Family of Robert 61 Family of Hanford 89 Family of William 129 Family of John
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The Olds (Old, Ould) Family IN England and America American Genealogy by EDSON B. OLDS English Pedigree by MISS SUSAN S. GASCOYNE OLD of Loadoa, Englaz,d Compiled aad Publi,hed by EDSON a. OLDS WASHINGTON. D. C. I~ I 5 Eotered ac:conlin• to Act cl Coo;r... , in the.,._, 1915 B1 EDSON B. OLDS lo cha ol!ice cl the l_jl,,.riao of Co..,... al Washi■ atoa PREFACE ITH some trepidation I have approached the task of compiling a genealogy of the Olds family. The data has been in many in ID stances so fragmentary that at first it seemed almost impossible to make a coherent book. Even now I have received many fragments which it has been impossible to connect with the main line.•- On this account some blank leaves are provided in the back of the book so that those members of the family who do not find their names in the genealogy may record their line should they discover it later. Some of the more important of these fragments have been placed after the connected lines. For many years several members of the family had been collecting data regarding the descent from Robert Ould, but had not discovered the English connection. By good fortune I was enabled to find this and obtain the English pedigree, which has been contributed by Miss S. S. Gascoyne Old, of London, who is in posses sion of the family records which have been handed down for many years. The thanks of all the members of the American branch sl1ould be extended to her. Much of it was compiled by her uncle, the late William Watkins Old, an antiquarian. The first intention was to publish this pedigree in the form of a chart, but the memoranda obtained in this country was so voluminous that it did not seem practicable to use it in that form. Those members who have been collecting data have been very kind in put ting them at my disposal and I am greatly indebted especially to the Rev. R. L. Olds, of Dexter, Me., who sent me everything he had, an invaluable list of names and dates. Much assistance has also been given me by Dr. Frank W. Olds, of Williamstown, Mass., by Mr. A. L. Olds, of Detroit, Mich., and by Miss Caryl E. Olds, of Chicago. Other members of the family have kindly helped by sending what they had, and to all of these I wish ,to tender my most hearty thanks. These should be extended also to Mr. W. B. Olds, of Decatur, Ill., who brought the pedigree o\1er from England. Since the book is not as complete as I would like to see it, I hope that some one else will in the future under take the task of continuing the work and enlarging on what I have done. I trust that any one in whose hands the book may come will forward to me any ad ditional information they may obtain, which I will be glad to place at the disposal of whoever may wish to publish it later. I have endeavored conscientiously to compile all au thentic data, but should errors have crept in, it would afford me pleasure to be notified of them. EDSON B. OLDS. Washington, D. C., August 1, 1915. CONTENTS. PAGE PREFACE 3 HISTORY 7 ENGLISH LINES-- Old of England 21 Ould of Ireland 39 Old of Sherbome 45 AMERICAN LINES-- Olds of America 55 Family of Robert 61 Family of Hanford 89 Family of William 129 Family of John . "11 Last Will and Testament of John Olds o, Suffield. Head of the "Family of John" ~ l.-1 UNCON::-7?.CTED LINES 269 INDEX- Olds {Old, Ould) 337 Alliances· . 347 HISTORY HE history of the "Old'' family in England commences in Anglo-Saxon times when its members were Thanes in Yorkshire. ancl O are mentioned in the Domesday Book of William the Conqueror. The original name was "vVold," pronounced "Old," and there is a v°illage in Huntingdonshire called "Old or \Vold," which once be longed to the \Voids of Derby. This village is men tioned in Murray's Hand-Book for Northamptonshire, as follows: "Between Brixworth Station and that of Lamport lie (right) the churches of Scaldwell, Old or Wold, and Faxton. "Old or Wold. The Church of St. Andrew has a fine Decorated tower (the most interest ing portion) but is mainiy Perpendicular. There are fragments of a carved pulpit of the 16th century." ("Decorated" is time of 1307 to 1377, Edward II and Edward III. "Perpendicular" is the time of 1377 to 1547, Richard II to Henry VIII.) The pedigree of the family goes back in an unbroken line to Roger Wold, who lived at Flixtune, in Yorkshire, 8 HISTORY in 1189. The seal of his son, William, is appended to one of the Campbell Charters in the