• General Notes

  Will of Francis Cooke
  
  
  
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  The last Will and Testament of ffrancis Cooke of Plymouth late Deceased: exhibited before the Court held att Plymouth aforsaid the fift day of June 1663 on the oathes of mr John Aldin and mr John howland;
  
  The Last Will and Testament of ffrancis Cooke made this seaventh of the tenth month 1659
  
  I being att prsent weake and Infeirme in body yett in prfect memory throw mercy Doe comitt my soule unto god that gave it and my body to the earthe; which my will is should bee Intered in a Decent and comly manner;
  
  As for such goods and lands as I stand posessed of I Doe will and bequeath as followeth;
  
  1 My will is that hester my Dear and loveing wife shall have all my moveable goods and all my Cattle of all kinds; viz: neat Cattle horsekind sheep and swine to be att her Dispose
  
  2 my will is that hester my wife shall have and Injoy my lands both upland and meddow lands which att prsent I posesse During her life
  
  3 I Doe ordaine and appoint my Deare wife and my son John Cooke Joynt exequitors of this my said will
  
  Witnes
  
  John Aldin
  
  ffrancis Cooke
  
  John howland
  
  
  
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  COOKE ANCESTRY
  The Cookes of Wheatley Hall were known in Kent, Devon and Yorkshire, since the Reign of Henry IV. Sir Anthony Cooke was a Tutor to Edward VI, and his daughter, Anne married Sir Nicholas Bacon, keeper of the Great Seal.
  
  The Cooke family, originally spelled Cok, is very old in England. To it belong Richard and Walter Cook, crusaders, who went to the Holy Land 1191.
  
  The Family of Cook came into England with the Conqueror, and has been for centuries seated in the highest respectability in the County of Worcester. Francis Cook was a Roman Catholic, who joined the Separatists, and early went to Leyden, where he married his Walloon wife, Hester. He was born at Dantry or Blythe, Yorkshire, Eng. He came on the Mayflower, with his son, John Cook, but left Mrs. Cook and three children to follow later by the Ann. He was excommunicated from the Plymouth Church, where he was Deacon, for taking the part of the Quakers. He removed to Dartmouth. Francis Cook was a "man of judgement, who could see both sides of a question." He was called in the Records "The Ancestor." (See Legends, Loves and Loyalties of New England, by Caroline Leonard Goodenough.)
  
  FRANCIS COOKE was born in England about 1583. He went to Leyden, Holland, where he was married, June 30, 1603. The marriage record at Leyden reads "Francis Cooke, wool comber, unmarried, from England, with Hester Mayhieu, unmarried, from Canterbury, Eng., accompanied by Jennie Mayhieu, her mother, and Jennie Mayhieu, her sister." The Mayhieus were Walloons and Huguenots. Francis and his son John, were on the "Speedwell" when it sailed from Delftshaven, July 20, 1620, with some of the Pilgrims bound for America. At Southampton, they joined the "Mayflower" and set sail on August 5. The "Speedwell" began to leak, but although the ships put into Dartmouth for repairs and sailed again August 21, new leaks compelled the "Speedwell" to return to London, with such immigrants as could not be taken in the "Mayflower," which then went on alone. Francis and his son were on the "Mayflower." He was about 10 years old and called Little John Cook, the child Mayflower Ancestor, and he was the seventeenth signer of the Mayflower Compact. His son John was living in 1694, probably the oldest male survivor of the Mayflower. His wife, Hester, and the rest of their children came in the "Ann" in 1623. Winslow recorded "The wife of Francis Cooke being a Walloon, holds communion with the church at Plymouth, as she came from the French, by virtue of the communion of churches." The Cooks were silk mercers by trade and probably brought a loom with them. Francis and John were naval architects. They were also connected with civil offices. He was freeman, 1633; a member of Myles Standish's Company, 1643; credit in King Philip's War, credit 2 items 04:04:04 and in the expedition against the Indians; on a committee to lay out roads in Plymouth. Bradford called him "a very old man" in 1650. He died April 7, 1663, aged 80, and was buried in the old Plymouth burying ground. His will of 1659 names his wife Hester and son John, executors. An agreement of the heirs in June, 1666, showed the surviving children were John, Jacob, Hester Wright and Mary Thompson. Hester, his widow, died in 1675.
  
    Children, four born in Leyden, one in Plymouth:
  
  
      JANE, b. 1608; d. before 1666; m. 1627, Experience Mitchell.
      JOHN, b. 1612; d. 1695; m. 1634, Sarah Warren (Richard1). See Warren
          Line, Vol. I.
      JACOB, b. 1618; d. 1676; m. 1646, Damaris Hopkins; (2) Elizabeth (Lettice)
          Shurtleff.
      HESTER, b. 1620; m. 1644, Richard1 Wright.
      MARY, b. 1626; d. 1715; m. 1645, John1 Thompson.
  
  
      References: Munsey Hopkins Family, Lowell, 1920.
                  The Basset-Preston Ancestry, p. 71.
  
  
  MRS. VOLLIE H. GRIFFITH'S LINE
      SARAH WARREN, who m. John Cooke (son of Francis Cooke), Mar. 28, 1634:
          and had MARY COOKE, who m. Philip Taver, and had BETHIAH TABER,
          who m. John Macomber, and had WILLIAM MACOMBER, who m. Lusanna
          Hicks, and had PATIENCE MACOMBER, who m. James Soule, and had
          JAMES SOULE, who m. Nancy Wellman, and had JOHN J. SOULE, who
          m. Mary Ann MacLauren, and had MARY ELIZABETH SOULE, who m.
          Vollie H. Griffith, Danby. Children: Caroline, Florence Mary, John
          B. and Elizabeth.
  
  
  

Details of Francis' family with Hester le Mahieu