The following was excerpted from the book The Genealogical and Encyclopedic History of the Wheeler Family in America, compiled by the American College of Genealogy under the direction of Albert Gallatin Wheeler, Jr. (Boston: American College of Genealogy, 1914) in order to show how the name "Wheeler" came into being.

A genealogy, while primarily an account of persons directly or indirectly connceted with a certain family and a recital of their deeds, is, in a secondary sense, a recital of the deeds of those who bear the family name. It is difficult, indeed, to follow a genealogy through its manifold entanglements save by the clues afforded in the use of the family name or names, and it is therefore of primary importance to determine the variants of the original cognomen. The genealogy of the "Wheeler" family would be utterly incomplete, for example, if it did not include also the records of the "Whelere" and "Whaler" families; at the same time it would be incorrect were it to include the "Wheeland" family, which, in spite of the apparent similarity of the first syllable, seems to have sprung from an entirely different source and is the patronymic of an unrelated stock.

The name first appears in history in the eighth century, when one of the Saxon chieftains is recorded as bearing the name "Wielher." As the word shows progressive changes from that date onward, there is no difficulty in tracing the character of that change. Thus, in the great Domesday Book of William the Conqueror, the anme appears as "Weleret," the holder of the name being recorded as a landowner. "Hugh Le Welere" is mentioned on the One Hundred Rolls in 1273 and "Richard le Whelere" on the Close Rolls in 1348. The spelling "Wheeler" does not appear until later, not until a date which precludes its having borne any relation to a trade, such as a wheelright.

Without entering into this question in too much detail, it may be pointed out that three dominate facts stand out from these early historical references. Of these, the significance of the early establishment of the cognomen comes first. No instance, prior to the ninth century, is known of an Anglo-Saxon family bearing on a surname from generation to generation, and there are not more than half-a-dozen in which a surname crops up frequently, every second or third generation. In such cases, these foreshodowed surnames, if such they may be called, are found in families strongly established, holding positions of quasi-chieftainship in their respective localities. When, therefore, the name "Wheler" is traced from the eighth century to the Norman conquest, when it is found to have survived triumphantly the revolutionary overthrow of tenure in that Conquest and to have maintained its individuality until the period of the definite establishment of surnames, there is strong evidence of the solidity and enduring worth of the family that bore so honored a name throughout a period of such storm and stress.

Again, it is a matter of moment to note that in each case these early citations refer to landowners. In Saxon times, in the early period of the Norman Conquest and during feudal conditions, the position of "landholder" implied a great deal more than appears at first sight. Class distinctions were far more rigorous than they are today and the landholder was rarely a worker on his own land, rather an administrator. His land was farmed by villeins and tenants, the former representing the various forms of involuntary or voluntary servitude, the latter including the innumerable graduations from crop lein tenancy to approximate ownership. The more prosperous of this latter class developed into the yeomanry of England. Superior to all these were the landholders, from whom the knights were taken, or, to speak more correctly, who learned to serve in battle in such wise that they more readily fitted themselves for admission into the Order of Knighthood. Not all, however, entered military service, though nearly all sent a quota of armed men to the wars.

The third striking point is the meaning of the name "Wheeler" itself. For this, it is evident, determination must be made from the earliest form on record. How significant is this early appearance has been mentioned, a fact all the more remarkable when it is remembered that surnames do not appear in general use until the eleventh and twelfth centuries. This early spelling "Wielher" is evidently a compound of two Anglo-Saxon words "wel" or "weil" meaninf "prosperous" or "fortunate," from which derivation the modern word "weal" and "wealth" may be traced; and the Anglo-Saxon word "hari" or "heri" a warrior, a root traceable in the modern word "hero." The present spelling of the family name "Wheeler," therefore, is a spelling of words which in their modern form would be "weal-hero" or in the Anglo-Saxon words "wel-hari." The meaning of the family name, therefore, is clearly "the luck warrior" or "the prosperous hero."

It may not be amiss to point out how utterly erroneous etymologically would be the attempt to trace the word "Wheeler" back to the combination of "Wheel" and "er." In the first place, at the time that surnames were being definitely determined, the name of the family was not spelled "Wheeler." In the second place, the wheelright was not a distinct occupation as was the "Smith" and the "Carpenter," and the wheelright and his ilk gave rise to the family name "Wright." Again, the very formation of the word "wheel" as an object made rather than as the name of a trade presupposes a different form of suffix from that which has been cited. To weave is a trade and in consequence there is the name "Weaver," but a web is an accomplished product and consequently there is no "Weber" from this source. ("Weber" is derived in far other fashion.); but the name ""Webster""is the outcome of ""web.""Even when trade and product are the same word this distinction can be noted, thus to "brew" will lead to the name "Brewer," while a "brew" in the origin of the name "Brewster." Consequently, while such a name as "Whelster" might perhaps indicate an origin referring to the trade of a wheelwright, it is highly improbable that any variants of the "Wheeler" name can have derived from this source.

