Origin of Surname
The original Ferbrache must have been a strong man because the name, according to George Balleine means "arm of iron", as does another Jersey surname, now extinct, Bras-de-Fer. There are also suggestions that 'fer' is derived from 'fier', meaning 'proud', which may well fit better with earlier spellings, although it is difficult to understand what ‘proud-armed’ might mean.
But it is not a very old Jersey name, and not a name which is commonly found in Normandy, so there must be some doubts about its origin. Neither the registers of France, nor the Dictionnaire de noms de famille de France, list the surname in any of the known spellings. There is a theory that it is a development of the more popular surname 'Firebrace, Fairbrass and Farbrace'. This is probably proved by the first known recording of those names when John Fierebrache of Oxford, appears in the Pipe Rolls for that city in the year 1190.
Early records
The name does not appear in Jersey until the first half of the 19th century. Whether there is any family connection with the much earlier Bras-de-Fer, which had the elements of the name reversed, is open to question. The spellings Fiere-brache and Firebrache are found in Jersey in the 14th century.
The heads of Jersey families in the late 19th century appear to have come to the island from Southampton and Guernsey.
The five-generation tree we have been sent (see below) starts with Peter, born in Guernsey in 1781, but who does not seem to fit into any of the Ferbrache trees going back much earlier in Guernsey. We also have reservations about the accuracy of the early generations of this tree. There appear to have been two or more Ferbraches living in Guernsey at the same time with the same forenames.
Variants
- Ferbrache
- Fiere-brache 1331
- Firebrache 1309
- Farbrache
- Ferbrach
- Furbranche
Family records
Family trees
Church records
- Ferbrache baptisms in Jersey
- Ferbrache marriages in Jersey (groom)
- Ferbrache marriages in Jersey (bride)
- Ferbrache burials in Jersey
Great War service
- Frank Henry Ferbrache (1880- ) (Southampton) son of Lydia, Private, RJGB
Occupation records
Family wills
These wills created by members of the Ferbrache family are now held by Jersey Archive. By visiting the archive site and using the names, dates and reference numbers 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
- Alfred Ferbrache, 24, Kensington Place, St Helier - 15 December 1939, D/Y/A/105
- Emma Ferbrache of St Luke's Cottage, St Saviour - 21 July 1888, D/Y/A/47
Burial records
Family album
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Henry Charles Ferbrache and Joan Vera, nee Hancock
Annie Clara Bichard, nee Ferbrache (1895-1985)
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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
Mont a l’Abbe cemetery
Mont a l’Abbe cemetery
St Brelade parish cemetery
St Brelade parish cemetery
Surville Cemetery
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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