The Ollier Surname and History
The surname of Ollier is an unusual one in the British Isles, before the nineteenth century the distribution of families bearing this surname was almost exclusively confined to the county of Cheshire in the north west of England with a few exceptions being recorded in London in the south, and Bath in the south west. During the nineteenth century however, the name was more widely distributed and was also to be found in the counties of Lancashire and Staffordshire in reasonable numbers, this was probably due to the rapid increase in industrial development during that period coupled with the ever expanding transportation network and the need to recruit labour to the centres of industrial production, particularly in the north west.
During my research I have come across several spelling variations of the Ollier surname, such as Ollier, Olier, Ollyer, Olyer, Oleheyre, Olliheire and also the name of Alloheire & Holowhear which could be an early interpretation of the name. The first six spellings have all been found in the original parish records relating to the county of Cheshire, as have the last two. The Ollier surname as currently spelt, has consistantly been found in the parish records and various surviving wills from the present day back to the mid 1600's in the county of Cheshire, with a few appearing as Ollyer etc. this I suspect is just a question of phonetics, as then as now, names are often written down as they are heard!
One apparent fact though is the absence of the Ollier surname in the early records prior to the introduction of the Parish Registers in the 1530's, very little is recorded about your average citizen before then unless they were of some note! However surnames as we know them were in common use before this date for at least 100 years, therefore one would expect to see our surname in much greater quantity after the 1530's registration began, this has always puzzled me, it seems that the name just suddenly appeared in the county of Cheshire in this early period.
From my research so far, it is reasonable to assume that nearly all appear to be related to each other. The fifth and the sixth of the spellings in the first six, Oleheyre & Olliheire, could possibly be a link to the last two spellings, Alloheire and Holowhear, the common thread being constonant "h" with its phonetic implications, the name of Alloheire and Holowhear are the earliest found to date, Holowhear in the records of the Parish of Prestbury in Cheshire:
"Weddynges, 1570, Macclesfelde, Wyllm Holowhear and Elizabeth Taylyor xvij Februarij"
And Alloheire from 1572 to 1614 all to be found in the parish register of St Wilfreds Church at Davenham in Cheshire.
"Robertus son of William Alloheire Bapt. 23 Jun 1572"
"Johannes son of William Alloheire Bapt. 8 aug 1579"
"Elizabeth wife of William Alloheire Bur. 13 Jun 1586"
"William Alloheire Marr. Margret Bleas 12 Jun 1588"
"William Alloheire Bur. 10 Oct 1611"
"Anna Olliheire Marr. Rici Stretch 25 Jan 1604"
It can be seen from the above that the same William Alloheire almost certainly married again to a Margret Bleas, two years after the death of his first wife Elizabeth, could Wyllm Holowhear be the same person as William Alloheire ? Their wive's names certainly tie up, as do the dates.
Sadly the Davenham Parish Records for this early period are in a very bad state, with some of the years missing completely. The next Ollier turns up in 1627 in the records of the Chester Archdeaconry Marriage Licences, it is for a Michael Ollier and Alice Holland, they were married on the 26th June 1626 at St. Chads in the Parish of Over (near Winsford) in Cheshire. One of their children, William, was Baptised at St Wilfreds Parish Church, Davenham in Cheshire:
"December 1637, William sonn of Michael Oleheyre"
Michael Ollier and his wife Alice ("Ales") are to be found in the Poll and Hearth Tax returns for Northwich Hundred for the years 1660 and 1664, at that time they were living at or near Wharton in Cheshire. Their son William "Oleheyre" left a will on his death in 1705 and he signed it "William Ollier"
Our next link is a John Ollier and evidence would suggest that he was the brother of Michael Ollier, John married Susannah Lockit in 1633 also at St. Chads in the Over. John Ollier died in 1682 and was living at Marton in Over at the time of his death, he left a will and William Ollier of Wimboldsley (almost certainly Michael Ollier's son) was named as one of the executors, although John signed the will with his mark (a cross) the author of the will clearly spelt John's surname as Ollier as he also did with William (the executor) It is not unreasonable to assume that in the absence of some of the early parish records that John and Michael were in fact the sons of Johannes Alloheire who was baptised at Davenham in 1579, although we may never know for sure.
