First found in Gloucestershire where they were seated from early times and their first records appeared on the early census rolls taken by the early Kings of Britain to determine the rate of taxation of their subjects.

For political, religious, and economic reasons, thousands of English families boarded ships for Ireland, the Canadas, the America colonies, and many of smaller tropical colonies in the hope of finding better lives abroad. Although the passage on the cramped, dank ships caused many to arrive in the New World diseased and starving, those families that survived the trip often went on to make valuable contributions to those new societies to which they arrived. Early immigrants bearing the Nutley surname or a spelling variation of the name include : James Nutt and his wife Rebecca settled with their three children in New York in 1739; Thomas and William Nudd settled in the Barbados in 1663; William Nutt settled in Virginia in 1636.

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