"Booth" Was Not John Wilkes Real Last Name?

[Steve]

(03-22-2017 02:55 PM)L Verge Wrote:  It has been stated by others that the Portuguese line was Jewish way back when, but I am not sure if that has been distinctly proven. Carolyn Mitchell on this forum might be able to help here. I have not read Steve Archer's great book on Booth, Sr. Does anyone know if Steve addressed this genealogical question?

In Archer's book, he skeptically describes the account of Ricardo Botha or Bethe, the Jewish lawyer in Madrid who fled Spain for Lisbon in the 1600's after the government confiscated his property in response to him publishing inflammatory pamphlets against the royalist government. Supposedly with his son then going to London to become a silversmith. Archer says that searches of leading Spanish and Portuguese archives have failed to find anything corroborating the story or any evidence of Ricardo's existence.