Where precise dates are lacking, the figure in brackets indicates the Quarter of the year in question (e.g. 1875(3) = July, August, September, .1875), under which the event should be found indexed at the Central Register Office.

Not surprisingly, the standard books of reference pay scant attention to the early divarifications of a simple family of French or Flemish weavers. They are sparing in mention of the humble origins of such of their descendants as have, in the normal expectancy of evolution, arrived at some eminence superior to their derivation. These later in turn display (in such records as they have left behind them) an unnatural reticence with respect to their forbears. Particularly marked in that generation which ought to have been able most easily to have stimulated the flow of facts, but which was unfortunately also that most inhibited by a process of social 'refinement' obstructively characteristic, at it's peak, of the late Victorian era. These same celebrities, while pretending to repudiate or at least to disparage their simple extraction, at once substantiated the status of their forefathers and obscured the lines of connection to them. They were at the same time at pains to recognize those infusions of intellect, of money and of position which from time to time and through the chances of marriage brought welcome reinforcement to the hereditary resources, the skills and qualities of their families. We might here remark that the women of all ages and in every period have frequently been found to demonstrate an interest in matters of ancestry and blood relationship to a greater degree than that shown by the men. From the documents at our disposal, it is further discernible that the problem of their provenance first attracted the attention of our elders in any serious sense in the first quarter of the present century. In some specific instances this was done with the proving of Arms or a claim to a legacy in mind. We find the inevitable legends of disputed Wills, disowning, and lost inheritances, but no shred of proof of any of any of the; a circumstance probably accounted for by an oft-repeated (if not wholly veracious) assertion that "No Perowne ever owned anything".

