Son of William and Eleanor Rogers
The Mayflower Pilgrim! Thomas died the first winter in Plymouth, between Jan and March 1621, at 49 years of age.
Of Thomas little is known. Born by about 1572, son of William and Eleanor Taynton Rogers, Watford, Northamptonshire, and grandson of William and Joan Rogers. [TGM 3: 1598 citing The Genealogist]. He married Alice Cosford before 24 October 1597 in Watford, Northamptonshire. Thomas' marriage to Alice Cosford and his children's baptisms are all found in the parish registers of Watford, Northampton, England.
Thomas was employed at as a Merchant in Leyden, Holland after 1610. Thomas Rogers became a citizen of Leyden, Holland on 25 June 1618 with sponsors William Jepson, formerly of Worksop, Notts., and by Roger Wilson, formerly of Sandwich, Kent Co. England, and is called a Camlet merchant. In 1619 he sued a baker and a miller of Leiden to free a lien on his house, and perhaps in preparation for his journey, won the suit and was awarded court costs. (NEHGR 143:207). He had bought this house in 1616/7. After just three years, on 1 April 1620, he sold his house on the Barbarasteeg in Leyden for 300 guilders before coming to America on the Mayflower (Ibid.)
He was listed on a passenger list 5 August 1620 sailing on the "Mayflower". Thomas Rogers brought his son Joseph on the Mayflower. He died the first winter, but his son Joseph survived. William Bradford in his “Of Plymouth Plantation” writes of Thomas Rogers: "Thomas Rogers and Joseph his son; his other children came afterwards...... Thomas Rogers died in the first sickness but his son Joseph is still living (1650) and is married and hath six children. The rest of Thomas Rogers' [children] came over and are married and have many children." Therefore we know that Thomas and his son Joseph arrived at Cape Cod aboard the ship Mayflower and on 11 November 1620 according to their calendar, or 21 November on ours, Thomas was one of forty-one signers of the Mayflower Compact. Thomas did not live through the rigorous winter which carried off half the group but young Joseph, like so many of the children, did survive.
In the 1622 poll tax for Leyden, in Over "t Hoff Quarter, in a house with other Pilgrim families in St. Peter's Churchyard west-side are listed his wife Elsgen (Alice), and daughters Lysbeth (Elizabeth) and Grietgen (Margaret), and son John. John Rogers is known to have come to America and married, but unfortunately the whereabouts of Elizabeth and Margaret remain unknown, though Bradford seems to suggest they came to America and married.
The often published descent of Thomas Rogers from John Rogers the Martyr is complete fiction. Thomas Roger's true English origins were discovered in 1989 by Clifford Stott and published with supporting documentation in The Genealogist 10:138-149. Many have claimed for Thomas other male descendants, none of which had been proved by the publication date of Mayflower Family Volume Two, Thomas Rogers, and it is there noted one has been disproved, i.e., William Rogers of Connecticut and Long Island.
We know that his son John came to Plymouth about 1630. Although many other male Rogers immigrants have been claimed as sons of Thomas the Pilgrim, none of the claims has been proved and some have been disproved. Therefore it seems likely that at least one of the Rogers daughters who were living in Holland in 1622 came over. John and Joseph Rogers each named a daughter Elizabeth, perhaps thereby indicating that their sister Elizabeth lived in New England. Unfortunately extensive research has failed to uncover any further evidence.