William Knopp’s life in New England is well documented and is summarized in Anderson’s GMB.484 He was a carpenter who immigrated in 1630 and resided at Watertown, where he appears frequently in the town records with respect to land transactions and payments for services. Anderson suggests485 that William Knopp’s passage to New England (and that of his family) may have been paid for by Sir Richard Saltonstall, as Saltonstall claimed half of William’s wages as payment for debt. William was in court in 1633 for swearing, in 1637 for making speeches against Governor Vane, and in 1641 for selling beer without a licence. The inventory of his estate, taken 31 August 1658, totalled £129 3s. 10d, including real estate valued at £100.

Although William’s life has been well documented, his ancestry and relations have been confused in the literature. I follow here the conclusions of Anderson. With respect to William Knopp’s family in New England, Anderson reports:485 “Many researchers have claimed that William Knopp and NICHOLAS KNAPP of Watertown were brothers, but there is no evidence for this connection, and much against. The most recent investigation of William Knopp shows no evidence of Nicholas Knapp in the family, or even in Bures St. Mary, Suffolk [NEHGR 147:327-28]. The two differ in age by about twenty-five years, a full generation. William and Nicholas, despite residing in the same town for fifteen years, are never seen interacting in any way. Finally, although this would not normally be an important consideration, the town clerks at Watertown were consistent in spelling William’s surname as Knopp and Nicholas’s as Knapp, suggesting that in Watertown the surnames were seen as distinct.”

With respect to William Knopp’s parentage, Anderson486 follows the work of Stott: “Two treatments of the family of William Knopp were published in 1993. Clifford L. Stott prepared an account in which the immigrant had resided both at Wormingford in Essex and Bures St. Mary on the Essex-Suffolk border, and had married a woman from Wormingford, Judith Tue [NEHGR 147: 313-28]. John B. Threlfall produced a version in which the immigrant had lived only in Bures St. Mary and had married Margaret Deane of that parish [GMC26 175-84]. Threlfall apparently missed the chronological clues which indicate that there were two William Knopps of Bures St. Mary, so he apparently did not undertake the wider search which led Stott to his conclusions. We follow Stott’s results, and the English records cited above are taken from his article, unless stated otherwise.” (Anderson in an addendum487 notes that the discussion of William Knopp in Threlfall’s GMC26 was written by John Brayton.)

Rodgers488 has published a complete transcript of William Knopp’s will and estate inventory (totalling about £129), along with transcripts of a number of other court documents relating to the settlement of his estate. The “intended will” transcribed by Rodgers was never endorsed nor probated.