Assimilating Jews in England and Ireland

A few more thoughts on Jewish migration to Britain [from my Google+ Collection, Jewish Identity]. My focus (for personal reasons) is on those who made the move before the middle of the 19th century.

One point I want to raise relates to a topic that came up recently in a comment on my blog post 'English Jewish surnames'. A commenter mentioned that his/her gentile great-grandfather had been lodging with a Jewish family in Birmingham and married a daughter of that family. They moved to Hertfordshire and became Christian spiritualists.

My speculation is that assimilating Jews were often drawn to nonconformist or marginal sects rather than mainstream churches. The 19th-century novelist George Eliot had a sympathetic interest in Jews, and explicitly wrote about them in Daniel Deronda. But I am also thinking of an earlier book of hers, Silas Marner. The book doesn't mention Jews or Judaism but the main character is obviously being presented as a Jew. I won't go into detail but he is described as having an alien appearance and as belonging to a slightly weird, quasi-Christian sect and as being unfamiliar with the rituals of the Church of England. He is a weaver by trade. (Jews were often involved in textile-related businesses, including weaving.)

Another point... Russell is a Norman name and one would normally expect families with this name to trace their roots back to the Norman invaders of the 11th century. But, in following up some Russell ancestors of mine, I came across a reference (in a book called The Families of County Dublin) to some Russells who lived in Dublin in the 18th century and who were merchants and weavers. Significantly, they were neither Catholics nor Episcopalians (the majority of Irish people were Catholic and there was a large Episcopalian minority). These Russells were Quakers.

There were also some notable Russells who were very active in Cork, merchants most of them. At least one was a draper. Some had links with Lisbon and one at least had business interests in (and travelled to) Brazil. This suggests to me that they were Sephardic Jews who had Portuguese roots, and that they may have simply adopted the name Russell and may not have had any connection to the Normans at all. (Russell is sometimes said to be a possible Sephardic name, but I don't have reliable information on this.)

Alternatively Portuguese Jews could have married into an established Russell family of that region, but I have found no evidence of this.

Joe Blank

E. John Winner talks in a recent post at The Electric Agora about his family surnames. His maternal grandfather (probably Jewish) had lived in various parts of Eastern and Central Europe before coming to America. Here is the story from Winner's essay:

'Nobody knows the name my mother’s father was given at birth. Family legend has it that when he arrived at Ellis Island, the first U.S. official he met could not pronounce his name and left the space on the list blank. The next processing official then wrote down “Joe Blank.” Eventually, by the time he needed to sign a marriage certificate, he was known as “Joe Blanchard.” Now, both “Blank” and “Blanchard,” while not common, can be found as surnames in Eastern Poland. However, there are a couple of problems here. Between Ellis Island and his marriage, he was known as “Blankodoff,” which is not found as a surname anywhere. Further, my grandfather was not Polish. According to the 1925 census, he was Romanian. By the 1930 census, he was Austrian, and in 1940 he was reporting as Russian. To his children, he was Ukrainian, but to his wife he was Hungarian. Since he could speak all of these languages fluently (the only language he had difficulty with was English), there was no linguistic or inflective means of pegging him to any one of these countries. It was generally assumed that he had lived in each of them at some time or other in his youth — a rather shady youth that included some military service, and left him with a pile of money, enough to buy a large farm in Steuben County, New York. (He later lost it all in investments thanks to the Crash of ’29.) We don’t even know exactly when he was born; he was 35 in 1930, by 1940 he was 49. The obituary has him dying at age 79, but my grandmother insisted he was 96. (He had bought her as his bride for 500 acres bottom land, when she was 15, the marriage certificate forged to make her 18.)'

Fascinating stuff. And probably not all that unusual really.

English Jewish surnames revisited

[This page remains active with the names list being periodically updated and comments welcome.]

As I have mentioned previously, some of the names of my (English) forebears would seem to indicate Jewish origins, and I would like to make a few general comments on the topic of Jewish immigration and surnames in the English-speaking world.

It's difficult to find good information on the history of Jewish assimilation in England. Jewish leaders naturally see the preservation of their religious and cultural heritage as paramount and often speak disparagingly of those who, over the centuries, intermarried with Christians and adopted Christianity or drifted away from religion altogether. And many who write on Jewish history take a similar line: Jewish culture and tradition are what they are interested in.

The stigma associated with assimilation is understandable, as it was only a strong sense of community that kept Jewish beliefs and customs alive in a world which lacked a Jewish homeland. But, as a consequence of the focus on synagogues and communities which maintained their religious heritage, I suspect that the standard histories of Jews in England underestimate the real number of immigrants with Jewish origins, in particular those descended from Jews from the Iberian peninsula. There were particularly significant migrations during the 16th and 17th centuries.

