John Lear was born in England in about 1632 and arrived in Virginia by 1656, settling in Nansemond County. A colonel in the militia, Lear served in the Virginia House of Burgesses from 1666 to 1676 and later served as a member of the Virginia Council from 1683 to 1695. Lear married four times, the fourth and final time to former North Carolina governor Seth Sothel's widow Anna. When Anna died in 1695, Lear inherited both Seth Sothel's landholdings in North Carolina as well as Anna's own extensive estate. Colonel Lear died shortly after his wife in about November 1695, which plunged Seth Sothel's, Anna Lear's, and his own estate into disarray that took many years for their executors to disentangle.