Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 3.djvu/39

 io<"s.m.jA_v.i4,i90o.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

27

of the parish church, immediately above the Hoskyns' family pew. It is the Union Jack which was flying on the ill-fated Victoria when she went down after being rammed by the Camperdown a few years since. When the Victoria sank this flag, strange to say, was found floating on the surface of the sea. It was picked up and sent to the Admiralty. The late Admiral Sir Anthony Hoskyns, when he had the command of the Mediterranean Fleet, hoisted the same flag on the Victory, then his flagship, and it was in turn hauled to the masthead by Admiral Tryon, who afterwards assumed the command, and who, it will be remembered, went down with his hip. On the occasion of the funeral of the late Sir Anthony Hoskyns, at North Perrott, the flag was used as a pall. It was afterwards given by the Admiralty to Lady Hoskyns. On her death this relic passed to the family, and they placed it in the parish church, where it hangs in graceful folds, commemorating the names of two brave men, and is a visible reminder of one of the saddest disasters in the history of the British Navy."

W. LOCKE RADFORD.

LUTHER FAMILY. (See 10 th S. ii. 323.) The earliest record of this family in my possession is from the Visitation of Essex, 1634(Harleian Soc. vol. xiii. p. 439), and it commences with the Richard whose monument the REV. JOHN PICKFORD refers to ; but no mention is made of the brother Anthonie Luther. Can MR. PICK- FORD or any other of your readers give any earlier information respecting this family ; a,lso the date of Anthonie's death ? It is possible that he died prior to 1634, and that the inscription was only placed on his tomb at the death of his brother Richard in 1638

My interest in the family arises from the grandson (Richard) and granddaughter (Jane) of the above - mentioned Richard having married the daughter (Rebecca) and son (Edward) of my great-great great-great-great uncle, Alderman Edward Rudge, Sheriff of London in 1637.

It was the great-granddaughter (Charlotte Luther) of Richard Luther and Rebecca Rudge, and sister of John Luther, M.P. for the county of Essex, who married, as his third wife, Henry Fane, of Wormsley, M.P. for Lyme Regis, and brother to the eighth Earl of Westmorland ; and the manner in which Miles or My less passed to the Fane family is described in the "Gentleman's Magazine Library : English Topography," part iv. p. 96, thus : " My less, the property of F. Fane, Esq. (related to the Right Hon. Earl of Westmorland), formerly belonging to John Luther, Esq. [who, though married, died s.p. in 1786], who left it to Mr. Fane at his decease."

This is confirmed by the following entry in 'Burke's Landed Gentry ' (ed. 1846, p. 395) :

" Francis [second son of Henry Fane and Char- lotte Luther] of Spetisbury, Dorset, and Green

Park Place, Bath, M.P. for Dorchester, who succeeded under the will of his uncle John Luther, Esq., to the large estates of Myless's, &c., and died without issue, when those estates passed by entail to his elder brother "

John, who married Lady Elizabeth Parker, daughter of Thomas, third Earl of Maccles- field, and by whom he had issue John, mentioned in the next paragraph, and others.

In 'Burke's Peerage' (ed. 1897, p. 1524) Charlotte Luther is described as sister and co-heiress (with Rebecca her sister, wife of J. Taylor, Esq.) of John Luther, Esq., of Myles, Essex ; and ' Burke's Commoners,' iv. 9, gives the representation of the Luther family as vested in Mr. Fane (John, grandson of Charlotte Luther) and Dr. Taylor (John Taylor Gordon. M.D., grandson of Rebecca Luther), of Clifton. According to ' Burke's Landed Gentry 1 (ed. 1846, p. 478), this Dr. Taylor, or Taylor Gordon, is of royal Scotch descent as well, as being a descendant of the Earls of Huntly.

I have been unable to trace with any certainty that the Luther family of Essex were descended from Martin Luther ; but it may be interesting to quote the following in this connexion, which appears in ' Burke's Commoners,' iv. 9 :

"Established in England during the reign of Henry VIII., and undoubtedly allied to the cele- brated Reformer, the Luthers remained seated in Essex for centuries, intermarrying with the leading families of thatcounty,representingitinParliament, and exercising paramount influence in its local government."

FRANCIS H. RELTON.

9, Broughtou Road, Thornton Heath.

" TOTEM." If there is any book to which one turns with confidence for the etymology of American words, the ' Century Dictionary ' is surely that book. Its note on totem would, however, be hard to beat for muddled arrangement, and liability to mislead the seeker for information :

" Amer. Ind. ; given as from ' Massachusetts Indian wutohtimoin, that to which a person or place belongs' (Webster's Diet.); Algonkin dodaim (Tylor) ; Algonkin otem, with a prefixed poss. pron. nt 'otem, my family token."

A commentary seems necessary to elucidate the facts which the above ingeniously conceals.

(a) Massachusetts ivutohlimoin, though here brought into the foreground, is at best only distantly connected with totem. If it were possible to imagine a lexicographer giving tooth as from German zahn, it would be a fair parallel to the quotation from Webster.

(b) It is a detail, but the quaint ortho-