Lavender, Duffell , de Verrye mystery possibly solved
(Still not sure where the Percyes fit in)
I was doing one of my periodical, half-hearted searches for any information on the above names a couple of days ago, when, lo and behold, I actually turned up some useful information, which might solve the mystery of where some of these families came from. Goodness knows what I typed this time that was different.
Anyway, to paraphrase Radiohead (in their song
Packt Like Sardines in a Crushd Tin Box), it seems we've been looking in the wrong place - we should have been looking further afield for their origins:
Basically, it seems they were French iron workers.
Although there is an existing English surname Lavender, in this instance, it looks like the name is a corruption of "la Fonderie" ("the foundry"), so may well be an epithet given to Peter/Petri as opposed to his original name. "Duffell" is most likely a corruption of "Duval". "De Verrye", on the other hand, survived the trip to England unscathed. It is likely that Elizabeth de Verrye was the granddaughter of the first de Verrye to come to England, John/Jean de Verrye, since she was born in about 1557 and he in Beaussault, Normandy in either 1487 or 1497 (also, he had a son called John and her father, apparently, was called John).
Still none the wiser re the Percyes. Apparently, the aristocratic Percy family did have holdings in Sussex and may have been involved in the iron industry, but any more is pure speculation at the moment.
Here's the blog entry that put me on this trail:
https://bucksgenes.blogspot.com/search/label/LavenderAnd here's the very useful website I found with information on Sussex iron foundry workers:
http://www.wealdeniron.org.uk (use the "Sites and People Database" link). Both Peter Lavender and John de Verrey (spelt as de Vere) are on it.