A Possible Kellogg Tartan
TIMOTHY HOPKINS, a member of the New England Historic Genealogical Society, produced a three volume book in 1901, entitled The Kelloggs in the Old World and the New. (San Francisco: Sunset Press and Photo Engraving Co.) The book has been reprinted by Higginson Book Company. The price quoted in early 2003 is $255.00/set for softcover and $285.00 for hardcover. The price isn't cheap, but the material is excellent and complete.
Hopkins had a number of connections with the Kellogg family--he was raised by "two elderly maiden Kellogg great aunts " (Mary and Nancy Kellogg of Great Barrington, Massachusetts), and married Mary Kellogg Crittenden, a niece of his adopted mother.
A more detailed biography of Hopkins (who, among other things, founded Palo Alto, California), is available to you by clicking on the white lettering in this sentence. Mr. Hopkins stated in the preface that he had "simply attempted to give an account of the Kellogg family in America, in all of its branches, and to trace it to its transatlantic home."
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A Possible Kellogg Tartan
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The book contains the records of nearly five thousand families with more than twenty-two thousand descendants. Almost the entire book follows the descendants of three sons of Martin Kellogg of Braintree, England. Realizing that the last half of the nineteenth century had seen the immigration of other Kelloggs from the Old World, he also included a section of those for whom he had been unable to find connections to Martin Kellogg's sons.
Hopkins traced the name back to about the time of the Norman Conquest (1066 A.D.), when William the Conqueror established Norman rule of England.
The use of family names rose about this time, with the rise of the Christian religion. Many of the family names used were identified with the profession of the first bearer of the name. Some have speculated that "Kellogg" came from "kill hog", i.e., butchers. Others have noted that in medieval times, a "log" was a form of manacle for prisoners, and the "key log" was the keeper of keys--i.e., a locksmith. Some believe the family is of Scottish origin--a family tradition holds that the Kelloggs were partisans of James VI of Scotland, and came with him to England (when, after the death of Elizabeth I, he ascended the throne of Great Britain as James I), and remained there until their settlement in New England. Others believe the family to be of Welsh origin. Some have pointed to Ireland as the source of the name.
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King
James I of Great Britain
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But the first public records in Great Britain which show the name are those of Debden, Essex County, England, which mention Nicholas Kellogg, who was born about 1488, a decade before Columbus visited the New World for the first time (and fifty years before James VI of Scotland came to the throne, which discounts the Scottish origin theory).
Hopkins sets forth in some detail his theory that Essex County, England is the ancestral home of the family. His research points to the strong Puritan roots in the area. Essex had a number of monasteries until they were dissolved by Henry VIII. Essex, a fertile farming area, is strategically located in southeast England, near London. The Puritans in England had for a long time contended for a simpler form of worship than that of the Church of England. The reign of Henry VIII's daughter, Elizabeth I, was a time of religious persecution, and that of James I (which united the thrones of England and Scotland) was one of struggle for the recognition of freedom of worship.
The period was a stormy one, both in political and religious affairs, and the contest for church reformation and freedom of conscience soon broadened into one for liberty of state as well. James, supported by the authority of the Church of England, suppressed Parliament for seven years, and assumed powers not granted him by the people. Many of the Puritans became Separatists during this period, and realized they must seek in other lands the freedom they were denied in their own. The great Puritan migration began during this reign, and about 21,000 people emigrated, starting with the first settlement in New England, at Plymouth, in 1620. Many more Puritans remained in England, of course, and their efforts resulted in the overthrow of Charles I and the establishment of the Commonwealth.
Hopkins traces the Kellogg descendants from Phillipe and Nicholas in England to Joseph, Daniel and Samuel Kellogg. These three were Puritans who left Essex in the 1630's, a decade or so after the Mayflower landed in Massachusetts. There doesn't appear to be a record of the name of the boat on which they sailed, but they landed in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
The descendants of two of the brothers (Joseph and Samuel) began a migration to the Middle West and West by the early 1700's. The third brother, Daniel, stayed in New England, as did his descendants. Many of the early Kelloggs moved through the Hudson River Valley throughout New York and into Canada, but today there are very few left in Vermont or New Hampshire.
Hopkins' research has some limitations. Although his research of members of the family throughout the East, Midwest and West is fairly strong, he has very little information of members of the Kellogg family who lived in the South, and, of course, his work stops in the late 1800's.
Furthermore, he ignores those whose original name was changed upon their immigration to the United States. For instance, The San Francisco Chronicle noted on June 23, 2001, the passing of Nina Poliakoff Kellogg, who had been born in Borguzin, Siberia, Russia. She had married Anatole Samuel Kaloogsky in China, and come to the United States in 1923. At the time they became citizens in 1928, they changed their name to Kellogg. Her obituary detailed her pride in her Russian heritage. She and her descendants would not have been detailed in Hopkins research.
Notwithstanding these shortcomings, the Hopkins material are of great value to the beginning genealogist. Who would ever have dreamed there was a three volume book on The Kellogg Family that had ever been published?
