Our first Jackson ancestor who adventured to America was William Jackson in 1679. With Jackson being a very common name, tracing his line further back in England is not simple. However, researchers in England and others have successfully traced back several generations to Thomas Jackson born about 1550 in Nottinghamshire, England. (Note this is around the time and place where Robin Hood, the heroic outlaw of Sherwood Forest in English folklore, became legendary.) Tracing further back from Thomas becomes even more difficult.
That being said, there is good reason to believe the Jacksons were actually descendants of the ancient Lascelles family from France. I’ll explain. Picot de Lascelles was a Baron who apparently come over from northern France in 1066 with a contingent of William the Conqueror’s army. He helped secure a strategic part of England around Cambridge by building a castle on a hill overlooking the river, and became the High Sheriff of Cambridgeshire. His son, Roger, was his successor. After that, history mentions several generations of de Lascelles mostly in the Yorkshire area. Then around the late 13th century, Sir John de Lascelles began using the alias of “Jackson”. This apparently continued until eventually their descendants simply became known only by the name, Jackson. Since these Jacksons came from the same general area of Northeast England as our line is highly likely that they are our forebears.
