Andrew Ward, of Fairfield - Parents of Andrew Ward Sr., Colonial Commissioner (Governor) of Connecticut

Thank you for posting this.

There is a pedigree suggesting that the parents of Andrew Ward were Richard Ward, of Homersfield and Gorleston, Suffolk & "Anne" Ward, {fictional profile}

Is there any evidence to support it?

My understanding comes from Families of Old Fairfleid:

Families of Old Fairfield makes the following statement on p.643:

"....family of Richard Ward of Gorleston or Homersfield have been investigated. No such person as Sir Richard Ward, Kt. was found; no Anne (Guiville) Ward. No Gunville family existed in that vicinity as lords of the manor; and every reference given has proved to be fictitous. It is likely that these statements were the invention of a fraudulent genealogist, innocently accepted by members of the Ward family, through whom they found their way into the book."

I downloaded and added to profile the article Donald Lines Jacobus wrote on Andrew Ward, which includes some research conclusions on his origins. Read here:

https://www.geni.com/documents/view?doc_id=6000000054920681821&
https://www.geni.com/documents/view?doc_id=6000000054920681823&
https://www.geni.com/documents/view?doc_id=6000000054920681825&

Marilyn and Erica - You guys are on top of this! Sorry I was gone to SF yesterday and just got back. Marilyn that research you cited above is a direct quote of this source:

Robert Charles Anderson, The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England, 1620-1633 , 3 volumes (Boston 1995) 1918-21

If you have a subscription you can access this article at either Ancestry.com or AmericanAncestors.com (or you can buy the books):

https://www.americanancestors.org/databases/great-migration-begins-...

If you are eager to research Great Migration immigrants that is the best place to start and well worth the subscription. In 2015 the author Robert Charles Anderson published a new book:

Robert Charles Anderson. The Great Migration Directory: Immigrants to New England, 1620–1640 (Boston, Massachusetts. New England Historic and Genealogical Society. 2015)

Which cited newer research if it is available and on page 357 we can see that there is none:

Ward, Andrew: Unknown; 1633; Watertown, Wethersfield, Stamford,
Fairfield [GMB 1918-21].

What's interesting is Anderson cites FOOF (Families of Old Fairfleid) which Erica uploaded above. And Jacobus calls this a probably fraud. Jacobus never would use those words to refer to research of another genealogist unless he actually believe this.

Jacobus goes on:

"It is certain that he m. in England, Hester Sherman, who was bapt. 1 Apr. 1606 at Dedham, co. Essex, and we should look for his antecedents in that quarter. The will of Robert Lockwood(3) of Eye, -near-Yaxley, co. Essex (who m. Margery Sherman), in 1558 named his daus. Mary wife of John Ward and Ann wife of Anthony Barker. David Rawson of St. Gregory's, London, father of Edward (Sec. of Mass. Col.), and son of Edward and Bridget (Ward) Rawson, in his will 1616 named his uncle John Ward, and Andrew Ward (a minor), son of his uncle Ralph. Now Dr. John Ward of Ipswich, Mass., besides mentioning various
2 The Lockwoods of Fairfield were prob. of this tribe.
3 By Col. Charles E. Banks for Mrs. Finley J. Shepard.
Sherman cousins in his will 1652, gave £20 each to the two youngest sons of his ''Cousin Ward of Wetnersfield.'' Dr. John Ward was son of John Ward (will 1631) of Stratford St. Mary, co. Suffolk, just across the River Stour from Dedham, co. Essex. The mother of Dr. John Ward was Anne, whose will 1635 made Dr. John Clarke of Colchester Executor. This was the Dr. John Clarke who settled later in Newbury, Mass., the same town to which the younger Edward Rawson had come in 1637.
Andrew may have been the son of Ralph, nephew of John of Stratford, and cousin of Dr. John Ward and of Sec. Ra,vson; but positive proof has not been found.*
*Stephen and Joyce (Traford) Ward had a son Richard of Faxton, co. Northampton, whose will in 1640 named various relatives, including a brother Andrew; but as this Andrew was in England in 1640, be was not the emigrant. However, Richard gave a legacy to Gov. Thomas Dudley in New England, and a clue may be found here."

So we can discount the original genealogy. However, Anderson also cites NYGBR 44:119-21 which is:

J. Henry Lea and J. R. Hutchinson, CLUES PROM ENGLISH ARCHIVES: CONTRIBUTORY TO AMERICAN GENEALOGY in The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record, Volume 1 through present (New York, NY: NYGBS, 1913) 44:119-21

And I'm in the process of uploading this article in PDF to the profile. The upload is going slowly. And I've got to run soon so check the media section in about an hour and it'll probably be done by then. The author makes a very good case as to the identity of the parents of the immigrant. I haven't studied this family in depth but it seems to me this article is due some serious contemplation and may even include strong enough evidence for the parents of the immigrant. I don't want to jump to conclusions though as I'm in the middle of a Clapp update and Downing update as well as some Marblehead work right now so my attention isn't all it should be. But if either of you have the time today maybe you could read it and share your opinions. The article posits that he was brother of testator Richard Ward and son of Stephen Ward of Northampton and Joyce (Trafford) Ward.

If the PDF doesn't upload you can view the article here:

I'm going to be gone for a couple of hours but will be back later.

It just uploaded.

https://www.geni.com/documents/view?doc_id=6000000054964606043&

Click on the Original PDF link to download it - I OCR'd it too.

Didn't read the NYGBR yet, but just from the notes it seems quite congruent with the research direction D.L. Jacobus suggested.

