The Ancestry of Leonard Vernedeau

by W.W.Varnedoe, Jr.

5 October 1999

The first hard, documented fact we know about Leonard Vernedeau is that he was granted a license to trade on the Savannah River by the British Crown Colony of South Carolina on 9 April 1736. From that time on he left a broad trail which is well documented. We know whom he married and who his descendants are down to today.

But where was he born? When? These are questions that have eluded us. Here is what we know

There is a line of Varnedores in South Carolina who trace themselves to an Adam Varnedore. There is also a book, The Mobley’s, Their Connections by W.W.Dixon, which tells a wild tale of an Adam Varnedore accompanying a Mobley from Ireland to Pennsylvania, then to South Carolina. This fits none of our known facts and Adam is, no doubt, just another descendant of our Leonard Vernadeau.

One member of our family, John Varnedoe, who was descended from Henry Varnedore, one of Leonard’s sons, had an oral tradition in his family that Leonard was born in 1717 and Leonard’s father born in 1682; his father in 1657 and his father in 1628, all without names or places. Actually, the 1717 date for Leonard’s birth seems quite reasonable since he must have been at least 16 years old to obtain that trading license, yet he married in 1742 and fathered children well into the 1750s. John’s tradition had Leonard and his father as the only members of the family escaping a massacre in the Vivarais Province of France.

I once corresponded with a Varnado (one of the western branch of the family) who had letters from a British genealogist showing Leonard and his father in London, England. It seems that there was a tombstone with Vernedeau carved on it which this person claimed to have seen. However, after paying this genealogist(?) to document the find, he claimed the cemetery had been destroyed and was no longer visible, but only after getting more fees from our family member. I believe he was robbed, and that no such tombstone ever existed. It is true that some Huguenots did migrate to England and some then move on to America, but this is pretty thin evidence for our Leonard.

I have several letters from a French Lawyer named Pierre Vernadeau who lived in Paris, France. Now deceased, he thought he was the last of the French Vernadeaus. He wrote that he had traced his family back as far as the French Revolution in 1795. Unfortunately, this is not far enough to get back to our Leonard, who was already in America by then. Pierre claimed the revolution had destroyed the parish records. He wrote that his family came from the Limousine District of France, and that the name Leonard was a frequent one in his family, being named for a famous Limousine Saint. He stated that a fragment of data listed a Vernhaudi in the Bishopric of Limoges. ( the "di" could well be a Latin grammatical ending for "do" or "du.") Limoges is in the Limousine.

Pierre also concurred that the name derives from the root VERNE, an old French word for an Alder tree. This leads to Vernet(e) as meaning an Alder grove. Add "de eau" (by water) to distinguish which Alder grove, then put it all together and get VERNED’EAU meaning "An Alder Grove by the Water."

In the Dictionaire etymologique des noms de lieux en France there is a city called Vernet-les-Bains in the Rousillon district, derived from the name Verneto. Bear in mind that Old French, like Old English spelled phonetically. Thus, "Verneto" sounds exactly like "Vernedeau" in French. Its mayor has written me that Vernet-les-Bains is indeed a " villedeau," although there is no one with the name Vernedeau living there now. However, it is very close to the Spanish border in the Pyrenees mountains. I have corresponded with some Verneda families in Barcelona who say they came from the Pyrenees area. Verneda in Catalan, the language of Barcelona, means, " An Alder Grove by Water." This is confirmed by their Coat of Arms (which they sent me) which shows two trees by a band of water. However, these arms were granted too late (1756) to be ancestral to our branch. Nor were the Vernedas able to trace themselves back into the early 1700s. This lead also ended.

In Reitstap’s Memorial, there is a Coat of Arms listed for the Verneto name in Vaud. Vaud is now in Switzerland, but may have been in France once.

Despite Pierre Vernadeau’s idea that all parish registers were destroyed, he was obviously mistaken because the Parish Registers of St. Maurice La Souterraine, Dept. of Creuse (part of the Limousine) list Gabriel Vernadaud (1685), Francis Vernadaud (1691), Pierre Vernadaud (1695), Leonard Vernadaud ( La Terrade 1699), Marguerite Vernadaud (1695), then that Francis Vernadaud married Jean Ducet (1687) and Francis Vernadaud married Simon Poujaud. These odd spellings could well be merely phonetic versions, (after all, look how the Rev. Geissendanner spelled our name!) "La Terrade" is a location near La Souterrain. I have been told that Vernadaud is a legitimate way to pronounce "Vernadeau" in French. If this Leonard is our Leonard, using John Varnedoe’s dates, we might be able to stretch back our ancestors’ names two more generations. Note that this parish date of 1699 will fit the American record but not John’s oral tradition. However, these could be death not birth dates, in which case, this Leonard could be our Leonard’s father. Somewhere along the line a belief arose among the Varnados that Leonard’s father was named Henri. I do not know the source of this.

Recently, a story has surfaced from John C. Varnadoe who put me in contact with Bill Hutto. Bill in tracing Sarah Hutto's husband, our Leonard Vernadeau, had him born near Limoges, in the Limousine in 1717, died 1794 in Orangeburg, SC. He gives Leonard’s father's name as Jean Vernadeau, born 1682 near Limoges, Married Anna ? and died 1735 in London. He tells me he has no references. This sounds like a composite of what I had written in my early book, "Leonard Varnedeau and Sarah Hutto, Three Generations," except for the "Jean and Anna," which are new. Much of this has been written, piece-meal, in the newsletter, "Varnado Genealogist," when it was published by Harrell Varnado.

I would guess that the family could have arisen in Vernet-les-Bains, then split up during the religious wars, part crossing the Pyrenees, others going to the Limousine. From there some, the Huguenots, came to America, some, perhaps Catholic, stayed in France.

So there we are today. I sure would like to see the actual Parish registers in France. But where?

Vernet-les Bains, as pointed by the linguistic evidence and as the Catalans think, Vivarais as in John’s oral tradition, or St. Maurice La Souterraine in the Limousine, as the one record seems to indicate along with Pierre Vernadeaus belief, or elsewhere? And did he come directly to America or briefly stop in England?