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I have just posted a revision to my tree on Ancestry/Rootsweb. One of my revisions is to change my theory of James Sands' parentage. The link to my entry on James is : http://awt.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=:3050219&id=I598788101
However, Ancestry truncated my entry due to space considertations. I, therefore, post it here and invite comment.
"In about 1638, James came to Plymouth, Massachusetts from Reading, Berkshire, England . In 1642, he was at East Chester, Westchester County, New York with Anne (Marbury)Hutchinson (see her entry for more about this). He removed to Portsmouth, Rhode Island where he gained grants of land on 5 October 1643 and served the community in various compacities until 1660. At this time, he, in the company of others, purchased Block Island from the Indians. This same group settled on the island a year later. James received a 1/16 share of the island. He again served in public office in this community, at least until the year 1676. James was a commisioner to the General Court & had been commander of the New Shoreham Company. He turned his house into a fort & garrisoned it. The house became company headquarters during King Philip's War [1675-1676]. James was a planter & physician. His wife was also a physician & nurse. He is buried in a public graveyard with a large sandstone slab recording his age and date of death.
The precise ancestry of James is not known. He is argued by members of the Sands and Sandys families to be descended from Archbishop Edwin Sandys, based upon family resemblences in their respective descendants. See "Descendants of James Sands of Block Island" compiled by Malcolm Sands Wilson. The active involvement of the Archbishop's children in establishing the colonies, also, supports this argument. See my entries for the Archbishop's sons Edwin II, Samuel and George. It, also, seems likely that James was sent to the Massachussets colony because of some sympathy by his parents for the Puritan faith of the colonists. The Archbishop, himself, is said to have joined a group, while exhiled to the Continent, which were the forerunners of the Puritans. Indeed, it seems likely that his children were such strong supporters of the colonies, in part, as a haven for freedom of religion. In addition, according to "Dawn to Twilight in American Colonization" by Charles Herbert Sandy, James Sands used the same coat of arms and motto as the Archbishop, but added the helmet-visor below the griffin tying the bar to the shield (Appendix G, pg. 178).
Traditionally, James has been asserted to be the son of the Archbishop's eigth child by his second marriage, Henry Sandys. This theory is problematic because James is believed to have been from County Berkshire, and Henry settled with his second wife, Priscila Chauncy, in County Northamptonshire, where he became Sherrif. According to Cambridge's records, at the time his son, Chauncy, enrolled at Cambridge, in 1621, Henry was already dead. Since James claimed to be born in 1622, Henry seems wrong as James' father by both by geography and age. Speculation about Henry as the father may have been generated by the letters of Adam and John Winthrop between the MA colony and Suffolk, England. The Winthrops were friendly with a Rev. Henry Sandes of Suffolk, who died there in 1626. However, another Sands descendant has pointed out that there was a Henry Sandes, who attended Cambridge in 1569, before the Archbishop's son, Henry, was born. Since the Archbishop's son, apparently, did not live in Suffolk and died several years before the Reverend Henry Sandes, it appears that there were two Henrys, the Archbishop's son, who attended Oxford, and the Reverend, who attended Cambridge. It was the Reverend who married Elizabeth Goffe, according to the Winthrops. They were, also, acquainted with her brother Edward, who, lived in the MA colony. The Goffes' father has often, mistakenly, been identified as Thomas Goffe, Deputy Governor of the MA colony, but a recent study of Edward's parentage has established that his actual father was Edward Goffe, senior, a clothworker of Groton in County Suffolk. see The New England Historical and Genealogical Register Vol. 158, April 2004, pg. 101. The often repeated identifcation of Elizabeth Goffe as the third wife of the Archbishop's son, Henry, and mother of James Sands, seems entirely wrong.
A more promising theory was advanced by Lt. Col. George Owen Sandys in letters from around 1952 which are on file in the Essex Record Office. Lt. Col. Sandys claims descent from James Sandys, The Archbishops oldest son by his first wife, Mary Sandys. Mary was a distant cousin of the Archbishop. Her family owned an estate in Woodham Ferrers, Essex called Edwardes Manor. When the Archbishop was exhiled, James was left with his mother's parents at Edwardes Manor. James' mother and brother both died while the Archbishop was in exhile and James' grandfather, the owner of Edwardes Manor, died in February 1558, just after the Archbishop's return. The Archbishop entered into a Compact with James' uncle, his deceased wife, Mary's brother, William, to take over Edwardes Manor and leave it to his son, James. The Archbishop remarried that same month. He fixed up Edwardes Manor and changed the name to Edwin's Hall.
The above is documented fact, as is the fact that the Archbishop did not leave Edwin's Hall to James, but, instead, to his eldest son, Samuel, by his second wife. It is also a documented fact that Mary Sandys had relations, who lived in Sonning, Berkshire. See my entries for John Sandys, d. 1554, and Henry Sandys, d. 1570. Lt. Col. G. O. Sandys claims that James, unhappy with his new stepmother, left Edwin's Hall and went to live with his mother's family in Sonning, Berkshire. He claims James Sands is James Sandys' grandson. This would explain James' birth in Co., Berkshire. It could also explain why James chose to change his name to Sands, in light of the shabby way the Archbishop treated his grandfather. It could, even, explain his name, "James", named after his grandfather.
Perhaps, someday, the relationship of the Sands and Sandys family will be proved or disproved by DNA testing or some other means but, in the mean time, I am, tentatively, adopting Lt. Col. Sandys' theory."
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