And I like that we're not looking for manors in England that never existed.

Here are the Geni profiles for Joyce (Trafford) Ward & Stephen Ward

Joyce Ward

Stephen Ward, of Northampton

Private User this is getting into work you've done ....

Another nail in the coffin for the spurious pedigree, from an NYGR article (I will add to the profile for Richard Ward):

https://books.google.com/books?pg=PA120&lpg=PA120&dq=richar...

It is also noteworthy, in further contravertion of that erronious derivation, that we find in the Parish Registers of St. Mildred's Cornhill, London, the burial of a Mr. Andrew Warde, gent., 23 January, 1615,f who was probably the son of that Richard Ward of Homersfield and Gorleston, Suffolk, who was so lightly accepted as the American Emigrant without a scintilla of evidence beyond the Christian name.

I've updated this family group which has been disproved as the ancestors of Andrew Ward of Watertown and Fairfield:

Richard Ward, of Homersfield and Gorleston, Suffolk

(stripped of his imaginary knighthood)

"Anne" Ward, {fictional profile}

Andrew Warde, Gent.

and the fictional "Anne" Ward, {fictional profile}

Not sure if Richard Ward of Homersfield should be restored as son of Thomas Ward, of Homersfield my earlier notes in that profile have him as "chronologically improbable."

Yup that's the same NYGR article I uploaded earlier in PDF. Nice work on the updates!

"burial of a Mr. Andrew Warde, gent., 23 January, 1615" = Nail meet coffin.

"If further confirmatory evidence were needed of the derivation of the Wethersfield people from the Braffield stock, we find it in the constant recurrence, among the American descendants, of the Christian names of the last mentioned English family, as shown in the will, every one of which is repeated and notably the very unusual ones of Ambrose, Andrew, Richard, Alice, Grace and Margery, while those of Stephen, Robert, Daniel and Isabell of the recorded pedigree also appear. All of them but Richard and Andrew being conspicuous by their absence from the Homersfield pedigree."

If it walks like a duck...

This exchange is why Geni is so great. Thank you for all your hard work Erica Howton and Roland Henry Baker, III to straighten out these similar named lines.

We still need to build affilliations from Joyce Ward to Andrew Ward of Fairfield

I don't think geni reflects this yet?

Also, here is the burial info for Anne, so I don't believe her to be fictional as originally thought.

https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=126319504

You could request a photograph be taken of the tombstone, or at the very least, a reference that a person by this name is in fact buried in this cemetery.

Did you follow the link? It has 4 family members as being buried there. Richard, Anne, Thomas and his wife Margaret Hare

so all this info, as enlightening as it is, still leaves me to question is Andrew Ward(1597-1659) the son of Richard or Stephen, both claims seem to attempt debunking the other, and leaves me just as confused as i first started

charles ward Andrew Ward is not the son of either. His parents have not been found.

From (page 174) of Fifty Puritan ancestors, 1628-1660 : genealogical notes, 1560-1900, by Nash, Elizabeth Todd. Publication date 1902. Topics Nash family, Puritans, genealogy. Publisher New Haven : The Tuttle, Morehouse & Taylor Co. Collection allen_county; americana. Does not gives many usable dates (which is problematic), except for further back... But, here is the page entry(from book mentioned. Viewable online here: https://archive.org/details/fiftypuritanance00nash):

"The Ward Family

The following authorities are given for the Ward Chart, which goes back to Osbert de Varde, 1130: Burton's “Monasticon,” pp. 139-166; Whittaker's “Leeds”; Dugdale's “Monasticon,” Vol. V, p. 139; Tanner's “Notitia.”

In 1130 there were three brothers de Varde: Simon, Godewin and Osbert of Givendale, Yorkshire. Osbert had two sons, Richard and William de Varde of Givendale Living, 1150.
William de Varde had a son, Simon de Varde, who married Maude___. Simon de Varde founded Escholst Priory the end of the Twelfth Century; he had two sons, John de Varde of Scotton and William de Varde of Givendale.
William de Varde had sons: William of Capes and Simon (made Sir Simon 1260, by Henry III).
Sir Simon had son, Sir Simon, knight and baronet, “A great Braon against the Scots;” and Sir Simon the second had two sons, Sir John, 1350, and Simon, “the Simon de Varde who married Margaret, a daughter of the House of Mortimer, Lords of Attilbury, County Norfolk, and ancestors of the Lords of Norfolk.”
Simon and Margaret de Varde's son John married Elena de Boost or de Bois; their son, John, 2nd, married Katherine Applegard.
Robert de Varde, son of John and Katherine Applegard de Varde, married Alice Kemp, had a son, Robert, 2nd, who married a Copperdick; and their son, Robert, 3rd, married a daughter of Sir Giles Capel of London, ancestor of the Earls of Essex, and had three sons, Henry Warde of Homersfield, who married ____ Hare, daughter of John Hare, D.C.L., of Homersfield, Norfolk.
Richard, son of Thomas Warde and ___ Hare, married Anne, daughter of Sir Richard Gunville; Munsell's “American Ancestry” for 1894 calls him “Sir Richard Ward, Knt. Of Homersfield and Gorleston, Suffolk County, England,” and says it was his son, Andrew Ward, who came to New England in 1634, and married Esther Sherman, daughter of Edmund and Joan Sherman, in which case Andrew Ward is the fifteenth in descent from Osbert de Varde." -END (is Richard Gunville (aka: Sir Richard Grenville? Names, often, had various spellings in historical documents- for various reasons- perhaps checking the Grenville line could suss out some information).