William Thrall is the founder of the Thrall family in the United States.
William was born in 1605 in Sandridge [3], Hertfordshire, England and came to the colonies on the Mary and John [4] in the year 1630. He died on 3 August 1679 in Windsor, Connecticut.
The Mary and John was a vessel of four hundred tons captained by a man named Squeb and the vessel sailed with 180 passengers. William was part of a company of Puritans [6] under the leadership of Rev. John Wareham of Exeter and Rev. John Meverick, both ministers of the Church of England Setting sail from Plymouth [7], England on 20 March, they first came ashore on 30 May 1630.
They disembarked with what goods they had, to some high land in the salt meadow, now a part of the city of Boston. They named the place Dorchester [9], which was selected by the captain of the "Mary and John" as he came from Dorchester, England. Page 277 of Prince's Chronology of New England records…
May 30, Lord's Day. Mr. Wareham and his church, and their goods, were put ashore at Nantasket Point [10]. The went immediately to Charlestown [11], and from thence to Mattepan, and began a town and named it Dorchester, and the native Indians were kind to them.
Revs. Wareham and Meverick and their group stayed in Dorchester less than five years, as a number of their menfolk had discovered more fertile land below the first falls of the Connecticut River [12], at the junction of the Farmington River [13] just above Hartford. Part of the colony went by boat and the remainder travelled across the one hundred miles of virgin forest, to establish the town of Windsor. Windsor was unofficially known as Thrallville in the early years.
The first we know of William Thrall is that he is listed with the following men who were among the thirty men who went from Windsor to join in the fight against the Pequod Indians [14] in May 1637. Capt. John Mason, Sgt. Benedict Alvord, Thomas Barber, Thomas Buckland, George Chappel, John Dyer, James Eggleston, Nathaniel Gillet, Thomas Gridley, Thomas Styles, Sgt. Thomas Stares, Richard Osborn, Thomas Parsons, William Thrall. The Indian village in this case was so completely destroyed that for many years, the settlers had no further trouble with the Indians. Some years later, the participants were given land grants. To quote from Dr. Styles records with regard to the first Indian war in New England,
The danger was imminent, and so complete the victory that it caused universal rejoicing throughout New England, and a grant of land was given each soldier and officer, and to this day the memory of an ancestor who was in the Pequod fight [15], is an honorable heirloom in every Connecticut family.
William Thrall is mentioned many times in the early records. His lot shows up in the first plot of Windsor, between the lots of Nicholas Palmer and Thomas Bascomb, and ran from the road to the Farmington River. In 1646, William sold this lot to Nicholas Palmer and moved to Simon Hoyte's place, north of the village. Robert Wilson bought a half interest with William in the Hoyte's 80 acres, but sold his half to Thrall in 1654. This 80 acres has been part of the holdings of the Thrall family ever since.
William Thrall was born in 1605 in Sandridge, Hertfordshire, England, and died on 3 August 1679 in Windsor, Connecticut, America. William Thrall made his will [16] in 1678.
We know very little about the wife of William Thrall. She is referred to in the old Windsor records as Goode Thrall, but 'Goode' was an expression applied to women with families and it is simply an abbreviation of 'Goodwife'. Whether she came over to New England on the "Mary and John" with her husband or they met in Dorchester, has never been established The record of her death simply states…
Goode Thrall, wife of William, died 30 July 1676
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We know that the first US Thrall was William Thrall. He was born in 1605 - apparently in Sandridge, Hertfordshire. The problem is that no one can directly link the English Thrales or Thrall family tree to the US Thrall family tree! The closest possibility from the known pedigree for the English Thrale family is William Thrale who was born in 1607 [26]. However this is very unlikely to be the same William that sailed to America in 1630, as the 1607 William married Margaret Smith in 1632 at Redbourn, Hertfordshire, in England.
According to an unconfirmed entry on the IGI [27], William Thrall's father was Sir William Thrall senior, who was born in 1559 or 1579 at Slope Hill, Netherbury [28], Dorsetshire, England and died in the same place. Frustratingly this teasing little clue is not verifiable as both the researcher who found this and the source document from which it was obtained, is unknown.
An attempt to trace the source of this information was made by Jim Thrall of Indiana1. with apparently no success. In March 2000 Jim posted the following message…2
I joined the Dorset list in September of 1999 and have contributed and received help and direction from others, but still have not accomplished my objective, which is, to confirm definitively, that my ancestor came from Dorsetshire. Details of my objective and results to date, since joining the Dorset list, are as follows:
I'm trying to confirm recent LDS information that states William Thrall 1579 born in Slope Hills Netherbury, Dorsetshire and his son William Thrall born in 1605. Prior LDS information only had reference to William Thrall 1605 and showed him coming from Sandridge Parish, Hertfordshire. This is the same information, my family and others, have carried for many years.
We understand that William Thrall 1605 sailed in the Mary and John in 1630 from Plymouth, while originating in Weymouth. The passengers were primarily from Dorsetshire and other west country areas. My Thrall was a quarryman and stone cutter, which maybe more in keeping with Dorsetshire than Hertfordshire. The LDS were able to supply the name of the submitter, stating Netherbury, Dorsetshire, but could not provide any address information and so I am trying to confirm the submitters findings.
Any information and direction to other sources in helping me to resolve these matters would be greatly appreciated.
