Many family genealogists have assumed that Walter Daux was French, based on nothing more than the fact that the name “sounds French”. The truth is that the name could be either English or French. But whatever the origin of the name, the evidence tells us that Walter Daux himself was English.
In old English an “x” in the middle or the end of a word was pronounced “ks”. Thus to an English-speaking clerk Dawkes and Daux were pronounced identically. Thus it’s not surprising that we find that in early records of Charles City County the spellings Dawkes, Daukes, and Daux(e) were used interchangeably. We find the same phenomenon in English parish registers of the 1500s and 1600s. In more distant times Dauxe (alder tree) was a French surname while Dawkes or Daukes (a diminutive form of David, the same root as Dawkins) was English. But in England both spellings were used interchangeably. Thus Walter Daux’s immediate ancestors could have been either English or French. Walter Daux himself was undeniably English. The given name Walter, his father’s residence in London, and the circumstance of how and where he appears in Virginia, convincingly argue that Walter Daux was an Englishman.
Indeed, virtually all immigrants to Virginia in the early and mid 1600s were English men and women. Although there are records of the occasional foreigner, they are rare. Under English law, foreign-born residents dealt with a number of restrictions that made settlement in the Colonies unattractive. Foreigners immigrating into Virginia could not buy or sell land, hold office, vote, or exercise any other political rights. The Navigation Act even prevented foreigners from enjoying the occupation of merchant.
Foreigners needed to be naturalized to acquire the rights of citizenship. Before 1680 all naturalizations in Virginia required an Act of Virginia’s General Assembly.1 Those legislative naturalizations, which contain precious few names, are preserved and contain neither Witt nor Daux. After 1680 the process was greatly simplified, and most of its records are now lost, but in the timeframe in which Walter Daux lived in Virginia we can safely conclude that he was English born or had been naturalized in England.
It should also be remembered that during the 1600s the spelling of one’s name was shockingly casual and imprecise. For instance, the surviving signatures of William Shakespeare never spell his name the same way twice. And Sir Walter Raleigh spelled his own name more than a dozen different ways — but, oddly, never as “Raleigh”. Thus Dauks, Dawkes, Daux and variations may be the same name. That becomes clear when we examine the records, as below.
John Dauxe, gentleman, came to Jamestown in 1608 in the Second Supply of settlers. A Mary Dauks (also Dawks) arrived on the Warwick in 1621 and was listed among the dead after the 1622 massacre. A widow named Joan Dawkes and a Thomas Dauks also appear in Jamestown records. Henry Dawkes obtained from the Virginia Company a Bill of Adventure in 1608, indicating that he planed to emigrate to the colony.2 In 1632 his son William Dawkes of Charles City County received a patent for 200 acres in Charles City County, of which 100 acres was due as heir of his father Henry Dawkes for his personal adventure3 and another 100 acres for Henry Dawke’s 1608 bill of adventure.4 His name is spelled William Dauxe in at least one record.5 William Dawkes leased another 50 acres adjoining a few months later.6 These 250 acres were located in what became Henrico County, about two miles west of the eventual border between Henrico and Charles City counties, very close to where we find Walter Daux a few years later.
A Walter Daukes was one of 39 persons claimed as headrights by William Perry in 1633, for which his son Henry Perry patented 2,000 acres in Charles City County in 1637.7 Perry’s patent was located a few miles down the James River from the William Dawkes patent. Almost thirty years later in 1664 a patent for land adjoining Henry Perry claimed a “Walt. Daux” as one of ten headrights. Whether this was the same Walter Daux or not isn’t clear.
Given the proximity of these patents, it seems possible that Walter Daux was a relative of William Dawkes. (The difference in spelling might be simply a matter of a different generation of clerks recording the name.) Interestingly, a John Rogers, perhaps related to the John Rogers whose daughter married John Witt II, purchased land in 1664 adjoining the land of Walter Daux.
Owing to the near total destruction of early Charles City County records, we have no other records of Walter Daux during his lifetime. However, we can identify his wife and his two children from postmortem records. And we can identify his father as Richard Daux of London.
Walter Daux was perhaps born sometime in the 1620s or early 1630s, as he married a woman named Mary and had two daughters in the early or mid 1650s. Charles City County court records tell us that Mary, whose maiden name is unknown, had first married Robert Plaine by whom she had a son named John Plaine. She was widowed and then married Walter Daux and had two daughters named Ann and Susanna Daux before being widowed a second time. She then married for a third time to John Flower(s) Jr., the son of a wealthy ship’s captain who had evidently inherited the part of his father’s estate that lay in Charles City County.
