History - Visits to Devon and Other Correspondence

The following is correspondence received by various family members who researched the family history.  The map shows the locations of ancestral homes and family origins that are the subject of this correspondence. Some of the correspondence contends that the family had its origins in Satterleigh.  Regardless of the view of origins, there is little doubt that there is a Devon connection and the family can trace its roots to Devon in the early 17th Century

Letters written by Charles Satterlee (1875-1918) while he was the captain of the USS Tampa, a naval transport, during World War I. The USS Tampa, a former coast guard cutter in naval service, was lost off the English coast on 26 Sept. 1918 with all men on board, while on convoy duty with 10 officers and 102 enlisted personnel.

28 Jan 1918

Yesterday I visited Satterleigh Parish, in Devonshire, England, near Barnstable. I left the train at South Moulton R.R. Station & London & South Western R.R. No conveyance was obtainable at the train, so I walked most of the six miles. I got a lift for two miles in a dog cart, whose driver also called for me at Satterleigh Barton, about 3 p.m., to take me to the train at the same station.

The church is small and has every indication of being very ancient. I obtained post card photos of the exterior and interior. A great many graves are in the churchyard and many of them are unmarked. The country is hilly with some woods but mostly well cultivated and beautiful. Satterleigh is on the junction of the Nome and Taw rivers, the church and Barton are on the crest of a high hill with a beautiful outlook. Satterleigh Barton is what is left of the hold estate; a good deal of the house burned about 100 years ago; it faces south and the wing with the blind end is the older part. Downstairs this wing contains a large kitchen and a sort of store room. Above there is a large room over the kitchen which is said to have been used for a courtroom which has double doors at the entrance, off the courtroom there is another smaller room. Some old windows have been plastered up so there is not as much light as there might be. These upper rooms are used for storing wool and produce. The living quarters are in the long east wing. The kitchen contains a large fireplace, where the cooking is done at present. A very small stove is also used for special occasions. Wood is quite plentiful and is used for heating. The place in general is run down, although the house is in pretty good condition. It is rented by Mr. Elworthy, a bachelor, who has a Mrs. Stevens and her daughter to keep house and care for the dairy and sheep. There are 2 hired men to assist him with the farming; he has been there 20 years. Mr. Elworthy is very deaf so I didn't obtain much information from him. My time was too limited to permit me to visit the rector of the parish, who holds all the records. This rectory is a mile or more from the church.

There are also some old ladies at Warkleigh House (Thorold by name) who are much attached to Satterleigh Parish, and intend to be buried in the churchyard. Their brother was rector there for a number of years. One of the Thorold sisters was buried there a few days before my visit. At another time I hope to have an opportunity to spend a night at Satterleigh and learn more of the history of the Parish. The Barton contains between 200 and 300 acres. Mr. Elworthy has some 60 cattle and 250 sheep. The products are barley, wheat and turnips for stock feeding. A very old orchard of apples and pears is still in existence. The orchard usually produces 100 hogsheads of cider. This year it only produced 30. The annual rental is 200£. A good deal of hard work is required to pay this rent and make a living and some profit. The roads are good. Satterleigh Barton does not adjoin the highway, but is reached by a lane. A number of large trees, ash, fir, etc., are situated about the house and add to the attractiveness of the estate.

My trip to the Parish was made on the next Monday. The family washing was in progress at the Barton, so a cooked meal was not prepared. This is what we had: cold chicken, cold pork, potatoes, bread and butter, spiced preserves, pears, rice pudding, preserved peaches, Devonshire cider, thick cream. Pretty good fare, nearly everything on the table was produced on their place. A great many stacks of wheat and barley are about the farm. They thatch the top of the stocks with straw, making a sort of a tent shaped surface to keep out the rain.

The necessity of walking most of the way shortened my stay by one and a half hours; otherwise, I might have had an interview with the rector. It was about noon when I had arrived and something influenced me to spend that portion of the day around the farm house rather than at the parsonage. South of the house is a lake which was stocked with salmon and trout in the old days. A deer park is said to have been on the estate. An old prayer book in the church bore the date of 1795 in pencil. The print was coarse and very old. No heating arrangement appears to be provided in the church originally. Now a little iron stove is here with a pipe running thru the roof on the north side, opposite the entrance door which is locked by a very large key. Two or three modern lamps are used for lighting. The pulpit has 2 candle holders for light. A small reed organ is the only musical instrument in the church.

