Rev. William Noyes

Biography

William Noyes combined parish ministry with the education of young men at Cholderton, a village near Salisbury in the county of Wiltshire in southern England. He entered University College, Oxford, in November 1588 and received his bachelor’s degree on May 31, 1592. By the opening years of the seventeenth century he was rector of Cholderton, the village with which his adult life remained associated.

Teaching brought another part of his work into the historical record. The family testimony preserved by Cotton Mather identifies William as the schoolmaster of Thomas Parker. It also describes him as a learned man and, in the account of Parker’s education, a severe teacher. These are remembered judgments from within the family’s religious circle, rather than William’s own description of his methods. They nevertheless establish an educational role beyond the title of rector.

William and his wife Anne raised children in England, including James and Nicholas. Both would later migrate to Massachusetts, but William died before their departure. An inventory of his estate was taken on April 30, 1622, and Anne undertook its administration in May.

His son Nathan succeeded him at Cholderton. William’s own career belongs to the English parish and schoolroom, before the Atlantic migration that made other members of the family prominent in New England.