Origins of surname
Although a common name in England, the original Holley immigrants to Jersey came from the Manche department of Normandy. English and French sources give different origins for the name. The English view is that it came from 'holly' and indicates a person living in a grove of holly plants, or coming from a location named Hollin or Holly. French sources suggest that it is related to places named Le Houley or Le Houlet and comes from the old word holei, meaning a sunken place.
Early records
- The first known records are found in St Brelade and Grouville birth registers in the 1850s. Brothers Emanuel and Desire Thomas settled in Jersey either side of 1860.
Variants
- Holley
- Hollis
The two variants above are found in Jersey. Those below are given as variants in the UK but are not found in our Jersey records
- Holly
- Hollins
- Hollies
Family records
Family trees
Church records
- Holley baptisms in Jersey
- Holley marriages in Jersey (groom)
- Holley marriages in Jersey (bride)
- Holley burials in Jersey
Family histories and biographies
Great War service
- Holley family members who served in World War 1
- Presentation to Private Paul Holley, CdG, at the Town Hall
Family wills
This will created by a member of the Holley family is now held by Jersey Archive. By visiting the archive site and using the names, date and reference number shown here, it is possible to view a copy of each will. You will have to subscribe to the Archive's online service to do this. To find out more about this collection, which covers the period from 1663 to 1980, and how to search for your family's wills there, visit our Jersey wills page
- Bienaimé Holley living near Fauvic, Grouville - 8 August 1923, D/Y/A/83
Burial records
Family album
Family gravestones
Click on any image to see a larger version. See the Jerripedia gravestone image collection page for more information about our gravestone photographs
Tips
The church record links above will open in a new tab in your browser and generate the most up-to-date list of each set of records from our database. These lists replace earlier Family page baptism lists, which were not regularly updated. They have the added advantage that they produce a chronological listing for the family name in all parishes, so you do not have to search through A-Z indexes, parish by parish.
We have included some important spelling variants on some family pages, but it may be worth searching for records for a different spelling variant. Think of searching for variants with or without a prefix, such as Le or De. To search for further variants, or for any other family name, just click on the appropriate link below for the first letter of the family name, and a new tab will open, giving you the option to choose baptism, marriage or burial records. You will then see a list of available names for that type of record and you can select any name from that list. That will display all records of the chosen type for that family name, and you can narrow the search by adding a given name, selecting a parish or setting start and end dates in the form you will see above. You can also change the family name, or search for a partial name if you are not certain of the spelling
The records are displayed 30 to a page, but by selecting the yellow Wiki Table option at the top left of the page you can open a full, scrollable list. This list will either be displayed in a new tab or a pop-up window. You may have to edit the settings of your browser to allow pop-up windows for www.jerripediabmd.net. For the small number of family names for which a search generates more than 1,500 records you will have to refine your search (perhaps using start or end dates) to reduce the number of records found.
New records
Since August 2020 we have added several thousand new records from the registers of Roman Catholic, Methodist and other non-conformist churches. These will appear in date order within a general search of the records and are also individually searchable within the database search form
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