Cockcroft History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms

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England

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Cockcroft is a name whose history is connected to the ancient Anglo-Saxon tribes of Britain. The name is derived from when the Cockcroft family once lived in Carcroft, a hamlet in the parish of Owston in Yorkshire.

Early Origins of the Cockcroft family

The surname Cockcroft was first found in South Yorkshire, at Carcroft, a rural village part of the Metropolitan Borough of Doncaster. The earliest record of the village was in the 12th century when it was listed as Kercroft and literally meant "enclosure near the marsh" having derived from the Old Scandinavian word "kjarr" + and the Old English word "croft." 1

Early History of the Cockcroft family

This web page shows only a small excerpt of our Cockcroft research. Another 50 words (4 lines of text) covering the years 1272, 1296, 1379 and 1764 are included under the topic Early Cockcroft History in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.

Cockcroft Spelling Variations

Sound was what guided spelling in the essentially pre-literate Middle Ages, so one person's name was often recorded under several variations during a single lifetime. Also, before the advent of the printing press and the first dictionaries, the English language was not standardized. Therefore, spelling variations were common, even among the names of the most literate people. Known variations of the Cockcroft family name include Cockcroft, Cocckecroft, Carrecroft, Calcraft, Chalcraft, Choldcorft, Cracroft, Chalcroft and many more.

Early Notables of the Cockcroft family

Notables of the family at this time include

John Cockcroft, esquire of Thornton in the 17th century

Cockcroft migration to the United States +

For political, religious, and economic reasons, thousands of English families boarded ships for Ireland, Canada, 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 Cockcroft surname or a spelling variation of the name include:

Cockcroft Settlers in United States in the 17th Century

George Cockcroft who arrived in Virginia in 1641
Georg Cockcroft, who landed in Virginia in 1641 2

Cockcroft Settlers in United States in the 18th Century

James Cockcroft, who arrived in New York in 1789 2

Cockcroft Settlers in United States in the 19th Century

M. T. Cockcroft, aged 40, who arrived in New York in 1893 aboard the ship "Umbria" from Liverpool, England 3
Fawer Cockcroft, aged 51, who arrived in New York City in 1894 aboard the ship "Kaiser Wilhelm II" from Genoa via Gibraltar 3
Rosamond Cockcroft, aged 33, who arrived in New York in 1895 aboard the ship "Teutonic" from Liverpool, England 3

Cockcroft Settlers in United States in the 20th Century

George Henry Cockcroft, aged 36, originally from Southport, England, who arrived in New York in 1919 aboard the ship "Baltic" from Liverpool, England 3
Ada Cockcroft, aged 29, originally from Southport, England, who arrived in New York in 1919 aboard the ship "Baltic" from Liverpool, England 3
Arthur Cockcroft, aged 30, originally from Bradford, England, who arrived in New York in 1920 aboard the ship "Imperator" from Southampton, England 3

Cockcroft migration to New Zealand +

Emigration to New Zealand followed in the footsteps of the European explorers, such as Captain Cook (1769-70): first came sealers, whalers, missionaries, and traders. By 1838, the British New Zealand Company had begun buying land from the Maori tribes, and selling it to settlers, and, after the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, many British families set out on the arduous six month journey from Britain to Aotearoa to start a new life. Early immigrants include:

Cockcroft Settlers in New Zealand in the 19th Century

Mr. George Cockcroft, (b. 1823), aged 34, British stonemason travelling from London aboard the ship "Roehampton" arriving in Lyttlelton, Christchurch, South Island, New Zealand on 7th March 1858 4

Contemporary Notables of the name Cockcroft (post 1700) +

George Powers Cockcroft (1932-2020), also known by the pen name Luke Rhinehart, an American novelist, screenwriter, and nonfiction writer, best known for his 1971 novel The Dice Man
Victor Herbert "Vic" Cockcroft (b. 1941), English retired professional footballer who played in the Football League for Northampton Town and Rochdale as a full back (1959-1968)
Barry Michael Cockcroft CBE, current Chief Dental Officer (CDO) for England
Sir Wilfred Cockcroft (b. 1923), English mathematics educator from the University of Hull, known for his Mathematics Counts Report in 1982, widely known as "The Cockcroft Report"
Joe Cockcroft (1911-1994), English footballer
Sir John Douglas Cockcroft OM KCB CBE FRS (1897-1967), English nuclear physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize winner for Physics in 1951, first Master of Churchill College, eponym of the Crockcroft lunar crater
Shamshad Cockcroft, British physiologist and a professor of cell physiology in the Neuro, Physiology and Pharmacology Division of Biosciences at the UCL
Donald William Cockcroft (b. 1946), Canadian asthmologist, co-developer of the Cockcroft-Gault formula
John Hoyle Cockcroft (1934-2023), British Conservative politician and journalist, nephew of the Nobel-prize winning physicist Sir John Cockcroft
John R Cockcroft, British Professor of Cardiology at the Heart Research Institute in Cardiff, Wales
... (Another 2 notables are available in all our PDF Extended History products and printed products wherever possible.)