Overview

This Web site, a work under construction, reflects the Stillwell family from its early members to the present. It considers the major lines of the family from Nicholas Stillwell, born about 1603, and all of his children, with special attention to direct ancestors of Harry Mote Stillwell.

Records of the Stillwell family are, at best, incomplete and sometimes contradictory. Competent and responsible researchers differ about many matters. I have tried to reflect both the known sources of the material presented and alternative viewpoints. For the sake of uniformity, particularly in handling records in tabular form, I have used the Stillwell spelling predominantly. I believe that the alternative spellings of Stilwell and Stillwell are more a product of the inclinations of the speller, at least in early times, than of meaningful distinctions in family lines. This convention I share with John E. Stillwell, who came to the same conclusion.

A central source for this work is the set of four volumes on the genealogy of the Stillwell family written by John E. Stillwell, M.D., of New York City. Genealogical material on the Internet has influenced this work in several ways. In particular, the World Wide Web includes the work of many careful researchers on the Stillwell and many other families. The work of the GenServ group of genealogical researchers is reflected here.

With rare exception, I have not included living persons. A more complete genealogical record of the current Stillwell families will be forthcoming from Jean Ladd.

For simplicity of making references, I have abbreviated the identification of some of the sources that I used frequently. Here is the pattern I followed:

AFN stands for Ancestral File Number. This is the standard identification used to give each person in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS) records a unique identifying code.

AF stands for Ancestral File. This is the name for the set of computer-based records prepared by the LDS church for use in their libraries and on their Web site.

Chris stands for Christopher Alden Stillwell of Texas. His Web address is: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/%7Ecstillwell/Roots.htm#gedcom
His e-mail address and mailing address can be found on his Web site. He traces his family line from Jeremiah son of Nicholas the Immigrant.

Cindy stands for Cynthia "Cindy" Lou Torres Owens of Virginia. She traces her family line from Nicholas son of Nicholas the Progenitor (the same as mine).

Hebert stands for Dan Hebert, whose Web address is:
http://www.danhebert.com/

JESv1p11 stands for the genealogy of the Stillwell family written by John E. Stillwell. The v stands for the volume number (of four) and the p stands for the page number. There are variations of this code in my work, as well as the citations Chris makes of his work. John E. Stillwell also wrote a set of five volumes entitled Historical and Genealogical Miscellany, to which reference sometimes is made.

I also am indebted to many other researchers, some of whom have made their work available on an Internet service called GenServ, which was developed by Cliff Manis of San Antonio, Texas. That Web site address is: http://www.genserv.com/
This is a paid membership service, and each person who belongs has placed at least one genealogical file into the system. Each submitter and file is identified by a code of letters and numbers, as will be seen in the body of this document.

As is the case in many areas of research, the information obtained from the Internet should be used with caution. Some excellent researchers have made their work available there, but there is a lot of room for error. John E. Stillwell appears to be the towering figure in research on the Stillwell family, and much of his work is documented with references to court records, land transactions, marriage and baptismal records, and the like. Others, particularly those identified above, have tried to do the same as much as possible. I, too, have tried, but in the case of older records I have relied heavily on the work of persons such as John E. Stillwell, Chris Stillwell, and Cindy Torres Owens, to name a few. In more recent times, after our ancestors moved to Ohio, there are more primary documents available. In this regard, I want to mention two web sites that contain much useful information:

http://www.tdn-net.com/genealogy/, which is the Miami Valley, Ohio web site and reflects the work of Joe Bosserman and his colleagues.

http://php.ucs.indiana.edu/~jetorres/dco.html, and the many people who help Jane Torres make research in Darke County, Ohio much easier.

The Stillwell family in Ohio overlaps with the DeWeese family, and the work of the late Kay DeWeese has been valuable in tracing the family in Miami and Darke Counties. Kinsman Grover Hamilton has provided numerous government and court documents, among other forms of support.

To say that this is a preliminary document is literally true. I hope to achieve two goals through this work: 
(1) to convey to members of my family something of the heritage which we have through this side of our family background, and
(2) to make my work available to others for critique, comparison, and, perhaps, some information useful to other researchers. I also expect that the real genealogist of the family, my wife Jean Karns Ladd, will build on this work by making selections from it to supplement the more contemporary records which she has compiled.

Forrest Ladd
forladd@ionet.net

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