BackGround: London Temple, London, England.
Up Dated 12 February 2008
William was born About 1605 in England, and married 26 May 1636, England, Martha DAVYES. She was born About 1610 England and died 1694, in Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts. William died 14 February 1661, in Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts. It is stated that he was the son of Joseph RUSSELL.
Martha married second 24 May 1665, Humphrey BRADSHAW, and third 24 May 1683, Thomas HALL.
In his Genealogical Dictionary 3:594 James SAVAGE stated:
RUSSELL William, of Cambridge 1645 or a few yre. earlier, a carpenter, brot w. Martha and son Joseph, b. a. 1636 bapt. in England says the reg. of matchless Mitchell. . .
The latter was Jonathan MITCHELL, minister at Cambridge, in whose register (Records of First Church in Cambridge, p. 19), it is shown that
Martha, wife of Wm. RUSSELL, is a member in full communion: her children: Joseph, baptized in England, and about ten years of age when his mother joyned. . .
Regrettably, the Rev. Mr. MITCHELL failed to tell us the year when Martha RUSSELL joined his flock; neither do any Cambridge town or vital records tell us when William RUSSELL first arrived in Cambridge, although the town land records first show him to have held land there in 1645.
As shown by SAVAGE (loc. cit.) and by the vital records of Cambridge, the said Joseph2 RUSSELL had son Walter3 RUSSELL, baptized 30 April 1676, and from what SAVAGE says, it would seem that Walter was the eldest son.
Surely there is confusion as to when Joseph2 RUSSELL was born. While T. B. WYMAN in his Genealogies and Estates of Charlestown, Mass. (1879, sub RUSSELL), tells us that Joseph RUSSELL was 25 years old in 1651, another account tells of his deposition in 1691 when he gave his age as 55 years (New England Hist. and Gen. Register 85:453-456). But if the account by WYMAN is based upon a contemporary record dated in 1651 showing age 25, it may be noted that in the 17th century the numeral 1 often was penned so as to look almost like the modern 2. This Joseph's age may, therefore, in 1651 have been written 15 and interpreted as 25. For example the probate notation of 15 Nov 1611 to the inventory of Edward TOVYE of Worcester, England, seems, at first glance, to the modern eye, to read, for the year "2611." More careful reading discolses that it is 1611 (see Worcestershire Record Office documents, ref. 0087. 125 e./1611, unpublished).
Boyd's Index to Marriages at the Library of the Society of Genealogists in London, we find that William RUSSELL in 1636 married Martha DAVIS, according to st. Albans Marriage Licenses. Turning to The Hertfordshire Genealogist 1:276, we learn that William RUSSELL, carpenter, bachelor, of Abbotts Langley, Herts., married 26 May 1636 Martha DAVYES of the same parish, spinster, a surety being Walter DAVYES of Bovingdon, Herts., wheelwright. The archivist of hertfordshire has in formed us that this marriage was solemnized at St. Stephen's Church, St. Albans, but that no RUSSELL wills are extant in the St. Albans Archdeaconry registers for that era. Neither is the will of Walter DAVYES to be found either there or in the PCC registers; nor do the indices of the latter include any RUSSELL testator that seems likely to have been akin to our William RUSSELL. Bovingdon parish registers commence only with the year 1674.
While the Abbotts Langley registers include entry for the marriage in 1579 of Robert RUSSELL and Joan COLMAN, there is in them no entry for the baptizm of any of our William's children. From this it seems that he left Abbotts Langley in or soon after 1636. Can he have gone to Barbados, where in 1638 one William RUSSELL owned more than ten acres (see Narraganset Hist. Reg . 3:285, cited to us by George Ely RUSSELL)?
The facts that William RUSSELL of Cambridge, Mass., was a carpenter, had a wife Martha, and a grandson Walter, suggests that he may be identical with that William RUSSELL of Abbotts Langley in 1636, a carpenter who married Martha DAVYES, perhaps akin to Walter DAVYES, as shown above.
CHILDREN of William RUSSELL and Martha DAVYES:
1. JOSEPH b: Dec 1636; , , England.
md: 23 Jun 1662, Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
Mary BELCHER.
d: Dec 1694; Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
2. BENJAMIN b: Abt 1639; , , England.
md: ; , , Massachusetts.
Rebecca ??.
d: 26 Jun 1691; Concord, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
3. PHEBE b: Abt 1640; , , England.
d: 8 Jul 1642;
4. JOHN b: 11 Sep 1645; Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
md: ;
Elizabeth FISKE.
d: 25 Mar 1737; Lexington, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
5. MARTHA b: Abt 1647, Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
md: 22 Dec 1688; Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
Joseph GLEASON.
d: 2 Mar 1684; Sudbury, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
6. PHILIP b: Abt 1650; Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
md: 19 Apr 1680; , Middlesex, Massachusetts.
Joanna CUTTLER.
md: 26 Nov 1705;
Sarah BROOKS.
md: ;
Abigail WINSHIP.
d: 7 Feb 1730; Lexington, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
7. THOMAS b: 21 Jul 1653; Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
d: 21 Jul 1653; Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
8. WILLIAM b: 28 Apr 1655, Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
md: 25 Oct 1678; Salem, Essex, Massachusetts
Elizabeth NURSE.
md: 16 Mar 1682;
Abigail WINSHIP.
md: 24 Apr 1688; Concord, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
Hannah ADAMS.
d: 17 May 1744; Salem, Essex, Massachusetts.
+ 9. JASON b: 14 Nov 1658; Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
md: 27 May 1684; , Middlesex, Massachusetts.
Mary HUBBARD.
d: 1736; Arlington, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
10. JOYCE b: 31 Mar 1660, Cambridge, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
md: 13 Oct 1680; Sudbury, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
Edmund RICE.
d: 1719; Sudbury, Middlesex, Massachusetts.
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