Early USA Plants

The name spelling Plantt and some early USA Plants

Plants in the USA have been associated with, for example, the following whose descendants have been DNA tested..

the Plant City, Florida Plants, as described in Issue No 1 of the Journal; these are associated with the railway pioneer Henry Bradley Plant who was a descendant of John Plant (c1646-1691) who emigrated from England c1639 (or possibly 1632) with his wife Betty Roundkettle and settled in the east part of Brandford, Connecticut [The Life of Henry Bradley Plant, by George Hutchinson-Smith (G.Putnam & Sons, 1898)]; the adjacent photograph of a map of the Plant transport System has been kindly supplied by John D Plant, a descendant of John Plant of Brandford;
or.
a William Plant who was in Virginia prior to 1677 whose signature is said to have been written Wm Plant^t as though an abbreviation of a longer name (e.g. Plantinet or perhaps even Plantagenet). It appears that shortly after 1829, members of this Plant family dropped the extra ^t though there are still some in North America sometimes using the spelling Plantt.

In view of the occurrence of the spelling Plantt in early USA records, it seem appropriate to summarise some backgound to this spelling. Early parish records for Lincolnshire, England for example include the spelling Plantt...

1565, 14 Oct, Thomas Plantt m Jone Pacoke at Wainfleet All Saints
1565, 29 Nov, Margaret Plantt, bap at Wainfleet All Saints

and, more generally, there are 16th and 17th century occurrences of the spelling Plantt ..

England: Oxfordshire (1540); Lincolnshire (1565, 1565, 1565); Worcestershire (1577, 1577); Cheshire (1581); Leicestershire (1586, 1637); London (1661); Staffordshire (1682)
Germany: Rheinland, Preussen (1651, 1651, 1651, 1651, 1662, 1662, 1662, 1662, 1662, 1662)

The following information for early Plant settlers in Virginia is taken from Nugent Cavaliers and Pioneers: Abstracts of Virginia Land Patents and Grants (denoted C+P below) and from Meyer Adventures of Purse and Person, Virginia 1607-1624 (denoted P+P)

William Plant is listed as dead on a 1624 muster-roll of Virginia Colony sent to England following an Indian massacre. He is described as having come over the water in 1624 (P+P).

Mathew Plant is listed as a witness of a Virginia land contract made in 1635 (C+P).

Land is granted by headright to an individual for having transported Richard Plant from England to Virginia Colony in 1638 (entrepreneurs were granted 50 acres of land for each person whose passage they paid - immigrants who came to America in this way typically indentured themselves to serve for several years to repay the debt) (C+P).

New Kent CO VA Land is granted by headright to an individual for having transported Jonathan Plant and William Plant in 1687 (C+P).

Land is granted by headright to an individual for having transported John Plant in 1704 (C+P).

New Kent CO VA Land is granted by headright to an individual for having transported Jonathan Plant and Elizabeth Plant in 1706 (C+P).

Henrico CO VA Land is granted to an individual by headright for having transported John Plant and Elizabeth Plant in 1715 (C+P).

Johann Mattheis Plantz is on the passenger list for the ship Francis and Elizabeth that arrived in Philadelphia from Rotterdam on 21 Sept 1742. There is also a Leonhardt Plantz (descendants also called Plants) who came to America from Bavaria in 1749 aboard the ship Fane. (The following information was supplied by Sandra Griffith). Leonhardt's son Leonhardt Plantz was born 1730 in Rothenstein, Palatine, Bavaria, Germany and died in Pennsylvania, USA. Another son Christian Plants was also born in Rothenstein, on 21 April 1747 and died 5th May 1823 in Washington Co., PA.

It is possible that our DNA Testing Programme may be able to distinguish between these various branches and/or relate them to other branches overseas

There are maps of the recent distribution of these names.

Plant Name Distribution Page