English or Foriegn ?
The spelling of the surname Ollier in its present form, is almost certainly French in its origin, from my research I would guess that 95% of the worlds Ollier's live in or came from France, the largest population of Ollier's outside that country are to be found in the county of Cheshire in the north west of England. It has long been said that the Ollier's of Cheshire came from France, possibly as Huguenot refugees, This line of thought though, could be based on the fact that the Ollier surname is predominantly French, and therefore would be purely an assumption. Another common thought is that it was a corruption of the more common name of Oliver, but if this were the case then one would expect to find the Ollier's a lot more widley distributed in the earlier centuries in England as was the name of Oliver, to date, the only Oliver's that were Ollier's that I have found so far have simply been clerical errors on some of the later nineteenth and early twentieth century Census returns along with an eighteenth century transcription of a marriage and the odd trade directory entry.
When the words Huguenot refugee are mentioned it is a common mistake to assume that they mainly fled from France around or just after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, this is not so, many came to England long before then following The St Bartholomews Massacre of 1572, and I think it is safe to say that many would have sensed the wind of change along with its religious and political implications long before that terrible event took place, we have to remember that religious strife wreaked havoc across a great part of Europe in the 1500's not only in France but all over the Low countries and neighbouring provinces, there were a great many that fled to England at this time, and later in the 17th century to Ireland and the new world of America and the colonies of South Africa.
So were the Cheshire Ollier's Huguenot, or religious refugees ? or were they home grown as it were, I have found to date no firm evidence that enables me to say either way! There are three other surnames that could be possible contenders for the origin of the Ollier surname, these are the name of Hollyer (also recorded as Hollier, Holyer, Holier etc) the name of Hollyhead, and lastly the name of Ollerhead. The name of Hollyer and its variants seem to be in two main regions of England, Hampshire and some of the neighbouring counties in the south, and Warwickshire in the midlands, I have to say though that I am not an authority on this name but it could be a contender with the first letter, H, being phonetically "dropped" as they migrated northwards, this name is also found in France. The second name of Hollyhead could be a variant of the name of Ollerhead, in the early centuries I have found only a few references to this spelling, those found were mainly in the county of Shropshire (Salop) it has however, the constonant "h" in the middle of the name just like the early Alloheire's of Davenham. Lastly there is the name of Ollerhead, early references to this name occur in Cheshire, mainly confined to the old City of Chester.
It is interesting to note also that the City of Chester has been a centre for trade with Europe for many centuries, records show that salt was exported from there to France as well as other countries, in fact there is an area called "Dunkirk" not far from Northwich in Cheshire which apparently took the name from its French namesake when Cheshire salt was exported there, this name goes back several centuries, how far back I have yet to ascertain.
I have listed the names discussed so far for comparison, please note that this is for illustration purposes only, for example the name Holowhear does not mean that it was evolved from the name of Hollyhead etc. except Oleheyer & Ollier which have been proved to be one of the same name.
Known Ollier's
Holowhear Hollyhead
Alloheire Ollerhead
Oleheyre
Ollier Hollier
Ollyer Hollyer
Olier Holier
Ollier Oliver
Other Contenders
Hollyhead
Ollerhead
Hollier
Hollyer
Holier
Oliver
At first glance it would seem that the name of Hollier etc. would be a safe bet for the origins of the Ollier surname in Cheshire, but then again it can be no coincidence that the earliest recordings of the name spanning a time of almost seventy years (1570 to 1637) have that "h" in the middle of the name, language difficulties perhaps ? or pure romanticism!! If anyone has any theories or information on these early years of the Ollier's of Cheshire I would be happy to hear from you.
One final note, the only reference to anything approaching the "Allohiere" surname I have found to date, were both in France in the area of Ille et Villaine, Cotes d'Amor, Brittany. It is two references to two "Alohier" burials:
"Rennes St Pierre en St Georges 1771-1775"
"Rennes St Etienne 1726-1750"
These are references to the surname of "Alohier" only, no first names or precise dates are given, one would have to look at the specific French Registers to obtain further details.
