Moles

This interesting surname of English origin is a nickname for someone bearing a fancied resemblance to the mammal, deriving from the Middle English "mol(le)" meaning "mole" plus the suffix "s" "son of". The surname dates back to the late 13th Century, (see below). Further recordings include one Nicholas de Mol (1272), "Testa de Neville, sive Liber Feodorum". Church recordings include one Jane Molles who married William Freesey on December 8th 1621, at St. Gabriel's, Fenchurch, London, Richard, son of Richard and Ann Moles was christened on January 30th 1701 at St. Anne Soho, Westminster. John Henry Mole (1814-1886) was a water-colour painter. He was vice-president of the Royal Institute of Painters in Water-colours, 1879. One William Mole, aged 32, a famine emigrant, sailed from Liverpool aboard the Rochester bound for New York on May 8th 1846. A Coat of Arms was granted to a Moles family which consists of a silver shield with a black bend or diagonal line representing the shoulder strap worm by a warrior between two black lions heads erased. The first recorded spelling of the family name is shown to be that of Willelmus Praepositus de Mole, which was dated 1272, Testa de Neville, sive Liber Feodorum, Gloucestershire, during the reign of King Henry 111, "The Frenchman", 1216 - 1272. Surnames became necessary when governments introduced personal taxation. In England this was known as Poll Tax. Throughout the centuries, surnames in every country have continued to "develop" often leading to astonishing variants of the original spelling.