Many people are interested not so much in Jewish religion and culture as in their own family histories, or, for that matter, in the ethnic history of their country. They see assimilated Jews not in terms of their ancestral religion or culture but rather as individuals who contributed to the broader culture of the country in which they chose to live.

New methods of genetic analysis* are revolutionizing the way we trace our ancestors. For the present, however, most of us rely on traditional records and, where records do not exist, on names and the clues that names can give of ethnic or geographic origins.

Unfortunately, Jewish naming practices make it very difficult for researchers. In many parts of Europe, Jews maintained their traditional practice of assigning patronymics and were slow to adopt the practice of giving permanent family names. For this and other reasons (such as the lack of a homeland, persecution and discrimination), Jews have been more inclined to adopt new or modified surnames than most other peoples.

Of course, in English-speaking countries, certain surnames - often German or Hebraic – are well-known as indicating Jewish origins. [A fairly good list is here. And here is a good explanatory article on the origins of Ashkenazic last names.] But Jewish immigrants often modified foreign-sounding names or chose English surnames, and some names were favored over others.

I have compiled a list of surnames based on my own (limited) knowledge and research. I emphasize that these names do not necessarily indicate Jewish origins, and some are more strongly indicative than others. I have excluded almost all Biblical (Hebrew), Polish and most German and other obviously non-English names and intend to refine the list over time, deleting names with only tenuous claims to be here and adding others. Comments and suggestions, either via this site or to my email address**, are welcome.

