Nutfield FAQ's

Scots Irish migration map

Frequently Asked Questions

(see the answers below, scroll to the bottom for sketches of the first 16 settler families in Nutfield)

1.  Can you look up X for me?

2.  Who were the first Nutfield Grantees?

3.  Can the Londonderry Historical Society help me?

4.  Can the Derry Historical Society help me?

5.  When did Nutfield become Londonderry, Derry or Windham? 

6.  Was Derryfield part of Nutfield?

7.  My Scots Irish ancestors lived briefly in Londonderry, and then moved on.  Where did they go?

1.  Can you look up X for me?

I can try looking up a name for you.  These are the books I look for first!  The following books are all available at the Leach Library in Londonderry, the McGregor Library in Derry, and in other public and genealogical libraries.   Some are also available online, so you can look up your own ancestors yourself in most cases. If you still cannot find your ancestors, be aware that the early records are skimpy and incomplete.  I can try to suggest other resources if you have exhausted all these.

History of Londonderry, by Rev. Edward Lutwyche Parker, 1851 (includes genealogies in the back) and is available online at the Internet Archive, Google Book Search, and the Hathi Trust for free.  Also at Ancestry with a subscription.

Vital Records of Londonderry, by Daniel Annis Gage, 1914 (covers 1719 – 1910). This book only has known records.  Be ware that not all the Scots Irish who passed through Londonderry left vital records, and even the written records are incomplete.  This book is available at the Internet Archive and the Hathi Trust websites for free.  Also available at the Ancestry website with a subscription. There is also a PDF at the Pelham Library website http://www.pelhamnhhistory.org/library/pdffiles/neighbors/vitalrecords/LondonderryVitalRecords.pdf

History of Windham, NH: 1719 – 1883, by Leonard Allison Morrison, 1883 available at Internet Archive and at Ancestry (subscription only).  This book has a large genealogy section in the back (after the town history). 

Willey’s Book of Nutfield, by George Franklyn Willey, 1895  available at Internet Archive and the Hathi Trust websites.  It is mostly a rehash of Parker's history book (above), with a lot written about the 200th anniversary of Nutfield. 

Family Search also has the vital records of the state of New Hampshire available online. These are the scanned images of the same cards you see at the Vital Records office in Concord, New Hampshire.  The link to these collections is:    https://familysearch.org/search/collection/location/41?region=United+States+of+America&englishRegion=United+States+of+America  

2.  Who were the first Nutfield Grantees?

From The history of Londonderry : comprising the towns of Derry and Londonderry, NH, by Rev. Edward L. Parker, 1851, ( page 423) "Those who first composed the settlement [of Londonderry NH], were the following sixteen men and their families namely--James McKeen, John Barnett, Archibald Clendenin, John Mitchell, James Sterrett, James Anderson, Randal Alexander, James Gregg, James Clark, James Nesmith, Allen Anderson, Robert Weir, John Morrison, Samuel Allison, Thomas Steele and John Stuart.”    See below for links to genealogical sketches for all of these 16 families.

3.  Can the Londonderry Historical Society help me?

If you contact the Londonderry Historical Society you will get me!  http://www.londonderryhistory.org/  I do the genealogy look ups for LHS.  Here is the “canned letter” you will receive with your request:

“Genealogy Requests from the Londonderry Historical Society:  We will do a lookup in two published volumes for the names you submit:

1.)    The Londonderry Vital Records, 1722 – 1910

2.)    The History of Londonderry by Rev. E. L. Parker, 1851

If you need more information you can come to the Londonderry Leach Library’s historical room and search through our town records, cemetery files, and other books. Here are additional places where you can find more genealogy information on your ancestors

1)      The New Hampshire Vital Records, 71 South Fruit Street, Concord, NH

2)      The New Hampshire State Library, 20 Park Street, Concord, NH

3)      The New Hampshire Historical Society Library, 30 Park Street, Concord, NH has their catalog online at http://nhhistory.library.net/

4)      Familysearch.org has NH vital records (free online) births to 1900, deaths to 1959, marriages to 1959, and other records https://familysearch.org/search/collection/list?page=1&countryId=41

5)      The Rockingham County deeds are online http://www.nhdeeds.com/rockingham/RoHome.html

If you need to hire a researcher to look up records for you, please consult the website for the Association of Professional Genealogists APG https://www.apgen.org/ and search by location for New Hampshire”  Be aware that at this moment there is no Londonderry town historian.  

4.  Can the Derry Historical Society help me?

There is no Historical Society in Derry at this time.  However, the volunteers at the Derry History Museum http://www.derryhistorymuseum.org/ can answer your queries. At this moment, there is no Derry town historian. 

