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| A map of early Londonderry from Willey's Book of Nutfield |
Frequently
Asked Questions
(see the
answers below)
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?
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.
History of Windham, NH: 1719 – 1883, by Leonard Allison Morrison,
1883 available at Internet Archive and at Ancestry (subscription only)
Willey’s Book of Nutfield, by George Franklyn Willey, 1895 available at Internet Archive and the Hathi
Trust websites.
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.”
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
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”
4. Can the Derry Historical Society help me?
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.
--------------------------
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]).
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