Another possible contender: It consists of the two words: Oller & Heyes. I recently came across this in an online document search with reference to the county of Shropshire, these two words were shown running together, and seem to relate to a field name / location name around Aston and Lacon (Nr Wem) in Shropshire. Field / Locations mentioned: "Ollar Hay" "Olary-heyes" "Little Oller Heyes" "Ollar Heas" these are mentioned in various "land transaction" documents in Shropshire from around the mid 1600's which are kept at the Shropshire Archives Service, and are most certainly very "localized place names". It can be seen that when these words are joined together, they have a similar phonetic sound to the already mentioned sounds of the early Ollier spellings. The above might seem a bit of a long shot, but due to the shortage of any other leads to the early history of the Ollier surname, I think it is best to list all possible avenues, however remote that they may seem!
Another possibility: Allihies, a place name in southwest Ireland, Co. Cork (means cliff). O'Leahy, a surname found in that, and other locations in Ireland. Cheshire was a popular place for Irish trade & visa versa.
There is one avenue of research that might tell wether or not the Ollier's were strangers, this would involve searching through the E179 series of records held at the National Archives at Kew, these consist of various records of the taxes levied during this early period, and in the case of certain taxes, a seperate rate was imposed on strangers. A brief online check has revealed that the locations that relate to the known haunts of the early Ollier's, is well represented in these documents ie: Wharton, Davenham, Middlewich, Whitegate etc. Names within these documents however, can not be acsessed on line.
The Huguenot Olier's (D'Olier or D'Ollier) in Ireland
My research to date has found no link with this Huguenot line or other known Olier Huguenots to our Cheshire Ollier's, the research indicates that they were probably of French origin and centers mainly around one Isaac Olier. From the Wagner Collection at the Huguenot Society Library in London his pedigree shows his Gt Grandfarther to be Jean Olier (Seigneur De Vaudelle 1538) Isaac was made Free Burgess of Amsterdam in 1686 and was naturalised in Dublin in 1698, under an Act for encouraging Protestant Strangers to settle in Ireland, (a la William of Orange et all) His son, who was born in Ireland, was named Isaac D'Olier in honour of his French roots, he became a Goldsmith in Dublin, and he went on to have at least three children, one of these children was named Jeremiah D'Olier who became a Goldsmith like his farther and later became the High Sheriff of Dublin in 1788 and was one of the founders of the Bank of Ireland, D'Olier Street in Dublin was named after him.
Could the Cheshire Ollier's Still Be of Irish Descent?
The O'Leary Theory?
In all probability I would say that the answer to this question is YES, in the absence of any proven genealogical connection. I consider this to be so based on the following known facts:
We know that nearly all the early spellings of the Ollier surname are to be found in the Davenham Parish Records.
These early spellings are entered in the Davenham Parish Register as Alloheire or slight variants of that name.
No other records prior to 1570's have been found in Cheshire or the rest of England.
It would seem and therefore not unreasonable to assume that the Alloheire's (Ollier's) of Cheshire were not from England originally but from elswhere due to the abscence of any records prior to 1570 in England.
No reason found to date for any French Ollier's turning up in Cheshire in the 1570's.
The O'Leary's ........ The gaelic (early Irish) spelling of this surname is O'Laoghaire and is sometimes recorded as O'Laohaire, phonetically this is amost identical to Allohiere.
There are a series of Irish historical events that lead up to a series of wars known as the "Desmond Wars" in Ireland which started around 1569. This more than likely would account for the migration to England of the family, the name evolving purely to Ollier and Ollyer by the mid to late 1600's.
For more information on the O'Leary's of Ireland follow the O'Leary link from the Home Page.
The Ancestors of Charles Ollier - Author & Publisher of London
The Family of Charles Ollier - Author & Publisher of London
The Ancestors of Richard Ollyer (Ollier) - Brewer of Holborn London