Mary Jordan Bass

My nine time great grandmother! What a woman she was!

Mary Jordan Basse was born in 1621, or perhaps earlier, either in London, or probably at Jordon's Point, VA.  If the story that she was a Huguenot refugee is correct, she might have been named Ann Marie Jourdan. She died 17 Jan. 1629/30, possibly in London. There are some sources that say she died in America. But she died trying to give birth to a still-born child, her 13th child. She and Nathaniel Basse had 3 sets of twins in all those children. (This is my current information from Ancestry, it may change someplace or another.)

Mary was the daughter of Capt. Samuel Silas Jordan, (1578-1623) and Cicley Reynolds Bailey Jordan (who later married a Mr. Farrer as well.) There seems to be controversy that Cicley was a Reynolds. So she's not the first with questionable parentage that I have in my tree. Cicely died on 12 Sept. 1660 on Farrars Island, Virginia.

Mary Jordan married Capt. Nathaniel Basse on 21 May 1613 in London. Many reccords indicate he had been born in London as well. Both her father and husband were merchants who took many trips back and forth form England to the Virginia Colony. 

Her childhood was probably spent in London, She married Capt. Nathaniel in London, and their first set of twins were born on July 15, 1615, in London. Their next son, John, was born in London on Sept. 17, 1616.  He became my nine time great grandfather.

I've already shared the story of how he escaped the Indian attack which burned Basses Choice. Remember this was very early settements, so think of log cabins and pallisades to enclose the homestead's buildings. 

John's younger brothers were also born in London, but at least oder brother Humphrey was killed by the Indians in 1622. It must be noted that their leadership was no longer Powatan, father of Pocahontas. And there aren't any records indicating other children also perished, but Humphrey's twin was also assumed to have perished at the same time.

The story that the parents were away when the Indians burned their holdings on Good Friday, it also srtressed that they returned and set about rebuilding, so that Edward might be born in a shelter by May 8 of 1622. But the records say he was born in London. Perhaps records were only being kept there, as the colonials hadn't set up their first government yet, let alone had time to write down birthdates.

Edward married Mary Tucker, a Christianized Native American cousin of John's Native American wife, Elizabeth Kesiah Tucker.

Of all the 12 live births of Mary Jordan Bass, about 4 died before they were 6, (2 in the Indian attack) and then 2 of the brothers, John and Edward must have been part time with the settlers, and/or part time with their wives' Indian families.* At best. I have heard that most Native tribes have the husband move in with the wife's family. But since both of these ladies were baptized and became Christian, I'm not sure. It would have been really hard on them to join the English society. And shortly after their marriages, a law was passed forbidding marriages between English and Indians. But the church made effort to Christianize the natives, and that' probably how John learned to read and write, after he'd been saved from the fire by friendly Nansemond Indians.

Mary must have been on the seas a few times with her husband in his ships. Early on the ships were providing all the necessities for the settlers, tools, iron things for building, food, animals.

By all the best guesses as to her birthdates, I think she was around 30 years old when she died in childbirth. And I don't see any records that her husband remarried. He lived until 1654, while she died in 1629.  There must have been servants enough to care for all the children in his home, Bass's Choice.

* thinking more of how colonial Englishmen were, I now believe their wives and homes would have been modeled after other Colonial Early Americans, and the Native families would have remained in a background to the business of farming tobacco.