Mary Wentworth

Not the same as Mary Brewster, "Mayflower" Passenger

John Hunt proposed that she married William Brewster. This theory was refuted the next year. Currently it is not thought that she was the wife of William Brewster.

"The maiden name of William Brewster's wife has not been proven. The claim it was Mary Wentworth rests solely on the fact that Mary Wentworth happened to live somewhat close to William Brewster in Scrooby, Nottingham That is very shaky evidence to say the least. Further, it has been proposed that William Brewster may have married Mary Wyrall, but the evidence is just as flimsy for that marriage.There are no fewer than seven marriages from 1590-1610 that have been located in parish registers showing a William Brewster marrying a Mary. All, however, have been satisfactorily eliminated as probable candidates for the William and Mary (Brewster) who came on the Mayflower. So at present, there is no evidence to document who William Brewster's wife Mary actually was."[citation needed]

Thomas Wentworth, father of Mary, had been bailiff of Scrowbie Manor immediately prior to William Brewster, Sr. (father of the immigrant). This led one historian to suggest Thomas's daughter, Mary Wentworth, as spouse of William Brewster, immigrant.

GEDCOM Note

Pilgrim Elder William Brewster married by 1593 Mary _____, and she & two of their sons accompanied him on the MAYFLOWER. She died at Plymouth 17 April 1627. They had 6 children: Jonathan, Patience Prence, Fear Allerton, Love, a child buried at St. Pancras in Leiden, & Wrestling. The quest for the identity of Mary, the wife of William Brewster, has attracted the attention of many genealogists, but as yet without a definitive result. For some time she had been thought to be Mary Wentworth, daughter of Thomas Wentworth of Scrooby, and in 1965 John G. Hunt presented his case in favor of this identity, but this claim was rejected by Rubincam and others, and Hunt himself has now given up this position. He has, however, published a pamphlet claiming that she was a certain Mary Wyrrall, based on the appearance in a will of a bequest to "Mary Butho," which Hunt took to be a variant of Brewster resulting from a speech defect in the person dictating the will [John G. Hunt, Of Mary Brewster: The Identity of Mary, Wife of Elder William BREWSTER of the Mayflower Voyage of 1620 from Plymouth, England, to New Plymouth, New England. Eugene A. Stratton reviewed this volume negatively in 1985, to which Hunt responded with a supplement to his pamphlet. The maiden surname of Mary, wife of Elder Brewster, remains unknown. (Hunt has published other articles on various aspects of William Brewster's life which, as with all of Hunt's work, need to be used with caution: "Master Williamson of the Mayflower;" "The Mother of Elder William Brewster of the Mayflower;" "Mary Stubbe - A Connection of Elder William Brewster?") A number of other children have been proposed for William Brewster. Jacobus in 1936 disposed of the claimed connections between William Brewster of Plymouth and Francis Brewster of New Haven and his son Nathaniel. Mary Walton Ferris proposes a son Edward. Source: Anderson's Pilgrim Migration.

Origins

“The Wentworth genealogy, comprising the origin of the name, the family in England, and a particular account of Elder William Wentworth, the emigrant, and of his descendants” (1870). Page 12. < Archive.Org >

Thomas was of Scoreby, in Yorkshire, and married Grace, daughter of John Gascoigne, Esq., of Lasingcroft, in Yorkshire, by whom he had an only son, Thomas, and three daughters, Mary, Grace, and Elizabeth.