Walter Rye, the author of "Norfolk Families"(Goose & Son Ltd., Norwich, 1913), gives the name PEROWNE as "originally PEROONE" and continues a slender reference to this large and much ramified clan by reciting that: "Michael Matthemon of James and Rose Peroone, was baptized at St Saviour's, Norwich, 1735; and his sister Rosamund in 1739." a pronouncement which was for many years accepted without question as evidence of common ancestry. We shall return to these particular events in due course and in the proper place; it is here sufficient to observe that these are not the earliest of which we have relevant note. After the publication of his book (letter dated 31st January, 1922) Mr. Rye stated that the name"is presumed to be Huguenot, is essentially a Norwich one and never (sic) occurs in the County". In a previous collation1 it has been shown that a substantial colony of our name (in several spellings) existed in the XVII Century in London and that isolated examples of it in England (including Norfolk) are extant from much earlier times. With the expansion of transport facilities throughout the XVIII and XIX Centuries, greater mobility and a wider distribution became both practicable and inevitable, with the result that the name PEROWNE is discovered increasingly in localities not necessarily related in any way (or only fortuitously) to those of its origins. Ida Layard (letter dated 16th January, 1903) found it remarkable that William Perowne in 1789 "went right across the County to find his wife"; a century later we find Priscilla Elizabeth Perowne, of Norwich, marrying a Mr Macfadyen of Glasgow. The Huguenot tradition is widespread, though we can not be certain to what extent this merely reflects the conclusions of authorities such as Walter Rye, W.D.Bowman (see "Origins" pp 4/5) and others accessible in the Public Libraries. Traditional connections with the manufacture of cloth are confirmatory and often more precise; as our investigations proceed, it becomes apparent that it is in Norwich that the majority of those who today bear the name PEROWNE should look for their derivation and lines of descent. We have elsewhere¹ commented on the apparent paucity of male issue from the settlement of silk weavers of similar name as noticed in the East End of London at the close of the XVII Century. Notwithstanding which we shall uncover in due course evidence of its survival in Shoreditch, Bethnal Green and Stepney, as well as of its dissemination in other districts of the metropolis. It is at this point sufficient to mention that certain events in the evolution of more than one branch of the Norwich clan suggest some continuing association (possibly of craft, trade, or commerce only) between the two colonies well into the XIX Century. Although Spitalfields was predominantly a centre of the silk industry and Norwich one of wool and worsteds, there were silk weavers in the latter place and Perownes among them. The material available at the start of this study had been assembled primarily with the purpose of establishing the antecedents of two specific branches, namely those of JOHN PEROWNE of Norwich (1794 - 1882) and of BENJAMIN PEROWNE of Great Snoring, Norfolk (1806 1881), from each of which authentic pedigrees descended. Once these aims had been achieved those searches ceased, with the result that the archive was in no sense comprehensive as regards Perownes in general and seldom strayed for any distance from the two lines mentioned. For close upon two centuries (1637 - 1832) the French Protestants in Norwich worshipped in the so called "Walloon Church" (St Mary the Less). However, the data that we find preserved from that source begins only with the birth of BALTASAR PIERON in 1645 and does not extend beyond the year of 1680. That there were no earlier entries in the name does not preclude the possibility that the family of FRANCHOY and DAVID PIERON was established in Norwich prior to the year1637, but of that we have no proof. In the extracts that we have only one marriage is mentioned. The recording of deaths did not seem to have mattered. If any relevant events were recorded in the Walloon Church (St Mary the Less) at Norwich after 1680, they have not been brought to light by any of the research that we have carried out. So it is from the beginning of the XVIII Century the Registers of the Parish Churches provide the greater part of the information we have namely births, marriages and deaths. It was not until 1754 that Lord Hardwick's Act gave the Church of England the sole authority to celebrate marriages (quakers and Jews excepted) and the Act providing for the General Registration of Births, Deaths and Marriages in England and Wales did not come into operation until July 1st 1837. Prior to this later legislation, with its concomitant standardisation of form, the records are frequently lacking in.essential detail; for example, it was often deemed unnecessary to enter in the Register the surname of a wife, thereby giving rise to much difficulty in identifying with confidence persons of the same forename. The large number of churches lying in close proximity within the confined limits of the City of Norwich to which must be added the several chapels contained within the Cathedral precinct makes identification by Parish less confident than it might be in a country area; though some attributions can be endorsed by this means, lending a measure of authority to otherwise optimistic speculation.2 The Church of St Mary the Less ceased to be used by the French Protestants in 1832, when "the remains of the congregation gravitated towards Unitarianism"² and not a few of our name in the latter part of the XVIII and early XIX Centuries are found to have been Nonconformists of one sect or another. In 1844, an Act of Parliament permitted the solemnization of marriages in Nonconformist Chapels and Meeting Houses. By this date it was compulsory to report such events to the General Register Office, where they can be traced in voluminous Indices. Not all these Protestant Dissenters, however, accepted the practice of christening in infancy, so that an adult baptism sometimes conceals the date of a birth not elsewhere to be found except, perhaps on the faded fly-leaves of some Family Bible lovingly preserved in private possession. Of births, marriages and deaths within the Roman Catholic Church we have no information prior to the third quarter of the year 1837, after which some occur in the indices at Somerset House. Of those who professed no faith and may lie interred in Common Burial Grounds we have no knowledge until the Act made mandatory the registration of such events. Similarly those who were born, married and perished beyond the boundaries of England and Wales we glean only occasional and fortuitous intelligence. In Great Britain, after proposals had been made and defeated in 1753, the Census was first definitely established in 1801 and was thereafter taken decennially, though the earlier returns are held to be not wholly reliable. In these, as in all the other repositories of information named above, a lack of variety in choice of forenames contributes to the complication. This is exemplified by a plurality of Johns, of James', Josephs and Samuels contemporaneous, with a corresponding proliferation of Mary Anns, Sarahs and Elizabeths; the combination James Joseph, alternatively Joseph James, is one that proves particularly perplexing. Meanwhile, the confusion of spellings continues, made more confounding by illegible handwriting, by perished manuscripts and successive transcription, and is not finally resolved today. In those branches with which we are more directly concerned, however, the present form of PEROWNE became general by the middle of the XIX Century, but by what process, or with whose consent, this was achieved we do not know. One line alone so far as we can tell, persevered with PEROWN until that, too, fades from view with the death of JAMES PEROWN, Straw Hat Manufacturer (Master), in a boarding house at Eastbourne on 9th September, 1911.

During this upgrade I have used the following websites for research:

1. https://www.freereg.org.uk/?locale=en
2. http://tinstaafl.co.uk/nbp/index.htm#N

If anyone has any data that they are happy to include or if they have evidence and information that identifies inaccuracies or ommissions please email us