British Museum. From Yorkshire the main branch of the family moved to Rowton Hall in Shropshire, where they lived from 1257 to 1815. They appear to have been people of education for their times, as many of them were cloister bred, and during that troublous period all education emanated from the monasteries and cloisters. In 159!1 Richard Olde married Agnes Courtenay, of Somerset. a relative of Lord Courtenay, and she brought him a:i estate near Yeovil in that County, called "Chilton Cantelo" and sometimes "Olds' Oak" or "Oldsoke." In 1759 it passed through marriage to the Goodfords, who still possess it under the name of "Chilton Cantelo." The son of the present proprietor is named John Old Middleton Goodford, and is mentioned in Burke's Landed Gentry of England. From the Yeovil branch sprang the line of "Old of Dorset," afterward called "Old of Sherborne," from which place Robert Ould, the ancestor of most of the Olds family, emigrated tr> America. The name of Old occurs very frequently in the records of Dorsetshire, and there are many wills filed and registers of births. deaths and marriages of the Old family both there and in Salop or Shropshire in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, showing them to have been persons of standing and some prominence. The family has always been well known as among the best county families of southern England, and their pedi gree is considered an unusually long one. even for tha~ country, where such records are usually so well pre served. The heads of the family appear to have been very conservative and to have held to the old religion for some time after the Reformation. During the Civil \Vars they were Royalists. HISTORY 9 John Olde, the father of Robert Ould, lived at Sher borne and was buried at Hillfield. In a recent number of "Somerset and Dorset Notes and Queries" there is an article on the enclosure of Hillfield Common in 1607 in which a document is referred to that mentions the names of \Villiam Old and Andrew Old as among the copyholders and leaseholders. John Olde had five sons, one of whom, Robert, emigrated to America, and the son of another, Andrew, went to Ireland and founded the Irish branch of the family, who still spell their name "Ould." From this branch is probably descended the Southern family of "Ould" in this country, prominent among whom was Judge Robert Ould, of Richmond, Va., the "Commissioner for the Exchange of Prisoners·· for the South during the Civil War, and who was well known at \Vashington, D. C., and Richmond, Va. Rowton Hall, in Shropshire, is in the neighborhood of Broseley. and in a curious book called "Broseley and Its Surroundings," published in 1879, is the following mention of it: "Rowton Hall. the home of the Old and other old Shropshire families, remains. There are traces about it of earlier buildings. Its great hell, which formerly summoned harvest-men, plough drivers, shepherds. carters, swineherds and laborers generally, on the estate to their meals, is still in its place. There, too, stands the enormous dove-cote capable of giving shelter to an inconceivable number of pigeons." In another place it says: "Adjoining the manor of Broseley, but not in cluded in it, although at the southern extremity of the parish. was the ancient estate of Rowton. An old family of the name of Old resided here. The name occurs in the register of the Wenlock Corporation 2Gth of Elizabeth (1593) where Ricus Olde, as the name is there given, appears in the list of Bailiffs. The follow- HISTORY ing year ( l!i04-) Thomas Olde is described as Baily. In the 9th of James (1610) the name of Richard Olde again occurs as Bailiff, and in the 16th of the same reign (1G17) we find Ricus Olde, gent., Bailiff." "The Olds held Rowton; Richard Old, son of John, held 138 acres and Rowton Hall; and Samuel Old, by purchase, had the Heath Riddings, near the :\mies, Rowton Gr~en, and other property, altogether a little over 50 acres." "The estate lay at the southern extremity of the Broseley Coal-field, where the lower coals only occur, and these very near the surface. Little is known of these early coal-workings, as plantations of larch, fir and birch, with other trees, grow upon the spoil banks on the high ground near Rowton; whilst at Gitchfield, near the Severn, to which the works extended, a thick turf covers the ground where levels were driven and pits were sunk, and tramroads connected them with the wharves beside the river. Still less is known of Gitchfield house, which stood on this side of the estate.