This final marriage took place before 24 May 1658 when John Flowers made deeds of gift to the children of his wife “Mary the relict of Walter Daux” spelling out the above relationships quite clearly.8 One child was John Plaine “the son of the sd Mary by her former husband Robert Plaine decd.” The other children were Ann and “Susan” Daux. Several days later, on 3 June 1658, John Flower was granted administration of the estate of Walter Daux “having married the relict of sd. Daux.” Fleet’s abstract of the deed of gift indicates that Robert Plaine had owned land at his death which fell to the son John Plaine, and indeed John Flower claimed that land in 1668, the son John Plaine having died by then.9 Walter Daux had evidently owned land as well, or lived on the Plaine property, as there are three records for John Flower regarding a shipment of two hogsheads of tobacco by Walter Daux to his father Richard Daux of London. (Fleet, p156 and p209, both references in 1658, and p243 in 1661.)) There is also a reference to the land of Walter Daux as late as 1664 when Edward Hill sold land adjacent Walter Daux.
There is at this point a gap in the Charles City County court records. Only a fragmentary book for 1672-3 and an order book for 1677-79 are preserved. It appears that John Flower died in the interim, as there is no further record of him. The two Daux children evidently married about 1673. Richard Rawlins14, who married Susannah Daux, and John Witt, who married Ann Daux, petitioned the court on 3 October 1673.15 The substance of the petition is not recorded, and the court records stop at that point, but from later records it is clear they were attempting to recover the estate of Walter Daux due to their wives. (The wives may have still been minors at the time, not eligible to receive the estate until their marriages.) The petition must not have been satisfied, for a year later, on 1 October 1674, John Witt and “Susannah” Rawlins were suing the commissioners of Charles City County in the colonial court. (Richard Rawlins had apparently died in the intervening year.) The case was deferred and, on 3 March 1674/5, the case of “Jno. Witt and Richard Rawlins who marryed the two orpts. of Walter Daux, dec’d” was deferred again.16 The case is not mentioned again, and was apparently not resolved. Three years later, on 14 February 1677/8 when the court records resume, John Witt and John Turberfield17 (who had married Susannah Rawlins) are found suing a justice of Charles City County for the value of the estate of Walter Daux. The suit claimed that “the estate was appraised and divided between the two Daux sisters. The court did not demand security of Flowers and he has wasted the estate. The plts. having married the sd. orphans now demand recompense by the court…The plts. ask the court to have the deft. pay Daux’s daughters according to the inventory as recorded.”18 The husbands were evidently suing the justices who were sitting in 1658, whom they claimed should be liable for the estate’s value.19 The court ordered the payment, but one of the justices at the time appealed the judgment.20 William Randolph (remember him?) was security for the plaintiffs. Unfortunately, there is no further mention of the case.
I might point out here that the orphans themselves apparently did not initiate any suits. That suggests they may not have been of age – most Virginia women in the 1670s had married by the age of 17, and the mean age at marriage was 18. Further, the timing suggests they had recently married.21 The first record of the suit is in September 1673 by Richard Rawlins alone, joined by John Witt a month later. Both John Flowers and his wife Mary apparently died before 1672. Neither is mentioned after the court records resume in 1672, and presumably Flowers was not available to be sued in 1673.
A hogshead of tobacco in those days was nearly 1,000 pounds, worth about $25-$30 depending on quality.26 One person could cultivate about three or four acres of tobacco yielding perhaps 1,500 pounds. Two hogsheads probably represented the annual production of two field workers, less costs.
Some persons of this name appear to have been in England for centuries before Walter Daux settled in Virginia. Others may have been immigrants into England from France a few generations earlier.
The Warwickshire parish records show baptisms of his children named “Jone” (1607), John (1613), Alexander (1618), and Joane (1626). These records also record his burial on 27 January 1626/7.
Still another Richard Dawkes is mentioned in the will of Richard Upton of Hereford dated 14 October 1588.36 The will identifies Richard Dawkes and Robert Dawkes as his nephews and mentions a John Dawkes. The will leaves a cow to Joyce Dawkes, daughter of Richard Dawkes.