A Brief History of the Rayne Family
by Derek Rayne, Ph.D.
The first person of the name Rayne to set foot upon the North American
continent was a soldier, Dylan Rayne, who was one of the men left behind at the first
Roanoak Colony by Sir Francis Drake.
The story of this colony is quite interesting and somewhat unknown. In 1584
Queen Elizabeth I granted a patent to Sir Walter Raleigh to colonize in America. The
following year the colony on Roanoak Island was established by one hundred
householders under the direction of Sir Richard Grenville, who then returned to
England for supplies. Unfortunately, his return was delayed and the colony languished.
Finally, after ten months, the surviving populace was transported back to England by
Drake, who was sailing home after having destroyed the Spanish fort at St. Augustine,
Florida. Drake left behind fifteen of his own men, one of whom was Dylan Rayne, to
scout the area and maintain a base for future colonization. They were never heard from
again.
In 1587 the colony was resettled, but by 1590 it too had vanished. This was
what became famous as the "Lost Colony of Roanoak". Amongst the missing was
Virginia Dare, the first English child born in the "New World". Personally, I like to
think that perhaps Dylan, or one of Drake's other men, came to their rescue and all
settled somewhere inland amongst a friendly Indian tribe. There to melt away into the
blood of Native America.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
According to a very ancient family Bible that resides in the Luna Foundation's
collections, the next Rayne to settle upon the continent was Captain Jacob Rayne,
who had been born in the parish of Rayne in Essex in 1607. It would appear that he
was a descendant of Sir Gilbert de Rayne of Rayne Hall, a gentleman of Norman
extraction, and his wife Morgwyn, the daughter of a Welsh nobleman, Emrys ap
Owain of Gwynedd. It also seems likely that Jacob was a kinsman, perhaps the
nephew, of the above mentioned Dylan Rayne.
In 1637, Captain Rayne was dispatched to "New Britainne" by a society of
gentlemen scholars based in London. He was sent as a replacement for their former
representative, Nathaniel Alyn, who had been slain in the 1622 massacre of Martin's
Hundred. Having arrived aboard the ship Crescent Moon, he settled on a tract of land
"lying and being in the Summer Islands, otherwise called Bermudas." It may sound as
though he had ended up in Bermuda, in the central Atlantic, rather than America,
however, this was Bermuda Hundred in Henrico County, Virginia. It is believed that
he was joined in 1640 by his wife, Hope, the daughter of John Avery of London. Two
years later their only son, Thomas, was born.
Jacob seemed to have lived quietly, engaged in a trading business, and followed
his societies mandates to "explore the Countrie and discourse with its Inhabitants."
Although his name is missing from an account, The Discovery of New Braittaine, by
Edward Bland, published in London in 1651, Captain Rayne apparently accompanied
the expedition made the previous year by Colonel Abraham Wood and the author into
the areas around North Carolina's Chowan River. Three years later, plagued by ill
health, Jacob, accompanied by his wife and son, returned to England, where he lived
the life of a country gentleman until his death in 1687.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Having completed his education and become a member of the scholarly society
himself, Thomas Rayne returned to Virginia in 1662. During the passage, his ship was
blown off course and forced to dock in New Amsterdam, where he remained for the
next year. While there, he met and married Christina, the daughter of Paulus Jansen
van Jevern, the society's agent in New Netherlands. Soon thereafter the couple
departed for Virginia, where they settled upon Thomas' inheritance in Bermuda
Hundred.
Thomas was the only member of this lineage to break the family custom of
marrying late and siring few children. In during their twenty-two years of marriage
Christina, reputed to have been a very small woman, bore to him ten children, most of
whom sadly died in infancy or childhood. Those that survived were a son, Avery, born
in 1682, and his two elder sisters, Jannetje and Maritje.