 

Wednesday, 27 Feb 1918

I went to Sotterley, in Suffolk County, England, today. It is a fine estate, park, church, etc. "Sotterley Hall" was rebuilt about 1744 by the Barne family who had come there about that time. They bought it from the Playters; and before the Playters it was owned by the Satterlees. There is a Coat of Arms in the church, very old, which contains the three buckles, the same as in ours, and some other designs from the arms of the Playters. This may indicate that the families were related by marriage. I saw no Satterlee tombstones and Mr. Barnes told me they had never found any; but some of the Playters may have been related to the Satterlees. Major Barne was killed in the war a few weeks ago.

In the church is a fine brass presented by the Satterlees in America and containing the names: Le Roy Satterlee; George B. Satterlee; and Churchill Satterlee; The Rev. Henry Yates Satterlee; and several other names I did not recognize.

If Major Barnes had been living he could have told me a good deal more about it, no doubt.

Regards

Charles Satterlee

From Mrs. Verna Satterlee Einarsen, Port Townsend, Washington, 1965 to Goldie Satterlee Moffatt:

Dear Goldie:

My cousin, Frances (Satterlee) Tallent, and husband Nixon recently returned from England and showed me the pictures they took in Devon, Eng. I will send you a set of them soon.

Their picture of the church at Ide, pronounced "eed," shows the old belfry as the only part of the original building left.

I know you are anxious to hear what little she could find out for us about the Satterlees, as they only had 14 days to see London and the county, as well as visit their daughter and family, so they had little time to do research. They talked to the present Vicar, who let them look thru the records, and they found that all the records had been cut out, seemingly with a razor, from 1658 to 1680. This covers the period Rev. Wm. Satterlee was vicar there. I am now wondering if Rev. Wm. Satterlee may have cut out those records when they banished him and he took them to Dorset with him. Or they may have been cut out at a later date by someone doing research on that period.

They talked to the present vicar, who has only been there a year, and he referred them to Rev. Coolridge at Mortenhampstead, who was the preceding vicar at Ide and had served there 14 years. This Rev. Coolridge said he was descended from the English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Rev. Coolridge had become interested in the Satterlee genealogy earlier, as a branch of Benedict Satterlee's family had visited him and were researching their family line and history. Rev. Coolridge had researched the records and wrote a paper on the family and had it published in a magazine. He tried to interest a family of Satterlees, now living in Ide, in buying his compilation but they weren't the least interested. (I should state, the Vicar Coolridge wanted 25£ per page for his records, which I guess is quite a sum.)

Frances and Nick Tallent while at Rev. Coolridge's pumped him for a little information which is: Rev. Wm. Satterlee was vicar of Ide Parish from 1633 to 1654, at which time Cromwell disbanded all the churches. In 1670 he was reinstated at Ide and served until 1672, when the parishioners banished him because of un-vicarlike attentions he gave to the ladies (in other words, he became quite a ladies' man).

Rev. Wm. Satterlee then went to Dorset; but where in the Dorset area? He was said to have had a dual vicarship in Dorset and Rev. Coolridge thinks he died and is buried there. (Note: I have not had a chance to research the Dorset area. G.S.M.)

I was very grateful to Frances and Nick to take their precious time to get what they did for us, but I guess it will take you or me or someone really interested to get what we want for our records.

Sincere best wishes,

Verna Einarson

 

From: Rev. R. D. Thompson -- Kent, England

To: Msgt. Thomas D. Satterlee, stationed in Brandon, Suffolk, England

9 March 1965

Dear Sergeant Satterlee:

It is strange that I should have been in your neighborhood little more than a fortnight ago, when by caravan we "rested at the Barton Mills" site. Altho I would gladly help you in the same spirit that American Air Forces helped me, when I took some "Sotterly" boys to your aerodrome long ago, I am afraid the kindest act would be to tell you to turn away from "Sotterly in Suffolk" and turn to Satterleigh in Devon, as the real ancient home of your ancestors. As spelling was very arbitrary in the Middle Ages and those two places have been described with similar names, I made some investigation into the Devonshire families affairs in the period shortly before some went to America. They appeared to be well educated, some of their number going to Oxford University.

If any further research is done, it would be done in the records of Devonshire and you would well be as proud of them as if they were of Suffolk. The basis of this view is sheer common sense because both "Satterley" and "Satterleigh" are mentioned in Domesday. Only if the Devonshire place-name had received its name as late as the XVI Century, could one suppose that it ha been given the name of a notable family that had migrated from Sotterley in Suffolk. There is no evidence of a documentary nature to show that people called Satterlee-ley-ly made the journey from Suffolk to Devon, or that people called Satterlee, who made the journey from Devon to America, originated in Suffolk. Only the glamour of the Hall overshadowed by the church with its heraldry and its old brasses make the wish to have belonged there turn into the belief.

