Announcement: Bissell/Bizzell DNA Project
Dear List Members:
I am now the co-administrator of the "Bizzell DNA Project," which includes Bissell and other variant spellings of the surname. I know some of you will be interested in this project, whether as "spectators" or as participants. To do a Y-DNA test, you must be a male person named Bissell (or some spelling variant). The Home Page for the project links to the DNA and lineage results to date, and it is all pretty self-explanatory. For details, go to:
http://worldfamilies.net/surnames/b/bizzell/index.htmlhttp://worldfamilies.net/surnames/b/bizzell/index.html
Here is an amended version of the notes I have posted there. Some who have asked about Captain John's parents or his wives should find this of interest. It also shows that we are casting a rather wide net, to include the Rhode Island Bissells who did ~not~ descend from Captain John, and the Virginia Bizzells who also did not descend from Captain John, but both of whom came from England.
Please feel free to email me at any time at:
[email protected]
Best to all,
Roger Bissell, editor, Bissell Histories & Mysteries
co-administrator, Bizzell DNA Project
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Notes to Researchers
by Roger E. Bissell, co-administrator
1. Captain John Bissell, the original immigrant ancestor of the "Connecticut Bissell" family, came from Huntington, Somerset County (or Somersetshire), England to Plymouth Bay Colony about 1628 and then to East Windsor, Connecticut about 1639. There is some disagreement as to whether Captain John was born in 1590, 1591, or 1592; however, since he died October 3, 1677 at the age of 86 (as per his grave marker), the odds are three-to-one that he was born in 1591, and this is the general consensus. His parents are unknown, though one probate record suggests that his father was named Thomas. Another possibility recently put forth is that his father was named Richard. However, in the absence of adequate documentation, neither of these purported ancestors will be included here on this web page.
2. There is also some disagreement as to the names, and even the number of Captain John's wives.
a. The mother of his seven known children -- Mary (who m. Jacob Drake), Thomas, Samuel, John II, Nathaniel, and Joyce (who m. Samuel Pinney) -- died May 21, 1641, and her name was believed to be Mary Drake, though some argue that this is a confusion with Captain John's daughter Mary, who married Jacob Drake, and that at most we can presume that his wife's name was Mary, because their eldest daughter was named Mary.
b. It is suggested that he had a wife prior to Mary, and that the Sarah Bissell born about 1615, who married in 1635 at Windsor, Connecticut to Simeon Mills, was their daughter; the name of this supposed earliest wife is not known.
c. Nor is the name of his last wife currently known, though it is widely believed, though mistakenly, that her name was Elizabeth Thompson. This is apparently due to an uncareful reading of a golden wedding announcement in 1870 (!) for Captain John's great-great-great-great-grandson, John Bissell (Capt. John-->John II-->Jeremiah-->John-->Hezekiah-->John) and his wife Elizabeth Thompson Bissell, also residents of East Windsor, Connecticut. Thus, at present, none of the names of Captain John's two or three wives are known, with the likely exception of Mary (Drake?), the mother of his seven known children.
3. We are currently reaching out to descendants of Captain John's four sons, trying to locate male Bissell descendants who are willing to help forward the research on our Bissell ancestry by submitting pedigrees and/or DNA test results. Another major line of Bissells from England stem from Thomas Bissell who came to Rhode Island about 1709. Many of their ancestors have been traced, and we hope to eventually include some of their pedigrees and DNA test results on this website. The same is true for the Bizzells, whose ancestor Thomas Bizzell came to Virginia in 1691. We are particularly anxious to include those with established "paper trails" back to Captain John or other immigrant ancestors -- however, we welcome any and all people who want to try to link up their ancestry to the "patriarchs" listed on this web page.