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I have reasons to believe that I descend from John Eells of Dorchester’s son John… The Eells book says very little of this John:” of whom nothing further is known” …. But I think I have found him…
If anyone would like to discuss it with me, to help the genealogy of the Eells family further, please let me know.
Ginette Ellis - I work on the Eels family because I have a number of ancestors from early Milford and in fact my Stowe family married Eels, which is why it's the Stowe-Eels house.
So, I would be interested in John Eels.
Speaking of Maj. Samuel Eells, who added the painting and is it actually Samuel born Dorchester 1639/40 who lived in Milford and then Hingham?
Hi Ginette Ellis I'm descended from this Anna Eells and her husband Samuel and would love to learn more about the Eells family.
The main joker that I have is the coat af arms (three eels naiant in pale) used by Major Samuel Eells in 1663 and found in the College of arms from ca 1570. It was used in Curaçao by my ancestor Jasper Ellis in 1747. Jasper had inherited the ring from his father. They were at the time prominent merchants. Trading with Holland and the Atlantic World. The first John Ellis was a merchant in Curaçao in 1680. His children’s names: Jan, Nathaniel, Daniël and Jannetje. He spoke both Dutch and English. Strongly related to the widow Jannetje van Santvoort, widow John Stonehouse (acquaintance of Captain Kidd) and widow Klinkenbergh. The Ellis children are here executers and they co-own a plantation. Probably also in her will. She is the richest person on the island. A genealogist in Holland confirmed that the best guess is that he descended from John Eells of Dorchester. John Eells probably took the coat of arms with him when he moved to Boston in 1630. (Unless John Eells was actually Ellis and we can find his ancestor in the UK, which I still haven’t). But the similar coat of arms, the region, the religion (his son Jan is alderman in the DRC), the time, the social status (captains of the militia) and the names John/Jan en Nathaniel give reason to believe so. There was a lot of trade already in the 17th century between Boston, and New England with the Caribbean. So I could very well be possible, also given the fact that he spoke both English and Dutch. I guess he lived there because the maritime laws (navigation acts) made trade difficult, so were able to circumvent around them by living and trading from this Duch harbour. In The UK I haven’t been able to trace this John Ellis, nor in the colonies. So anyone who knows more about “John Eells of whom nothing further is known” according to “The Eells family etc…” . He probably went to sea, bur from which harbour…I can only search online, unfortunately. It would be interesting if we could prove this link. Otherwise it remains an unconfirmed link. The Ellis family tree can be found online in Dutch: by Krafft: “Historie en oude families van de Nederlandse Antillen” any info about Klinkenberg (there was a Klinkenberg farm in Schenectady) or John Stonehouse would be very welcome as well.
I'm a descendant of Maj. Samuel Eells via son Col. Samuel, grandson Nathaniel, and great grandaughter Martha (who married Samuel Spencer and whose daughter Hannah married a Stowe). Would be interested in following the research wherever it leads.
And, to Hatte, I think the picture comes from the Eells family of Dorchester book, https://archive.org/details/eellsfamilyofdor1903star/page/n125/mode...
Still waiting for that visit to Milford!
I really need to get to Milford. A friend of mine, an ex-employee and great guy, is from Milford. He nearly fainted when I rattled off the names of the early families I am descended from. I was brought up on the West Coast with no sense of early American history, so none of it meant anything to me until I started doing genealogy in ~ 1999. My mother had told me the stories she had heard from her mother and her grandparents, one of them Hattie Stowe Williams, for whom I am named.
I don't know if there is an Eels surname project on Family Tree DNA. I should check.
Martha Stowe Eels was the sister of my 5th great grandfather, Stephen Stowe, the Martyr of Milford. My mother grew up hearing stories about him and his wife, Freelove Baldwin. Among my ancestors, they are the ones I heard the most about, along with Zebediah Williams because people told my mother she was a little Zeb.
Hatte Blejer on hiatus I find it amazing that you were told stories about your ancestors so many generations back! I knew very little about my great grandparents.
How fascinating that must have been for you to hear these stories as a child!
The direct lines in my family didn't do genealogy and my great uncle who did our tree only gave names. However, he did metion on his tree our Mayflower connection.
There were congressmen and senators in my direct line that were never mentioned. My grandfather's grandfather was a known conductor in the underground railroad, but he never mentioned. I don't know whether my grandfather didn't know, or just never spoke of it.
I think it would have made certain subjects much more interesting in school if I had known these family stories. Since most of my family lines go back to the early american colonies, Including the dutch colony in what is now New York City, I can't help but think that there must be a lot of lost stories in there somewhere. :)
Linda Kathleen Thompson, (c) - On both sides of our family, there was a great interest in family stories.
My mother's father's side, Williams, is the Mayflower and Great Migration side and they could talk about Gallup, Stowe, Baldwin, Ruggles, various governors, but only a couple of the 15 Mayflower ancestors, primarily John Howland.
But they knew the Williams line going back to Richard Williams, father of Taunton and his equally famous wife, Frances Deighton or Dighton.
Ironically, my mother's mother's side, Johnson, was thought by my grandmother, Hazel Adele Johnson Williams, to be inferior and she didn't know about Captain John Johnson of Roxbury and his many notable children, especially the hero of the battle of Narragansett, Captain Isaac Johnson. And the Wilbur family. In fact the Johnsons arrived in 1635 and the Williams in 1640.
My maternal grandmother, Hazel Johnson Williams, was descended on her mother's side from Scots Irish from the first wave. She knew only a little about that I think, but my mother and her cousins worked on the Johnson family tree extensively and were in contact with Petticrew researchers. Even my grandmother's grandmother was doing genealogy research early in the 20th century and from an advertisement she wrote, we know a little about her mother, Sarah Davis of Cohansey (Fairfield Township), Cumberland County, New Jersey. My ggg grandmother was raised in the Jersey Settlement in Warren County, Ohio by the Old New Amsterdam family of her half-sister.
On my father's side, there was a well-known book written about his Margolis line--his maternal grandmother was a Margolis. They are a rabbinical line related to another dozen or so well-known rabbinical lines. I was the oldest of the oldest of the oldest and heard many family stories from my grandmother and her sister over the years. She had been born only a couple of years after her young parent immigrated to Peoria and they heard from their mother and father about the large and very interrelated Frankel, Bramson, Margolis families of a small NE Polish village. I heard so much that I go there every summer to restore the Jewish cemetery.
It sounds like you were born to pass on the genealogy tradition.
I'm double descended from John Alden, and also descended from a couple more of them. But my favorite line is on my dad's side. It was my favorite even before I found out they were close friends with George Washington. However, I must admit that Washigton added to my interest on that line of descent!
I also like that I have live all my life in the areas that they lived in. I often wonder what things looked like when they were here.
We also share as grandparents Edward Fuller, "Mayflower" Passenger and of course William Mullins, "Mayflower" Passenger That one comes automatically with Alden.
Geni gives us as having our closest relationship through the daughters of Samuel Hinckley, I but I'm guessing that we have in common many other grandparent as well.