Look at your record of "Descent of de Sotterly," concerning the de Sotterley lords of Sotterly Manor. "Levying a fine" was the expression for the payment made at the transfer of property that the White rose Playter family ousted the Red Rose de Satterley is not true. Thomas de Satterley died without an heir to his name. The manor became the inheritance of Thomas Cheyne, his grandson by daughter Elizabeth (Satterley). It was from this youth that the estate passed to the Playters. It appears to have been an amiable transaction because of his will, dated 1472, as Thomas Playter bequeathed to Thomas Cheyne his old gold and silver cup. Apart from charitable bequests, there were few, if any, personal gifts beyond the family in that will. Unfortunately, I have no further notes of my investigations.

Having read an early 16th Century will of a Satterly at Chelsworth, where three sons were beneficiaries, I went to that parish in Suffolk and searched the registers, but no one with the name was recorded. Between those individuals and the period when the emigration to America took place, I found records of about three individuals, one in Essex, one in London, and another in the north, all bearing the same surname. There was no indication of any connection between them, except the surname.

Either people care nothing about their ancestors, or else they care too much and make the family history more or less of a fairy tale. For contrast, the few who proceed with the truth by documentary evidence cross referenced, slowly and surely, by probing into the past, generation by generation, without any, or few jumps, or guesses, are like myself, the greatest of bores.

There are three Satterleys in my telephone book in this area, which is remarkable owing to the rarity of the name. Today I telephoned to two of them, after receiving your letter. They appear to belong to the first of the two classes above. It is true that one of them was an elderly mother-in-law, the son-in-law, a chemist, being on holiday. The other was a spinster, who cared not a dam, but she did let on that her father came from Devonshire. Being so very easterly, I imagined I was onto a Suffolk Satterley, so I think the Suffolks must have died out. The third Satterley in my phone book was quite a surprise. Although he wrote to me, when I was Rector at Sotterly and sent me a lot of his family history of the traditionary sort and wrote I think from Newcastle, I find he lives barely five miles from here. He is Air Vice Marshal Harold V. Satterly, and his address is Horsalls, Harrietsham Maidstons, Kent. He had a fairly full account of the Devonshire connection.

Mrs. Mabel Satterlee Ingalls, who is owner of "Sotterley Hall" in Maryland, visited us when we lived close to Sotterley in Suffolk. Knowing she was a granddaughter of J. Pierpont Morgan, I was glad to obtain from her the means for a renewal of one of the church windows.

Yours sincerely,

R.D. Thompson

From: Rev. R. D. Thompson

To: Msgt. Thomas D. Satterlee

14 Sept 1965

Dear Sergeant Satterlee:

Were I round your way again, I should be delighted to meet you and your family, but I am much curtailed in my movements by my health.

Domesday was mainly a survey of manors instituted by William I. It is too early for most genealogies and shows the transference of ownership from Saxon to Norman. The Sotterleys' Saxon Lord was, I think, named Burchard, holding under the dominion of Gurth (King Harold's brother). His successor's name was Mundret.

Most counties have histories, some quite old, and deal with each parish by parish. Gipp's is about the earliest for Suffolk; then comes Suckling's, this is two volumes. They record a fine levied on the manor of Sotterley by Thomas Playter in 1475, and of T. Cheyne and others; but he also records that in 1477, a Thomas Sotterley entered the Conventicle Church of the Austin Friars at Norwich. (The Chapel and Church have long since disappeared.) This is supported somewhere by the account of a tombstone in their chapel to Thomas, and I think Elizabeth Sotterley. This might have been the Thomas who was one of the brothers of Walter Sotterley. It would appear that several died without issue. The Chapel had a name like "Coeli-Escali" meaning "Steps to Heaven," and was looked upon as providing the buried with favorable prospects.

The most reliable information on Suffolk comes from 2 series of volumes by Coppinger. These are the latest. One is called "Suffolk Manors" and the other has some title like "Suffolk Records." The first of these I feel would serve your purpose as providing a detailed list of members of the de Sotterley family. The others provide sources of information for research workers.

Personally, I think it is a waste of time for anyone with a name like Satterley to try and connect up with the lords of that place name. If only the descendants could have survived in some prominent capacity up to the Heralds Visitation of the 16th Century, when pedigrees had to be produced to prove rights to arms, there could have been some slight hope. Either they died out or sank into oblivion, where there are only fragmentary and disconnected records of the existence of the name in Suffolk.

For years when I was Rector at Sotterley, I struggled to find a connection between the Sotterleys and Playters and an American family of consequence in Maryland. I even paid a visit to the old home here; but all in vain. Devonshire is obviously the home of your English ancestors, and I hope you will be successful in finding more about them.

Sincerely,

Rev. R. D. Thompson

^{Thanks to Katie Jaques for providing an electronic transcription of the published text.}