from Nolton, around the same time. The Thomas Codd from my line was the son of my great x5 grandfather, William Codd, and brother of my great x4 grandmother, Elizabeth. Thomas was born in 1744 and died in 1807.

About three years ago, I bought a CD of the Pembrokeshire Hearth Tax of 1670. The Hearth Tax was introduced in England and Wales in 1662, to generate an income for the monarch of that time, King Charles II, to help pay for the running of the Royal Household. The tax was a shilling per hearth or stove in all dwellings, twice a year, on Michaelmas, 29th September and on Lady Day, 25th March, each year.

When the tax was first introduced in 1662, there were no exemptions. Changes were made to the tax so that it was paid by the occupiers and that the poor did not have to pay. A large percentage of the population were exempt from paying the tax as they were too poor, but from 1663, the names of the poor were included on the list, even though they didn’t have to pay, which is very helpful when researching your family history. In general, the more hearths you had, the richer you were perceived, as that meant more rooms in your home.

On checking the data on the disc, the first villages I checked for residents named Codd were Nolton and Roch, but there were none in those places. Evidently, my Codd line moved to Roch when Tobias Codd took over the lease for Folkeston Farm in Roch, in 1701. There was an entry in Rudbaxton, for a David Codd, who was liable to pay the tax for one hearth. Tobias was born in Rudbaxton in 1670, and from the information I was given by my distant cousin, Tobias’ father is named as David on her family tree.

Altogether, there were eleven individuals with the surname Codd listed on the Pembrokeshire Hearth Tax, ten men and one woman named Elenor Codd. Elenor lived in the Rosecrowther Parish. She was listed as a pauper with one hearth. As a pauper, she was exempt from the tax. The variations of the Codd name in the list include Codd, Cod and Codde.

The Hearth Tax was unpopular because it often meant that an official had to enter the home to inspect the property, to check on the number of hearths. In 1689, William and Mary became the reigning monarchs. The English parliament repealed the Hearth Tax and the new monarchs agreed, declaring it to be “not only a great oppression to the poorer sort, but a badge of slavery upon the whole people, exposing every man’s house to be entered into, and searched at pleasure, by persons unknown to him”.

The earliest mention I have found of anyone named Codd or any similar name, such as Coade, Cod etc, during my research into Pembrokeshire Records is the burial of a Harry Codd, buried in Steynton in Pembrokeshire, on 12th January 1647. This entry is in the Steynton Parish Records and is transcribed on the Family Search website. I do not know whether or not this person is related to me in any way, as so far I have not found any one named Harry on my side of the Codd line.

Two of my Codd ancestors add another bit to the history of the Codd line. Another Tobias Codd, born in about 1839 at Marloes, Pembrokeshire, was a Master Mariner who drowned at sea on 9th January 1880. He was the Master of the vessel Fanny, which belonged to A D Payne, of Cardiff. Tobias was the great grandson of William and Elenor Codd, my great x5 grandparents, through their son Tobias born in 1773 and Tobias’ son William, born in 1808 and the great nephew of my great x4 grandmother Elizabeth Codd.

Another Codd ancestor, Reuben Codd, was the last warden on Skomer Island. The current farmhouse was built about 1840 and was lived in by various tenants and owners of the Island. The Island was bought by Lord Kensington in 1897.  He used it as part of his sporting estate. A trawler owner from Cardiff, Mr J J Neale, leased the Island in 1905 with the aim of protecting the wildlife, but he had to relinquish the lease later. It was then bought by a well-off dentist, a Mr Sturt, who stayed on the Island with his family, and whose daughter married Reuben Codd. The Codds farmed the Island until the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939. The Island became a Field Study Centre and visitors stayed in the house and were supported by Reuben Codd and his family, who returned to the island in the 1940’s. The Codds finally left the island completely in the 1950’s.

Reuben had a brother Abel Edward Codd. Reuben and Abel were the great x2 grandsons of Tobias Codd, the brother of my great x4 grandmother Elizabeth Raymond, nee Codd. Abel Edward Codd wrote a book called The Midas Touch. It was a story about his life and mentioned the story of the six Swedish brothers leaving Sweden and setting up mills in South Pembrokeshire. One of the six mills is still standing today; Slate Mill Lodge is on the main road between Haverfordwest and Dale in Pembrokeshire.

Abel emigrated to British Columbia in Canada at the age of about 26, in the 1920’s.

It has been said that many myths and stories have their basis in a bit of truth that gets distorted over time and ends up being different to the original story, but still containing a hint of what is true. Maybe that is what has happened with the myths surrounding the Codd name, as Scandinavians (including Norsemen or Vikings) and Normans share the same DNA making it impossible to differentiate between Viking DNA and Norman DNA. There have been some DNA studies and Genetic projects focused on the Codd name and some of its variants, such as Coad, Cod and Coade, concentrating on the male Codd line, but so far as I can tell, the results have been inconclusive.

The general opinion seems to be that the name Codd came over with the Normans at the time of William the Conqueror and spread out from England when the Norman earls and knights settled and intermarried in Pembrokeshire with the daughters of Welsh nobility from different parts of Wales and the Norman soldiers married local Pembrokeshire girls. As to their origins before the Norman Conquest, that remains a mystery yet to be solved.