There is evidence that Thomas frequently reported to the gentlemen scholars in
London upon his explorations and contacts as a trader. His only appearances in the
court records, other than when he was called for jury duty or fined for taking part in
the local illegal horse races, seem to revolve around a dispute with the local sheriff. In
the first instance, he charged the sheriff, Major Thomas Chamberlayne, with being
drunken in public and exposing himself at the crossroads. The sheriff was tried by the
grand jury for being drunk and disorderly, convicted, and relieved of his position by
the governor and the council. The court minutes of "30 April 1679 at a Court Holden
at Varina" read, "It having been shown by many witnesses that he had highly and
contemptuously offended said court."
The following year Chamberlayne made accusations of blasphemy and
witchcraft against Thomas, who was rumored to have "second sight" because of his
uncanny luck at the above mentioned horse races. Fortunately, because of the former
sheriff's reputation for erratic behavior, all charges were dropped before a single
witness could be called.
Four years later, in 1684, Thomas Rayne accompanied a caravan of Indian
traders bound for the Cherokee lands west of the Appalachian mountains. According
to the History of the Dividing Line, by William Byrd II, "All were killed by the Indians
in their returne from the Westward about thirty miles beyond Ochanechee," along the
Ochanechee Path. Thereafter, Mistress Rayne sent her children Holland to be schooled
at Leiden and assumed her husband's duties with regards to both the society and his
trading endeavors.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Avery Rayne returned to assist his mother at some point prior to 1717 when he
married Elizabeth Drake of Turkey Island. Nothing much is known of this couple
except that amongst the children Elizabeth bore were twin sons, Ethan and Nathan,
born in 1719. Both boys were educated at the College of William and Mary in
Williamsburg and in England.
Upon their return to America, the society dispatched Ethan Rayne on
expeditions into the French claimed lands that would become the old Northwest
Territory, the area north of the Ohio River. There he became well acquainted with the
major tribes, the Shawnee, Miami, and Potawatomi, amongst others. It was upon one
of these journeys that he was lost. Nothing is known of his fate.
Having little academic vocation or intellectual curiosity, Nathan Rayne never
joined the society. Instead, he married Mistress Rebekah Williams, a young widow
with a sizable dowry, and concentrated on expanding his business and the trading
relationship with the Cherokee and other southeastern tribes, such as the Choctaw,
Chickasaw, and Creek.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Their son, Emrys Rayne, born around 1750, drifted back into society circles,
but because of the worsening relationship with Great Britain did not return to England
for a formal education. Instead, relying upon instincts native to the family, he became
a rather mysterious figure, choosing to immerse himself in the cultures and religions
of the southeastern tribes. Once a year he would return across the mountains to send
his reports and dispatches back to the society in London or to one of their associated
establishments in Paris or Amsterdam. It is believed that his excursions may have taken
him as far west as Santa Fe and as far north as Canada.
Ultimately, he married a Cherokee shamaness, Adawehi. Renowned for her
intellect and her ability to "conjure," she was, even in her youth, a woman of high
standing within the nation. Throughout the Revolutionary War and for many years after
they lived in a settlement, Conisca, on a branch of the Tennessee River. In 1788,
Adawehi gave birth to her only child, Evan Rayne.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Evan Rayne appears to have been a man of great drive and vigor, endowed with
good business sense and an uncanny foresight. At the age of fifteen, he emerged from
the Cherokee lands and made his way alone to Boston, where he immediately
presented himself to the society's representative, Rev. John Winston.
Rev. Winston had no difficulty bringing the youth's educational level up to
acceptable standards and within a year was able to gain his admission to Harvard.
Because of the Napoleonic Wars and a worsening political situation that would result
in the War of 1812, Evan chose to forego furthering his education abroad and remained
in Boston for several years, engaging in religious studies and scientific investigation
under the guidance of Rev. Winston.
At the age of twenty-four, however, Evan was not immune to the military fervor that swept the nation during the War of 1812. He participated in several battles, including the Battle of the Thames, fought in Ontario on the north shore of Lake Erie in 1813. It was here that the great Shawnee leader, Tecumseh, was slain.