In Colonial records alone the variations in spelling the old "Wel-hari" name are as follows; "Weler" and "Weeler"; "Wheler," Whelir" and "Whelor"; "Whaler" (which has nothing ot do with whaling) and "Whalor"; "Wheelr" (probably a misspelling), "Wheelar", and "Wheeler", "Whealer" and "Whealor"; "Wheller," and "Wheter" (which is probably a misspelling). It is notorious that great laxity of spelling presisted in colonial days in America, largely because pioneer life bred a disregard of fine distinctions of verbage and because the occasions for writing the name were infrequent as compared with the present day. Bearers of any of the above names, however, may be reasonable sure of tracing back their ancestry to a Teutonic origin, and may rightfully think of their forebears as having been men and women of a rugged warlike race, fortunate upon the battlefield and prosperous upon their home estates, whose principal characteristics in those semi-barbaric times was that of solid worth. To this, the elapsing centuries have added honor and renown in many fields, and in America it is doubtful if any family can show a loftier standard or a more untarnished shield than can that one whose members scattered throughout every state in the union, bear the name of "Wheeler."

Francis Rolt-Wheeler

THE WHEELER FAMILY IN AMERICA

In America, prior to the year 1650, it may confidently be affirmed that no other one surname was borne by as many families as the name Wheeler. Numerous families bearing that name were domiciled in Mass., Conn., New York, Penn., Maryland, and Virginia. In the New England colony Savage says that in the year 1640 there were in Concord alone thirty-five families bearing the name, and Hudson says that there were more families of that name in town than any other.

That this large number of families could not all be related to each other is evident, although in some cases relationship is certified to by wills, and the degree of relationship between any fixed number of them is problematical. While the interlocking relationship could be more established by a search in England, it is by no means certain that all the links in the chain could be secured as many parish registers there were not kept at a period which would include the years when these entries must necessarily have been made. Such research, moreover, is definitely outside the scope of this work, in which the labor has been confined entirely to Wheeler families after their settlement in America.

The principle reasons for emigration of the Wheelers from England naturally closely paralled the causes which led to almost all the emigration at that period. Chief among these reasons was the infamous Act of 1593 which said "all persons above sixteen years of age, who obstinately refuse to attend divine worship at some established church should be comitted to prison, without bail, until they conform and make public confession of conformity, in terms prescribed by the statute itself." "This atrocious state," said Edward Everett, "in its final result peopled New England."

Hopes that relief from iniquities of this Act would be realized upon the acession to the throne of James in 1603 were grievously dashed when James himself sais, "no bishop, no King: I will make them conform themselves; or I will harry them out of the land, or else do more …" The direct evidence that this religious persecution was the leading cause for the emigration is shown in a letter of Dr. Samuel Collins, Vicar of Braintree, Essex, written to Dr. Duck under date of Jan. 18, 1632, after Bishop Laud threatened to employ the arm of the High Commissioner against him for not forcing the parishioners to conform. "It is no easy matter to reduce a numberous congregation into order …" he said, and added that "if he had suddenly fallen upon the strict practice of conformity he had undone himself and broken the town in pieces. Upon the first notice of alteration many were resolving to go to New England." He further explains that by this "moderate and slow proceedings" he has "made stay of some."

Charles I ascended the throne in 1625 and the following nine years were troublous ones for England. The struggle with the Crown for the maintenance of the constitutional rights of Englishmen and the conflict between the liberty of the people and the royal perogative, in addition to a religious movement became part of the great political strife which resulted in Civil War and culminated in the death of the King. In 1627 many people of large means refused on constitutional grounds to pay the "Ship Money tax," or forced loan of Charles I, because it was not levied with the consent of Parliment.

As early as 1629, Charles I had summoned and proprouged four Parliments because each had dared demand redress against the King’s illegal acts – redress against the extortion of gifts and forced loans; against the arbitrary commitment to prison and the degradation of the judiciary. Charles resolved to govern without Parliament. For eleven years no Parliament sat at Westminster. For eleven years the King taxed his people without representation, and confined in the Tower those who questioned his right. The people of England rose in one mighty protest against such tyranny, They found their leaders in Elliott and Pym and Hampden. Political and constitutional liberty was dead, escept as it lived in the hearts and memories of the Englishmen, who could not forget Runemede and Magna Carta. All of these things resulted in a steady stream of emigration of Separatists and Puritans who sought toleration in Holland, and especially in America, recognizing the "special hand of Providence in raising this plantation." Green says that "between the sailing of Winthrop’s expedition (1629) and the asemblyof the Long Parliament (1640), in the space of ten or eleven years, two hundred emigrant ships had crossed the Atlantic, and twenty thousand Englishmen had found refuge in the West."

Individuals of the name Wheeler appear in Mass., Maryland, Virginia, Conn., and Pennsylvania as early as 1629 in some places, and in considerable numbers during the next five years in all others except Pennsylvania. The Concord settlers came from Odell, Bedfordshire, twelve families according to Walcott embarking at London May 9, 1635, in the ship "Susan and Ellen" under the leadership of Rev. Peter Bulkeley, and later with the Rev. John Jones in the ship Defiance, landing Oct. 3, 1635 …

A.G. Wheeler, Jr.

While it is certain the religious persecution in England was the main reason for the wave of emigrants to New England, that was not entirely true for the emigrants to Virginia as you will see.