Jeannie -
I too am a descendent of the Cecils and Wittens, who
came south from Prince George's Co., MD c.1767 and
settled in the part of Montgomery Co., VA that is now
part of Tazewell Co.
My closest Cecil ancestor is Ann "Nancy" CECIL
(1771-1841) who married Samuel CADDALL, and who who
was daughter of John "Jacky" CECIL & Keziah WITTEN.
The Cecil line is fairly well traced, both on this
side of the Atlantic and the other, and there are
connections to English peerage & nobility. The
difficulty is that we have yet to prove the exact
parentage of the immigrant Cecil, William CECIL
(c.1665-1749). There are several plausible hypotheses
about his parents.
Additionally, there are medieval gateways more certain
through the Bulkeley family (Thomas WITTEN b.c.1630 m.
Mary BULKELEY) and the Griffith family (ggrandparents
to Rebecca (White) CECIL. But even these are disputed
by some researchers.
Let me know if I can provide any information.
- Randy Jones
P.S. Everyone note my new email address.
--- Melissa T Alexander <ma.da(a)gte.net> wrote:
If you are a direct to this line, please get contact
Jeannie direct.
Melissa Thompson Alexander
Edmonds, WA USA
mailto:ma.da@gte.net
-----Original Message-----
From: Jeannie Frazier
[mailto:Jeannie.Frazier@worldnet.att.net]
Sent: Tuesday, March 21, 2000 12:55 PM
To: ma.da(a)gte.net
Subject: Re: Possibly cousins?
Dear Melissa,
My line of Cecil's are from MD, then settled in
Tazewell through the brother
and sister 5th gr.grandparents children I mentioned.
You see, in all the
Presbybtarian's, Scotch-Irish lines I descend from,
I'm Catholic. Although
it had nothing to do with my grandmother. It comes
form my Northern Italian
mother...But, when I was little my grandmother would
joke about the fact the
family was practically a non-stop line of
Presbyterian and Methodist clergy,
but she said that that was not always the case and
then would talk about
Lord Baltimore, the Cecil's and our relationship
with them. I was just too
young to follow a lot of the information, but I have
inherited Crystal that
is preported to be close to 300 years old and was
said to be a wedding gift
from Lord Baltimore to a Cecil. I've had the
Crystal examined by the Museam
of Fine Arts and Christy's in San Francisco and they
agree that the crystal
and it's design are of that area. I was so hoping
that you could shed some
light on this mystery for me.
As to forwarding my e-mail address: By all means,
please pass my address on
to anyone who can help me. At this point I'm not
really trying to prove
there is a so-called royal connection to the Cecil
line, but solve the
Mystery...it really is intreaging, don't you think?
If it wern't for the
Crystal, I think I would have left it at there not
being a connection. But
then where did the Crystal come from???
Thank you for ansering my letter and for the
information. Maybe one day
I'll be able to solve this mystery. Thank you so
much for the notes.
Sincerely,
Jeannie Frazier
----- Original Message -----
From: Melissa T Alexander <ma.da(a)gte.net>
To: 'Jeannie Frazier'
<Jeannie.Frazier(a)worldnet.att.net>
Cc: Randy Jones (E-mail) <rjones(a)charweb.org>
Sent: Tuesday, March 21, 2000 9:38 AM
Subject: RE: Possibly cousins?
> Sorry this took me so long to answer. My computer
crashed and I had to
> reformat and reload everything. It takes a long
time to get things back
to
> working. Fortunately I have learned to save key
files-including my e-mail
> one. Anyway, I host the Cecil list, which is
partly why I have so much
> information. Your line is not actually my line-as
I descend from the
> Cissell's and Thompson lines of Catholic MD-though
I also have other lines
> from VA. Randy-who I have cc'd this e-mail, is
one of the premier
> researchers of the Tazewell, VA line. It is
speculated, but not yet
proven
> that the Cissell line descends from a different
child of Lord Burghley
than
> the Cecils from VA.
>
> Attached are my raw notes from Samuel and Rebecca
White Cecil. Not all is
> proven, and I did not do most of the research.
Good luck and what
wonderful
> stories. Thanks you for sharing. Might I pass
your e-mail on to the
Cecil
> list? You can subscribe to this list
CECIL-L-request(a)rootsweb.com.
>
>
> Melissa Thompson Alexander
> Edmonds, WA USA
> mailto:ma.da@gte.net
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jeannie Frazier
[mailto:Jeannie.Frazier@worldnet.att.net]
> Sent: Monday, March 20, 2000 10:57 AM
> To: ma.da(a)gte.net
> Subject: Possibly cousins?
>
> Dear Ms. Alexander,
>
> Your WorldConnect Project was sent to me by a
cousin on my grandfather's
> side of the family, but who is familiar with my
work and relationship to
the
> Cecil's.
>
> Let me give you just a brief connection here so
you won't be completely
> confused. Samuel White Cecil and Rebecca White
along with Samuel's sister
> Elizabeth Cecil and her husband, Thomas J. Witten
are two pairs of my 5th
> gr.grandparents through their respective children.
Samuel and Rebecca's
> daughter, Rebecca Cecil White and Thomas and
Elizabeth's son James "the
> Scout" Witten. Rebecca Cecil White married her
first cousin, James the
> Scout" Witten and they are my 4th gr.
grandparents.
>
> When I was a child of 4, my grandmother used to
sit me on a stool between
> her legs and brush my hair. While doing this she
used to recite this
> wonderful oral history to me about William Cecil,
Lord Chancellor of
England
> during the reign of Elizabeth I. This oral
history went on for about 2
> years or so until my parents moved away. At the
end of each little
session
> she would give my hair a tug and tell me, "Never
forget who you are".
Why
> I remembered those words all those years ago,
where never clear to me
until
> I began to do my family history. All those years
ago, my grandmother made
> me make a promise to her, that I would join the
DAR, like all the females
in
> my family sense isn't inception. The only thing I
had to go by was her
and
> my aunt's DAR papers which both ladies left me.
My grandmother was Mary
> Blair Ward, daughter of Rev. John Blair Ward and
Sally George McCall. The
> name's probably mean nothing to you, but their
origins might. They were
> from Tazewell CO., VA. My grandmother was born on
her gr.grandfather's
> estate, "the Willows" in Witten Valley, Tazewell
CO., VA.
>
> A gazillian years past before I finally got around
to researching my
> family's history. It appears that my grandparents
for some reason, which
I
> have still to figure out, left Graham, (now
Bluefield) VA in the 1920's
and
> moved their family to Kennewick, Washington. And
although almost all my
> family is still in Tazewell Co., VA, I was born in
CA and spent those two
> years with my grandparents in Kennewick. By the
time I was old enough to
> start questioning my grandmother, she was gone.
So for many years I
really
> didn't do any research at all. But once I got
going
=== message truncated ===
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