5.  When did Nutfield become Londonderry, Derry or Windham? 

Nutfield was the name of the original grant of land given to the Scots Irish settlers with Rev. James MacGregor in 1719.  They received a charter to this grant in 1722 and called the town Londonderry.  In 1721 the settlers in what is now Windham (south of Londonderry) petitioned for their own town, which was granted in 1742.  The eastern part of town was set off as the town of Derry in 1827.  Small portions of Manchester, Salem and Hudson (Nottingham West) were once part of Londonderry, too.   If your ancestor was born in Londonderry, NH in 1740, you should search the records of Londonderry, Derry, Windham and Manchester. 

6.  Was Derryfield part of Nutfield?

Derryfield was chartered at a meeting house on the Derry Road (now Mammoth Road) in 1751. It included the land originally settled in 1722 by John Goffe III and called Harry’s Town.  The first settlers here were John Goffe, Edward Lingfield and Benjamin Kidder. This area was later called Tyngstown and was west of Derryfield. The entire area was renamed Manchester in 1810, the same year the Amoskeag mill was built on the Merrimack River.   Part of Derryfield was originally within the Nutfield grant, and part of it was expanded with the 1751 incorporation.   The land north of Harrytown and Amoskeag Village was ungranted, and was not annexed to Derryfield until 1792 (the year the corporation for the proprietors of the Amoskeag Bridge was formed). 

7.  My Scots Irish ancestors lived briefly in Londonderry, and then moved on.  Where did they go?

The Scots Irish who came to Londonderry did not leave good records.  The vital records are skimpy, and the church records (Presbyterian) are incomplete.  The Scots Irish tended to settle with other Scots Irish – they kept to themselves and intermarried.  Some of the settlers spread out to Derryfield, Litchfield, Bedford, Antrim, Dublin, and Dunbarton in New Hampshire (note the Irish names?).  Some left to form Londonderry, Nova Scotia and Londonderry, Vermont.  Others traveled all along the Appalachian mountain chain or Atlantic seaboard and can be found in Pennsylvania (which had the largest number of Scots Irish) and other places where other Scots Irish settled.

Other resources:

A Nutfield Research Guide (with live links, by Erin Robinson of the Derry Public Library):

https://dplnhroom.wordpress.com/nutfield-research/   

A Self Guided History Tour of Londonderry, Derry and Windham, NH:   https://www.windhamnh.gov/DocumentCenter/View/6133/Nutfield-300-History-Tour-  

Several useful blog posts:

Genealogy Research in Concord, NH
   https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/05/researching-your-ancestors-in-concord.html

Genealogy Research in Derry, NH
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/05/researching-nutfield-ancestors-in-derry.html

Genealogy Research in Londonderry, NH
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/05/researching-nutfield-ancestors-in.html

Genealogy Research in Manchester, NH
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/05/researching-your-ancestors-in.html

I recently started a new series of blog posts on the genealogies of the first sixteen families (plus Rev. James MacGregor) to settle at Nutfield in April 1719.  These are the families that came with Rev. MacGregor from Northern Ireland, and traveled to Nutfield, which eventually became the towns of Londonderry, Windham, Derry and Derryfield, New Hampshire.

These are crowd sourced genealogy sketches.  Many of the readers who commented on my blog posts helped with details on these families, as well as comments made on social media (such as the Nutfield Genealogy Facebook page, and the 1718 Society Facebook page). 

There are plans to publish these genealogy sketches in a brochure for Founders Day Weekend April 12 – 14, 2019 in Derry, New Hampshire.  If I have the time I will also try to write up some genealogy sketches of some of the other early settlers in Londonderry, New Hampshire.  Stay tuned!

I’m adding this list as a permanent tab at the top of my blog page.  Look for it right under the photo at the top of this and every blog page. 

Here are the surnames sketches of the 16 original Nutfield Grantees and the links to their blog posts…

ALEXANDER  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/alexander-early-nutfield-settler.html  

ALLISON  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/allison-descendants-of-nutfield-settler.html  

ANDERSON  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/anderson-descendants-of-nutfield.html  

BARNETT  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/barnett-descendants-of-nutfield-grantee.html  

CLARK  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/clark-descendants-of-nutfield-minister.html   

CLENDENIN https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/clendenin-descendants-of-nutfield.html  

GREGG https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/gregg-descendants-of-nutfield-settler.html  

MACGREGOR  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/01/macgregor-early-nutfield-settler.html  

McKEEN https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/mckeen-descendants-of-nutfield-settler.html  

MITCHELL https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/02/mitchell-descendants-of-nutfield.html  

MORRISON  - https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/03/morrison-descendants-of-nutfield.html 

NESMITH – https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/03/nesmith-descendants-of-nutfield-settler.html   

STEELE – https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/03/steele-descendants-of-nutfield-settler.html  

STERRETT – https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/03/sterrett-descendants-of-nutfield.html  

STUART  - https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/03/stuart-descendants-of-nutfield-grantee.html  

WIER – https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/01/weir-early-nutfield-settler.html     

If you still have questions, leave a comment below and I will try to find the answer!

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To Cite/Link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Frequently Asked Questions - FAQ's", Nutfield Genealogy, posted October 17, 2016, (http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/10/frequently-asked-questions-faqs.html: accessed [access date]).