Search results, to date:
1. Society of Genealogists catalog, inquiries and name searches, were of no help.
2. Name search by Rob Wilkins gave it a good try, but no luck.
3. Jim Polson suggested Bishop's transcripts and I worked with local LDS Family History Center on this and other areas, with no results.
4. Dorset County Council archivist just advised their search of Netherbury christening register and burials were to no avail, also they had checked Netherbury marriages, to no avail.
5. Jerry Willmott provided helpful direction.Last chance, yet to be explored, that I know of, is the Dorset marriage index, which will be checked when Mr. Andrew is available. Once again, I respectfully request any and all help that list members may be able to supply.
A more recent attempt to trace the source of William Thrall information was made by Joe Neilson. In January 2005 Joe sent the following update to Thrale.com…
Hi, We mused some time ago over how William Thrall earned an exact birth date, in Sandridge, Hertfordshire without having any parents identified. I think it is guess work.
I spent a little time looking at this while at the Mormon Family History Center in Salt Lake, USA. They have on film3 the Church of England Bishop's transcripts for Sandridge parish. The records contain baptisms, marriages, and deaths. They begin in 1575, cover only a few intermittent years up to 1595, and then jump to 1686. So there are about 90 years of missing records. They are in Latin mixed with a little of old English and are very hard to read. So, William Thrall's 1605 birth (or Baptism) did not come from those records.
I looked very closely at the 1595 entries and could find no Thrall or Thrale.
On another film4 are baptism, marriage, and death records in Sandridge for the year 1639/40. Those records are very legible and again, no Thralls.
So, there you have it. On one of the web sites someone has claimed William Thrall's father was William Thrall Senior, born 1579, Netherbury, Dorsetshire. The Mormons have filmed Netherbury bishop transcripts that begin in 1585, again baptism, marriages, and burials. I found no Thralls there from 1585 to 1635 so I folded-up shop.
I don't know how all this information surfaces. Perhaps some institution has more complete records than the Mormons do. But on the face of things, if 1605 is the correct birth date, then it must have come from a headstone or a bible record or something other than a birth or baptism record.
Cheers, Joe Neilson.
In response to a follow-up enquiry, Joe Neilson provided the following helpful analysis to Thrale.com…
Hi David, Spent some time on your website… nice, very nice job. Congratulations. I spent the last several years working on my Danish line, thus have spent very little time on the Thrall line or other New England lines for that matter.
I am descended through William Thrall's daughter Phillipa and John Horsforde who probably did came from Netherbury. That may be the reason someone has marked Dorset as the origin of the New England Thralls since William Thrall and John Horsforde's father William were neighbors in Windsor, CT.
The founders of the Mormon or LDS Church were from New England. Almost all Mormons, up until about 1845, came from New England so many past and present Mormons have New England roots. The Mormons took an interest in genealogy 100 years ago or so and asked their members to submit their family history. The members obliged and they still do to this day. Volumes of family history, and much of it from New England, have ended up in the International Genealogical Index (IGI) and the Ancestral File (AF), two databases maintained by the LDS FHC.
Unfortunately, the swarm of LDS members who submitted their family history into those data bases were in large part unqualified for the task. The result is much of the information is not correct. And the real tragedy is, once some family history is written down, even if it is later shown to be incorrect, it is very difficult to erase because it is, by then, written down in hundreds of places. It later becomes "family tradition" or "bible record" or some such thing.
That is why, on hundreds of family group sheets, the name of William Thrall's wife is shown as "Goode". "Goodwife" was an early New England Puritan term applied to the wife of a church member who was in good standing. Often shortened to "goode", it had nothing to do with the wife's Christian name. Near trollops, if not previously stoned to death, were never called goode, only "decent" wives. Even so, I bet one could still get an argument from most American Thrall descendants over the name of William's wife. Goode or Elizabeth Goode [29] shows up over and over again as the name of his wife.
Staff members at the LDS FHC will themselves tell you to be very cautious when using data submitted by members. All of the Ancestral File is member-submitted. Most of the IGI is member-submitted. A small percentage of the IGI can be trusted The Mormons have filmed church and civil records from all over the world. The FHC is the repository for all those films. Each film is assigned a number. The FHC staff is very qualified and some staff members extract data from those films. Those extractions are put into the IGI along with member-submitted data. When a record has been extracted and entered into the IGI by a staff member, the number of the film from which the data came is included as the source for that record. That particular record can be trusted. All others, beware.
So, the IGI submittal showing Wm Thrall's father as born about 1579 in Netherbury would be suspect right off. And, the fact the entry says 'about' means no real record was found by the submitter, only that he had some reason to believe Wm Thrall hailed from Netherbury. It was simply a guess. A good one perhaps, but still a guess. Perhaps something will show up if enough people keep looking.
I think there are still many records not yet examined that might shed some light on the early Thralls. Thanks, and again, your website is well done. Best wishes, Joe Neilson. 5
Possibly a good place to start looking, might be the Church of England churches at which Rev. John Wareham (a nonconformist) and Rev. John Meverick (a conformist) were ministers, as William Thrall may of worshipped there? Wareham was minister at Crewkerne [30] in Somerset and at Exeter in Devonshire; Maverick had been Rector at Beaworthy [31] in Devonshire.
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