The Mary Thear Myth

It is interesting how myths can develop and take on a life of their own.  For decades Skaggs researchers have been trying to fit a Mary Thear into their genealogies.  Mary Thear was supposedly the mother to a Richard and John Scaggs in Kent County, Maryland in the mid-1700s.  In 1928 a gentleman by the name of Gaius Marcus Brumbaugh published a volume of colonial Maryland records extracted from original sources.  One of these original sources was a list of the status of Maryland land leases in 1766, reported to the Lord Proprietor of Maryland, Lord Baltimore.  The Lord Proprietor owned the colony of Maryland and leased portions of it to Maryland residents.  A “land owner” in Maryland actually owned a lease and paid rent to the Lord Proprietor.  One of these lessees was listed as a Mary Thear by Brumbaugh.  Also listed were a Richard Scago and John Scago.  Many researchers interpreted this record as Mary Thear, mother of Richard and John Scaggs.  However, it appears that Brumbaugh had trouble reading the eighteenth century handwriting.  Robert W. Barnes and F. Edward Wright also read the handwriting and interpreted the record as follows:

KEAR, MARY, on 10 April 1753, had a lease from Benjamin Tasker of Annapolis, Agent and Receiver General for the Lord Proprietary, for part of His Lordships Manor, 15 acres. The lease was to run for the lifetimes of said Mary Kear, Richard Scaggs and John Scaggs, all of Kent County. Mary Kear, widow, assigned the land to John Knock.

Evidently, the name Kear looked like Thear to Brumbaugh and Scags looked like Scago.  Over the years Skaggs researchers have not been able to find credible evidence of a Mary Thear in Maryland.  Now we know why.

Maryland records indicate that a Mary Kear leased land from the Lord Proprietor in 1753.

Tasker, Benjamin, Receiver General, to Kear, Mary (KE).
Dates: 1753/04/10.
Property lease agreement.
MSA S1005-27-3443 MdHR 19,999-025-004  Location: 1/8/5/26

Mary Kear subsequently had this land surveyed.

Garnett, George, Dep. Surveyor, to the Agent (KE).          
Dates: 1753/04/06.
Survey and plat for Kear, Mary's land.
MSA S1005-27-3444 MdHR 19,999-025-005  Location: 1/8/5/26

There was no Mary Thear.  She was a myth.  However, there actually was a Mary Kear and she did have some relationship to Richard and John Scaggs, since her 1753 lease was to run for the lifetimes of said Mary Kear, Richard and John.  And that relationship may have been more than lessor /sub-lessee, since in 1766 the tenant in possession was listed as Annas Glenn, not Richard or John Scaggs.

According to the respective ages listed on the 1766 report to the Lord Proprietor, Richard Scaggs would have been 16 years old in 1753 when the lease was signed and John age 12.  Could Mary Kear have entered into the lease on behalf of these two minors?