Following his discharge, Sergeant Rayne returned to Boston, where, in 1817 he married Sarah, the sixteen-year-old daughter of the minister and his
wife, Elizabeth Sloan. The following year, he accompanied William Sloan, his wife's
uncle on a westward expedition in search of likely sites for future society branches.
Along the way they took every opportunity to send back reports of intellectual and
scientific interest to the Reverend, who then, since peace had again been established,
forwarded them to the society's main repository in London.
Late in 1822, the pair reached California just as the Mexican revolution was
putting an end to Spanish rule. They made their way to the small pueblo of Yerba
Buena, the embryo of modern San Francisco and thence, across the bay, to the thriving
whaling village of Sausalito.
Realizing that the proper founding of a branch society would require funds, both
for housing and investigation, Evan Rayne established a business refitting and
resupplying the numerous whaling vessels. Continuing his explorations of the west
coast, William Sloan returned to Sausalito every few months to forward his dispatches
to London and Boston.
By 1825 Evan had been joined by his wife. (Sadly, William Sloan's wife,
Abigail, had died of small pox in Boston the previous year.) Over the next few years,
Evan developed a close relationship with Father Mag�n de Catal� of the mission at
Santa Clara. However, because of the distance between Sausalito and Santa Clara the
two frequently met at the mission farther north, San Francisco de As�s, commonly
called to this day Mission Dolores, for the creek upon which it sat.
The padre, who from youth had been an associate of the same scholarly society,
was a pious man who loved and in return was loved by the native children. The two
men had much in common, both the society and a gift for surprising intuition. Father
Mag�n was known as "the Prophet" for his uncanny ability to foretell such events as
the coming of the Americans and the discovery of gold. In 1830, he was recorded as
predicting in a sermon the San Francisco earthquake of 1906. He said, "At the place
now called Yerba Buena there shall one day arise a great and populous city. The city
will flourish and its inhabitants will become rich and powerful, and when at the height
of its prosperity, it will perish by earthquake and fire."
Because of the friendship between himself and the father, Evan Rayne and his
wife converted to Catholicism in 1828 and began the family's close association with
Mission Dolores. There, in 1831, the first Rayne to be baptized in the church's font
was a daughter, Christina Rayne. Five years later the couple christened their second
child, Winston Rayne.
In 1841 a cholera pandemic swept the world, amongst it's victims were William
Sloan and his second wife. Their three young children were taken in by the Raynes.
Evan Rayne's foresight in the founding of his business paid off a thousand fold
during the California Gold Rush, when he expanded his supply and refitting endeavors
into furnishing the "Forty-niners" with all of their needs for the gold fields. Such
businesses were the true gold mines of the gold rush. The family's wealth increased
to the point that he was able to purchase nearby Angel Island, where he began a family
home built upon the foundations of an earlier Mexican fort.
Both of the Rayne children, Winston and his sister, Christina, as well as the
Sloan children, were sent to Great Britain and the Continent to receive their higher
education and social polish.
As an amusing aside, in 1844 just before their departure for Europe, thirteen-year-old Christina caught the eye of Manuel Micheltorena, the last Mexican governor
of Alta California. The governor, who had a notorious reputation with the ladies,
proposed to young Christina, even though he had recently married his longtime
mistress. Fortunately, Christina had inherited the family's instincts and penchant for
accurate character judgement. She dismissed the rogue, telling him, "Since I intend to
obtain the best education Europe has to offer a woman, I am certain that you would not
wish a wife of more intellectual acumen than yourself." Micheltorena took the
response good in humour and, with a laugh, presented her with an intricately carved
mother of pearl comb to wear with her lace mantilla. The comb had been intended as
a gift for his bride, but it is uncertain as to which one.
Evan Rayne passed away in 1861 and was followed shortly thereafter by his
wife, Sarah. Both were buried in a family tomb, created from a natural cave on the
hillside above Angel Island's Ayala Cove.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
While in Europe, two events of the utmost significance occurred in the life of
Winston Rayne. He met his future wife, the Se�orita Elena Ryan de Yorba, the
daughter of Don Hilario Yorba, a fellow Californian and society member from Los
Angeles, and his wife, Mary Ryan. Miss Yorba had been sent on the European Grand
Tour with her due�a. There, in Florence, she met Winston. The two were married at
Mission Dolores upon their return to California.
