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Salvador Genealogy and Salvador Family History Information

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About the Salvador surname

In Spain there were many people of the Jewish faith who converted to Catholicism and changed their names to avoid being burnt at the stake by the Inquisition. The Rodrigues family 'converted' and took the family name of Salvador, later feeing to Portugal, then to Amsterdam. In 1654 Cromwell invited them to England to stimulate the economy and they re-settled in London becoming very successful in the British East India Company and marrying well throughout both the English community and the Portuguese - the main player being Joseph Lewis Salvador born 1716 in London and dying in Charleston in 1786.

In the mid 1700's , one of the Rodrigues-Salvador people (Isaac?) went to India to trade for diamonds, fell in love with a Hindu girl and stayed there, creating an alternative family. One (Francis) went to Charleston where they had land, to plant indigo (1773). First he became a politician, then he was scalped whilst fighting the British (1776). Also in India, were a number of people from a prominent British family who had intermarried with the Salvadors.

Our great great grandfather was Robinson Lewis Salvador who was born in India in 1834/5. nothing is known about him other than that he came to Australia, married an Irish girl (1858) and started a large family.

My male cousin and I did dna testing and autosomal dna links us to: Silva, Rodrigues, Ferreira, Pereira, Costa and Nunes all figuring prominently - most with links to the Azores and Canary Islands. (Unfortunately his dna had mutations which do not allow the patrilineal tracing we were after; this being probably due to twins and a cousin marriage.)

We are hoping to find one of these families that has links in India who may be able to connect up the dots between about 1750 and 1834. (My cousin and I have both been designated as having about 8% Indian dna, which would seem to equate to 2 maybe 3 generations in India.)