Monday, February 28, 2011

Working on William Leete (1671-1736). Help with Parmalee

In "cleansing" the '34 book, I've been working from Gov Wm Leete forward in time, following one branch at a time up to the 1880 period, when the new trees take over.   I want to be able to give each family a "scrubbed" genealogy.  I am at this William Leete, son of Andrew, grandson of Gov Wm.  He is important because he was the last one of his generation before the children began to "break out" of the Guilford area to populate neighboring states. 

As I try to cleanse the record, I have to deal with the Stone family.  This is the big deal because there were two Stone brothers who signed the original Guilford Covenant and the Leet(e) and Stone families have many common ancestors even to this era. 

So, I need help.  The Stones and Leetes both married into the Parmalee family.  A John Parmelee Jr appears to be the "root" immigrant.  But, the last name Parmalee seems to have different spellings, such as Parmelee, Parmaley, and Permely.  The on line information has John Parmelee immigrating through Boston or Connecticut.  But John Permely is a signer of the Guilford Covenant.  It seems most reasonable if THAT John Permely aka Parmelee is the one I should use as the root for the Parmalee family's relationship to the Leetes. 

Can anyone help? 

Objectives of a My Genealogical Research

I recently corresponded with Joel Helander, the Guilford historian and author of  "Leete's Island Legacy."  I was looking for a map of early Guilford.   As I described in my note to him, here are 4 objectives of my research:
  • My primary project is to republish the "'34 book" on the internet at https://sites.google.com/site/leeteleetgenealogyna/.  (Elsewhere in the note I emphasized that the republication should eliminate as many errors as possible, based on the wealth of internet data becoming available.)
  • A second project is to bring the genealogy up-to-date. This will be done by creating a new tree with the root person being a Leet(e) born around 1880.  I'm hoping that a descendant of that Leet(e) will take ownership of each tree. 
  • A third project, and one that is most exciting to me, is to track the movement of the various Leete/Leet clans across North America.  In particular, for Wm, starting with the Charter signers, to track how they moved as interconnected family groups from Guilford to other parts of New England and then west.  For example, the Hoadleys and Leetes, the Cruttendens and Leetes, the Chittendens and Leetes.  That's where a map of Guilford would come in handy, both for ahah moments on why someone married someone else (they were down the street- often found through census sheets), and to rationalize why a group moved together.
  • A fourth project, also exciting, is to document how Leete/Leets crossed paths, mostly unintentionally, during pivotal times in our history.  The most interesting one is the Civil War.  In this case, I am actually "tweaking" the official version of some battles based on my findings. Yes there were CSA Leete/Leets, both because of migration from the NE and new immigrants, A I Leet being the most notable.    

Thursday, February 10, 2011

The descendants of Roland Leete (#51)... Thomas H (#262) and his son William (#548) and his son George E (1143)

These are questions about some Leets that helped build MI.

The people in question are Thomas H, William, and his son George E.  Thomas H Leet, #262, was one of the original settlers of Clinton County.  Anyone in Clinton County... can you look up info on Thomas?  I have a land deed for him... and some census info, in addition to the 1934 book info. 

William- his son... I found where he was buried- in the Maple Grove Cemetery in Ovid.  A lot of that family lived and died around Ovid.  Can any body provide info or get pictures?

George E... That's a famous Leet name- several notable George Es.  This George E has only a birth entry of April 24, 1866 in the 1934 book.  But I've found an interesting 1900 census from Sterling Township, further east in Mi.. Macomb County, that lists a George Leet.  Can someone connect the two?  Contact me direct or attach a comment below. 

Note:  If you attach a comment, it is not immediately published.  I review it first.  So if you don't want it added to this blog, let me know and I will delete it after recording the info. 

Leete/Leet Line Starting with Roland Leete (#51) Asahel Leet

So, I've been working on my ancestry line using the 2011 Family Tree Maker, which finally has a lot of the publishing tools I need.  To get right to the point- I've been in contact with the Tinmouth, VT town clerk.  She says there is a Leet(?e) cemetery in the town.  That's a new piece of information.  One of the week links in the Roland Leete story was that of his son, Asahel.  She may help me piece some of that family together.  But I have a question: 
 
There is a town in CT called Torrington.  Asahel was not a common Leete name.  I have found an Asahel in that town's history!  Google has been scanning some rare books and making them available on line.  That's how I found this.  The Asahel I found joined the Continental Army at Torrington and I'll tell the rest of the story once I get some pieces of information.  My question:  would it make sense for Asahel, who I assume was from the Guilford area, to muster at Torrington?  Can you folks in CT help?  Just attach your comments to this post. 

Status- and plea for help

I'll put this on the myfamily.com web page too.  I'm getting ready for some big "dumps" and updates to the external web page.  But as I do each twig on the tree, I have questions about some of the twiglets, questions that are essential to answer before I can publish the twig.  Please help me where you can.  If you are close to a place where I have a question, I'm hoping you will volunteer to seek out the missing information.  Thanks, Duane