The other event that made a lasting impression upon the young man was the
current craze of "Gothic follies". Upon his arrival home, he threw himself into his
business pursuits and the expansion of the Rayne home into his own castle, his own
Gothic folly, which he filled with artworks, books, and curiosities collected by his
sister.
Though Winston never joined the society of which his father had so long been
a member, Christina did. Never marrying, she devoted herself to scientific, academic,
and arcane interests and to furthering the prestige of her house, over which she ruled
for nearly fifty years.
Winston and Elena remained childless for many years. Finally, at the age of
nearly forty, Elena delivered a healthy baby boy, Eric, in 1883, but gave her life to do
so. Winston continued to amass his fortune until his death in 1902.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
In accordance with family tradition, Eric Rayne was sent to Oxford for his
higher education and returned to Angel Island in 1905 to assume the reins of both the
family fortune and his aunt's endeavors with the academic society and her scholarly
investigations.
The following April, disaster struck in the form of the Great Quake of 1906 and
the ensuing San Francisco fire. Although the house sustained considerable damage,
Eric pumped immense amounts into the relief funds for the devastated city's refugees.
Five years later he married his distant cousin, Amanda Sloan, who bore him a
son, Winston Rayne II, in 1914. Hours later, the assassination of the Austrian
Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo set Europe aflame in World War I.
Although he was the father of a young child, as well as a man of position and
wealth, Eric, for reasons only known to himself, chose to travel to Europe at the height
of the war. His last correspondences, a letter to his wife and a journal sent to a friend
in London, were posted from Etain, a village east of Verdun, in February 1916. It is
believed that he was killed days later during the German advance and bombardment
of French lines, which resulted in the earthly hell of trench warfare stalemate and
poison gas attacks.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Winston Rayne II was was my father. He became an archaeologist, linguist, and
founder of the Luna Foundation. During World War II, he served as a fighter pilot in
the US Army Air Corps, attaining the rank of captain. In 1944, while on bomber escort
duty, he was shot down over the Netherlands.
Nearly all of the members of the society in Amsterdam were active with the
Dutch resistance. During his escape, my father was assisted by a young woman,
Barbara van der Linden, a society researcher, who was to become my mother.
Following the war, they were married in England at the parish church at Rayne
in Essex. Thus, the family had come full circle. However, like so many foreign war
brides, my mother was lonely and unhappy in her new home on Angel Island, where
I was born in November of 1953.
My father was frequently gone for months at a time on expeditions and
archaeological digs. By 1958, she could no longer stand the loneliness his long
absences. Finally, she decided to take my older sister, Ingrid, and myself and return to
her home in Amsterdam, where we were brought up. She lives there still in a house on
a canal. After that, I saw my father on school holidays and summer breaks, and would
then accompany him on whatever business had engaged his attention at the moment.
It was during one such holiday, in 1969, that I accompanied him to a dig site in
Chipote, Peru where he died in a cave in. The report of the San Francisco
Chronicle
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
There you have my family's story, such as I know it. In the years since my father's death I have attempted to continue his work, both in nurturing and expanding the interests and benefices of the Luna Foundation and in the founding of the Winston Rayne Hall of Antiquities to preserve my father's collection, and those of earlier family members, such as Christina Rayne. It is an endeavor that I hope to continue for the rest of my life. God willing.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
One additional note: Before you ask the question, as any good researcher would.
Sadly, London was the repository for the archives of the scholarly society to which my
family has for so long been attached. All records were destroyed during the Blitz, late
in 1940. It was a devastating loss both for historians and scientists. Most of the other
European branches suffered as well during both World Wars. If I may be of further
assistance, please, do not hesitate to contact me.
Derek Rayne
Angel Island, CA
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