One website which sells family crests claims that the name Colver is derived from the Old English word “culfre”, which is itself derived from the Latin “columbula” or “columba” meaning “dove” [strangely, this is also given sometimes as a possible root of my first name, Colin, via the Gaelic “Cailean”].  It suggests that people were given this name who displayed characteristics associated with doves, such as a mild temperament.

 

The website also claims that there were Colvers recorded in Herefordshire earliest, where they held lands possibly from before the Norman conquest.

 

 

Although at no time a very numerous family, the Colvers, or Culvers, are readily traced in many of the English Shires, or Counties.  The name is found in various forms of spelling, such as "Colver," "Collver," "Coluer," "Culver," "Culliver," etc.; the variation arising principally from the poor orthography of the middle ages and the mood of the scribe who wrote the document, who would often spell the same word in two, or perhaps more, ways in the same record, as is well known to genealogists, often to their perplexity.  Several excellent authorities state that the Colver family originated in Saxony, the spelling of the name there being "Kolver," and that the descendants in England and later in America were of Saxon ancestry.  The history of the early Colvers in England gives evidence of their Saxon origin.  (At this date, 1909, there are a few families in the United States using the spelling "Kolver" but are evidently not descendants of Edward Colver, the Puritan.)  In America the various branches have invariably used one or the other of the two forms, "Colver" and "Culver," both of which are found in the old records applying to the same person.

The etymology of the name seems to have been derived from the word "culver," meaning a pigeon or dove.  The name "Culverhouse" is found in some parts of England and evidently means "dovecote;" probably from the fact that the person with whom the name originated kept a number of pigeons or doves.  The poet Thompson in his "Seasons" makes use of the word thus:

 

"Or lie reclined beneath yon spreading ash,
Hung o'er the steep, whence born on liquid wing,
The sounding culver shoots."

In the south of England there are several places with names employing the word "culver," such as: Culverden and Culverstone in Kent, and Culvercliff in the Isle of Wight, all of which were doubtless places frequented by unusual numbers of wild pigeons or doves.

The trustworthiness of the tradition that the name Culver is an Anglicization of the Prussian Kaulver is sufficiently disapproved by the fact that William Culvere is in the Hundred Rolls, long before the period of immigration from Prussia.

Families of the name Calver or Colver have been found in Derbyshire, Suffolk and Leicester; but the indications are that Edward Colverm the Puritan emigrant, came from one of the southern counties in the vicinity of London.  John Winthrop the younger, in whose company Edward Colver came to America, recruited his band of colonists from the counties Middlesex, Kent and Essex; and as the name Colver, or Culver, is found in the Middlesex records, especially in some parishes of London, it is more than probable Edward Colver was a native of those parts.

For illustration:  On the registers of Kensington parish church were found the following:

Marriages "1549 Edward Colver and Alis Lincone."
Baptisms "1552 Oct. 23 Richard son of Edward and Alis Colver."
Baptisms "1563 May 30 Wm. s. of Edward Colver."
Burials "1556 July 2 Hughe Colver."
Burials "1559 Oct. 1 Rich. s. of Edward Colver"
Burials "1559 Alis, wife of Edward Colver."

The above record indicates that Edward Colver married a second time; his son William being the child of the second wife.  The Kensington records cease here; the next being found in the adjoining parish of Clerkenwell:

 

"Middlesex Sessions Rolls

 

"Muniment room, Sessions House, Clerkenwell.

 

"4, April, 1596.  36 Elizabeth.  Coronoer's Inquisition-post mortem, taken at Hardmondsworth, Mdx. on view of the body of Edward Culver, there ling dead:  With the verdict that, on the 26 Dec. 36 Eliz. between the hours of eleven and twelve p.m., the said Edward Culver, George Hulett, labourer, and Robert Glynne, Yoman, all of Hardmondsworth, aforesaid, quarrelled and fought together with their fists, in which affray George Hulett with his teeth bit the middle finger of Edward Culver's left hand, so that the same left hand and the arm became putrid and sick and that Edward Culver languished from the said 26th day of December to the 25th of March next following, on which day he died of the wound so given him.  On his arraignment for thus killing Edward Culver, George Hurlett put himself "Not Guilty," and the jurors on their oath declared "quod Johannes Atstyle interfecit et occidit predictum Edwardum Culver."

 

"Gool Delivery Roll--21 June 36 Eliz. (1596)"

 

Whether the Edward Colver of Kensington is identical with the Edward Culver of Clerkenwell is not proved; if they were the same person he must have been an old man bordering on seventy years of age in 1596.  The similarity of name, and also the location, would suggest some connection with Edward Colver the Puritan.

 

In 1577, on 11 May, Benett Colver, the wife of William Colver was buried at St. Alphgate Church, Canterbury.  Eight months later the second marriage of this William Colver is recorded in the same parish: "Wm. Culver of St. Alphage, Centerbury city, Vesturer, and Josue Wright of St. Peters, widow, at Monkton, Jan. 11, 1577."  According to our present reckoning this date would be 11 January, 1578.  The baptism of two daughters, Libbell and Margaret Colver, are also recorded in the same parish.  Other Colvers and Culvers appear on the registers of Cantebury, but have no bearing upon Edward the Puritan specially, although, doubtless, they are branches of the same family.  As early as 1475 a Richard CUlver, weaver, lived at Bristol; but the family seem to have clustered in the south-eastern counties for the most part.  Edward Colver sailed from the port of London in 1635, in one of the ships which carried John Winthrop's company of emigrants to America, but so far the research has failed to reveal his parentage.

 

Footnote:  Some students of Colver genealogy claim the name was originally Colliver, derived from the Latin word Coluver, a snake or serpent, and that the heraldic crest is a right hand holding an uplifted club signifying a snake killer.  The compiler of this work can find no evidence to support this view.