Author: Nichelle Barra Page 4 of 91

I’m a bit late on my 52 Ancestors post! It has been a busy last two weeks. Better late than never though, so here is my Week 9 post!

When I was younger, I heard many rumors about my maiden name Witherell and where it came from and what it meant. The most frequent one told to me was that Witherell’s were shepherds and were named after the ‘weather-all’ they created for shelter in the fields. The rumor said they were from the England/Scotland border. So, one of the things I’ve always wanted to find out is how true all of that is!

Which means, of course, that I hit my Witherell brick wall in the early 1800s, still in the United States. I have confirmed my 4x great-grandfather and who he was: David Witherell, born in 1813 in New York and died in 1862 in Michigan. He is the beginning of my Witherells in Michigan and although he died in Genesee County, his wife and children moved to Saginaw shortly thereafter. His descendants have lived in Saginaw, Michigan since 1866 – which means that line of family has been in the same area for over 150 years ((Martha Curtis Obituary, Saginaw Daily News (Saginaw, Michigan), 14 January 1911, page 2.)). I think that’s pretty amazing.

It’s his parents where I hit a wall. David married a woman named Martha Wolcott, who has a family book where she is mentioned. In that book, it states that David is the son of John and Juda (Bullard) Witherell of Richmond, NY ((Wolcott Genealogy The Family of Henry Wolcott (Rochester, NY: Genese Press, 1912), page 212.)) .

My search on John Witherell didn’t lead to much, but Juda (or Judith) Bullard had more information. Her parents are David and Elizabeth (Hadley) Bullard ((Arad Thomas, Pioneer History of Orleans County, New York (Bowie, Maryland: Heritage Books, INC, 1871 Reprint 1998), page 231.)). With that, I began to hunt for information on David, hoping he may have left a will that mentions his daughter or grandchildren.

I found a general index on FamilySearch.org for Orleans County, New York from 1825-1926 that showed David Bullard DID have a probate record. I then contacted the County Courthouse in Orleans County and they sent me along to the Orleans County Genealogical Society – my heroes for this post!

I gave them the box and file number and asked if the files still existed and if there was a way to get more information about this record.

By the end of that day, they had emailed me the ENTIRE file (it wasn’t large, thankfully)! I cannot stress how absolutely amazing this group is for doing something like this! I would have paid for the information as well and sent them a donation for doing such an amazing thing. Seriously, genealogy societies have gold mines of information!

The record did not have a will, sadly, but there was a lot of fun information:

These records do not specifically say if any of the names are his children or how they are related (if at all) to David. ((Orleans County, New York, David Bullard probate file, box 6, file 779; Orleans County Genealogical Society, Albion New York.)). That is usually the case though, and I have seen the name of Ransom Bullard in connection with a possible sibling of David. So it’s another link, albeit indirectly (and it needs more), but a link. Nonetheless, the generosity of the Orleans Genealogical Society brought me such a gift and I hold this probate record in high value!

Never underestimate the records of local groups!