Matt
Had a much more thorough look at the various resources today, and I have found another bit of evidence which links John Fearon to Matthias Fearon.
This comes through Matthias Fearon's wife Marie Huet.
She was baptised on April 19 1691, at The Threadneedle Street French Huguenot Church in London. Her parents were Jean Huet and his wife Susanne Chalon, who came to England as refugees probably around 1689, joining the church officialy the next year on 11 May 1690. They were originally from Château Queli, in Brie, just outside Paris and they had following children in total:
Elizabeth Susanne Huet 1689
Marie Huet 1691
Marie Jeanne Huet 1693
Abraham Huet 1694
Jean Huet 1696
Suzanne Huet 1699
Catherine Huet 1701
Abraham Huet 1703
Their second son Jean Huet, Marie's younger brother, was admitted into the French Hospital in 1777 aged 81, and died there two years on, and it is from his petition the details on their origins in France come, but also, importantly the sponser who applied for him to be put in the hospital at that time, and presumably his next of kin, was none other than one Jean/John Fearon!
If John was as we suspect a son of Matthias Fearon and Marie Huet, it would of course make him this Jean Huet's nephew. Acting as his next of kin suggests a close relationship.
As for Matthias Fearon himself I am beggining to suspect, that rather then connecting him to Jacob Feron of Lintot, which none of the evidence really can support, he may instead have come here via Holland.
Alot of the Huguenot refugees went first to there circa 1680-88, and then only later moved on again to England approx 1699-1712. There are a variety of different reasons behind this, which I wont go into great detail on, but suffice to say, a few reasons make me think this is so for your branch of Fearons.
Firstly several of the godparents of Matthias Fearon and Marie Huets children in London that I've looked at clearly come via this route.
Secondly, John Fearon's own wife Marie Ann Quantin/Quentin's family came via this route. She was born around 1710 in London, as was her younger sister Suzanne around 1713, but their older sister Catherine was born around 1705 in Holland, so the family came to England some time between 1705-1710. They were originally from Vendeuil in Picardy in the border region with the Nertherlands, and fled there to Haarlem.
Finally, when Matthias Fearon and his wife took their baby son Abraham, to be baptised on 29 Nov 1719 at La Patente, Spitalfields, the only other couple on the register that day, coincidently. were my own 6xg grandparents Antoine and Judith Deverdun, baptising their baby daughter Judith. Both babies had been born on the same day 16 Nov, a fortnight previous. This makes me think they may have actually gone to the church together, and a relationship existed between the families. My Deverduns were certainly also from the same Picardy border regions, and also fled first to Haarlem, Holland, in the 1680's, before moving on again to England around 1702.
So no hard proof of this, you'd need to examine the Dutch Huguenot registers, but the circumstances I say appear to point in this direction, Matthias Fearon being initially part of the Huguenot refuge in Holland, he certainly has several overlapping links with that community in London, and neither does he appear to have been baptised here in England.
Food for thought!
Regards
Richard
