ODELL, William

Notes:

William appears to have had a brother, Richard (1605- ), who married Ursula Franklyn, 12 Nov 1627 in Southampton. Torrey, New England Marriages Prior to 1700, has William married to Rebecca Franklin in Concord, Massachusetts, 4 May 1629. Manning says he m (1) Agnes Franklin and (2) Rebecca Brown (1633). Mais has Agnes Franklin, daughter of William and Ursula Franklin, the mother of five children by William: William (1630), Thomas (1632), John (1634), James (1640), and Rebecca (1642).

William Came from England to Concord in 1639; probably a member of Peter Bulkeley's congregation. Bulkeley was born in the parish of Odell, Bedford, England. In 1644, William Odell moved to Fairfield, Connecticut, and his son William became one of the principal proprietors of Rye, New York. (NEHGR, 29:203; 137:37).

William may have been a brother of Ursula Wodell (also written Odle), who married Christoper Wooley at Concord in 1646 (King, NEHGR, 60:91). His will, proved 6 June 1676, mentions, among others, sons William and John and daughter Rebecca Moorehouse. Cranfield, Bedford, England, is a small parish about eight miles from the village of Odell. The Cranfield church register records nearly seventy entries of Odell baptisms, marriages, and burials between 1602 and 1625, the name variously written Wodell, Odell, Odle, Woddell, Woddle, etc. Among these: Willliam, son of William Wodell of Warleyend, baptised 24 Feb 1602, and William Odle of Worley buried 22 Jul 1615. This may be the record of the baptism of the William Odell who came to New England and the burial of his father. The name "Warleyend" is doubtless that of a hamlet about one mile from Cranfield, which appears on an old map of Bedfordshire as "Wallerd" or "Wall End." In Cranfield Parish there was in 1632 a district, or possibly an estate, known as "Virginia." At Concord, the original road cut through the woods by the first settlers had been called, since 1650, "the Virginia Road" and the district through which it runs, "Virginy." The plain at the end of Virginia Road was described as "Cranefield" as early as 1648. It would seem that these names, Virginia and Cranefield, were given by the early settlers of Concord in memory of their English home (See NEHGR, 45:7-8).

William Odell is purportedly memorialized as a "Concord Planter" on a plaque in the Fairfield Public Library together with Rev. John Jones, Thomas Bulkley, Thomas Jones, John Tompkins, Daniel Bulkley, Joseph Middlebrook, Ephraim Wheeler, Thomas Wheeler, Jr., James Bennett, Richard Lettiss, John Ebats, Peter Johnson, George Squire, and Benjamin Turney. Ridge, Bateman Connection, 173:
http://www.familyhistorypages.com/Odell.htm
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William — BROWN, Rebecca. Rebecca was born 1606; died Abt 13 May 1654, New Haven, New Haven County, Connecticut. [Group Sheet]

Richard — NICHOLLS, Martha. [Group Sheet]