Abrams, Adams, Albert, Allen, Alexander, Alpert, Ames, Amsterdam, Angel, Ansell, Archer, Arnold, Asher, Asherson, Astley, Avery, Baker, Ball, Banks, Barber, Barkin, Barnard, Barnett, Baron, Barr, Barret, Barrett, Barron, Barrow (sometimes from Baruch), Bart, Barton, Bass, Batt, Beck, Becker, Beer, Belcher, Bell, Bellman, Belman, Belmont, Benedict, Bennet, Benson, Bentley, Bernard, Berry, Bickel, Bickell, Bickle, Bird, Bissell (from German Biesel, or Yiddish), Blond, Bloomfield, Black, Blacker, Blackman, Blackwell, Bland, Blank, Block, Blue, Bolton, Booker, Bookman, Bowman (from Bauman(n)), Brand, Bray, Brayer, Briar, Brice, Brier, Brill, Brilliant, Briscoe, Brock, Brody, Brooks, Broomfield, Brower, Brown, Buckley, Burstin, Bush, Byrd, Cain, Cap, Cape, Capp, Carpenter, Carr, Carter, Chandler, Chaplin, Chester, Chetwynd (an old English name adopted by some families), Cline, Cobb, Coe (from Cohen?), Cole, Coleman, Colman, Cook (from Koch?), Cooke, Cooper, Cope, Copeland (from Kaplan), Copland (from Kaplan), Cove, Cowan (from Cohen), Crane, Crawford, Cripps, Crossman, Crouch, Cutler, Darley, David, Davidson, Davies, Davis, Diamond, Dove, Draper, Durant, Eastman, Ellis, Ellman, Elman, Elton, Fain (from Feinman(n) or Feinstein), Faine (from Feinman(n) or Feinstein), Falk, Feldman, Finch, Fine (from Feinman(n) or Feinstein), Finniston (from Feinstein), Firestone (from Feuerstein), Fish, Fisher, Foreman, Forman, Forster, Foster, Fox, Frank, Franks, Fredman, Freedman, Freeman, Froman, Gardner, Garfield, Garland, Gilbert, Glass, Gold, Golden, Golding, Goldsmith, Good, Goodman, Goodwin, Gordon (from Grodno, Lithuania or from the Russian word gorodin (townsman)), Gould, Gray, Green, Greenfield, Greenwood, Grey, Gross, Hacker, Hale (as variant spelling of Ashkenazic Halle), Halperin (from Heilbronn, Germany), Halpern (see Halperin), Hancock, Harding, Harman, Harris, Harrison, Harlow, Hart, Hartman, Harvey, Harwood, Hayman, Heller (from Halle, Germany), Helman, Hendler, Henry, Hering, Herring, Hickman, Hill, Hiller, Hilton, Hodges, Holden, Holder, Holland, Hollander (from a town in Lithuania settled by the Dutch?), Holman, Holt, Holton, Hook, Hooker, Horn, Horne, Horner, Horton, Horwich (from town in Bohemia (Horowitz/Horovice)), Howard (from town in Bohemia (Horowitz/Horovice)), Hurwich (see Horwich), Hyams, Hyatt, Hyman, Ivory, Jackson, Jarvis (sometimes from the Eastern European Javitz, as in the case of the family of the American philosopher Judith Jarvis Thomson), Jewel, Jewell, Jones (from Jonas or Jonah), Kane, Kay, Kaye, Kennard, Kerr, King (from Koenig), Kline, Knight (possibly from Sephardic names Cabalero/Caballero/Cabaliero = knight or horseman), Lambert, Landon, Landis, Lane, Lang, Langer, Langerman, Langley, Langman, Lawrence, Lawson, Leavit, Leavitt, Lee, Leigh, Leonard, Leslie, Lester, Levin, Levine, Levett, Levitt, Lewin, Lewis, Libson (eastern Ashkenazic metronymic), Lincoln, Lipson (eastern Ashkenazic patronymic or in some cases variation of Lipschitz (Polish town)), Lipton, Little, London, Long, Lott, Low, Lowe, Lowy, Lucas, Lyon, Lyons, Lytton, Mack, Mander, Manders, Mann, Manson (from Mankiewicz), Marchant, Marcus (from Marx), Marks (from Marx), Marlow, Marlowe, Marshall, Marty (Sephardic), Mason, Maurice, Maxwell, May, Mayman, Merchant, Michael, Michell, Miller, Millman, Milman, Milner, Mitchell, Montague, Morris, Moss, Moyse, Myer, Myers, Nelson, New, Newman, Newmark, Nichol, Nicholl, Nicholls, Nichols, Nobel, Norman, Oliver, Paley, Palmer, Park, Parker, Parrish, Parsons, Paul, Pavey, Pearl, Pearlman, Peavey, Peavy, Peck, Pember (from Pemper), Perkins, Perry (from Pereira), Pepper, Peters, Phillip, Phillips, Pine, Pinner, Pinter, Pittman, Platt, Polk, Pollard, Pollock, Pool, Poole, Porter, Portman, Posner, Powers, Price, Priest, Prince, Rae, Raine, Raines, Randall, Ray, Raye, Raymond, Raynor, Reed, Rees, Reid, Rendel, Rest, Rice, Rich, Robbins (see Robin), Robert, Roberts, Robertson, Robin (from Reuben, Rabinowitz, Rubinstein, etc.), Robins (see Robin), Robinson (see Robin), Ronson, Rose, Rosefield, Ross, Roth, Rothman, Rothwell, Ruby, Russell (sometimes indicative of Sephardic heritage), Sacks, Salmon, Salman, Sams, Sand, Sanders, Sandler, Sands, Sassoon, Saunders, Saville, Saxon, Sefton, Selwyn, Sharman, Sharp (from German Scharf (= sharp-witted); or perhaps Shapiro), Sharpe (see Sharp), Shaw, Shayne, Sher (Ashkenazic, from word for scissors or shears as used by tailors), Sherman, Sherwood, Shields, Shinwell, Shore (from Schorr), Short, Silk, Sills, Silver, Silverstone, Simkin, Simkins, Simmonds, Simmons, Simon, Simons, Simpkin, Simpkins, Sims, Sinclair, Singer, Singleton, Sless, Sloman, Smith, Snell (from the German name Schnell), Snider (from word for tailor), Snyder (from word for tailor), Somers, Sommer, Sommers, Speed (from the German name Schnell), Spelling, Sperling, Spurling, Stainer (from Steiner?), Stanley, Stark (from Yiddish Shtark = strong), Starr, Sterling, Stone, Strong (translation of Yiddish Shtark?), Sugar, Summers, Sumner, Swan, Swann, Swanson, Syme, Symes, Symonds, Taft (from Tugendhaft), Tate, Taylor, Temple, Trilling, Tucker, Turner, Uren, Vale, Waddell, Walker, Wall, Waller, Walt, Walter, Walters, Ward, Wardle, Waterman (from Wascherman or Wasserman(n)), Watt, Watts, Webber, Weller, Whaley, White, Whiteman, Whitman, Wideman, Wiley, Winner, Winston, Winters, Winton, Wise, Wolf, Wolfson, Woolf, Worley, Yarrow (from Yaroshavitz), Yates, Young, Younger.



* I suspect that DNA analysis is going to present an unwelcome and challenging picture for those who wish to maintain a simple concept of Jewish ethnicity. Of course, it is well known that the population groups which have formed the Jewish people over the centuries have been geographically divided and genetically diverse, so it will come as no surprise if there are no clear genetic markers for Jewish ethnicity. What DNA analysis will do, however, is to indicate how particular populations have maintained continuity or merged with neighbouring populations.

** engmar3 at gmail dot com.

*** It is difficult to know whether to include here such common English names as 'Harris' which in the majority of cases is not Jewish, but which has been adopted by Jews. Preliminary Y-DNA results may be of interest. Y-DNA results for Harris (based on 465 samples) reflect standard Western European/Scandinavian patterns (haplogroups R1b1 and I1), though there are also instances of haplotypes characteristic of Eastern European, Mediterranean, Middle Eastern and African populations. But even names which are more identifiably Jewish (e.g. Silver) are often associated with the R1b1 haplogroup.

**** Note an interesting surname change in the late nineteenth century from Raby to Simmonds.