John Sibley and Jane Pochard

John Sibley (1755-1835) and Jane Pochard (1760-1860) were my 5th great grandparents, and one of very few sets of my ancestors who migrated to the US after the Colonial period.

They had eleven children, and have many hundreds of descendants living today, and their arrival in Maine was more by chance than many other New England families.

John Sibley was born in Nova Scotia to Englishman and soap magnate Henry Sibley and Halifax native Sarah Haislup.  When John was only eight years old, his father Henry sailed home to England to settle his father's estate and died at sea.  This left John and his five siblings orphaned in Halifax, which Sarah couldn't handle, so she left her children to be raised by others and moved to England.  While his siblings appear to have stayed in Halifax, John joined the Revolution.

JONATHAN EDDY

In particular, John became involved with Jonathan Eddy's movement to make Nova Scotia the 14th American Colony, to break ties with England during the American Revolution. Jonathan Eddy made a failed attempt to siege Fort Cumberland in central Nova Scotia, in the fall of 1776, and John Sibley somehow ended up in Maine (then part of Massachusetts) following Eddy's retreat back to his native Massachusetts.

John later fought in the Battle of Monmouth in New Jersey, and also Saratoga with the Continental Army as a private in Captain Smart's company, Colonel Calvin Smith's regiment.  John was also at Valley Forge in 1778 and reported on command at Boston Neck in March and April 1779. He was reported deserted July 12, 1780, which many believe was the reason his pension application was later turned down.

John married Jane Pochard December 8, 1782 at Pownalborough, Maine.  Jane was born in Frankfort, Maine to Abraham Pochard, whose father was a French Huguenot who had arrived in Maine 1751 with his wife and four sons from Chenerbie, Haute-Soane in eastern France near the Swiss border. They arrived in Boston on the ship Pricilla, which sailed from Rotterdam,   Netherlands, and then proceeded directly to Frankfort Plantation (Dresden) in Maine   where they settled. Some of the family moved to Fairfield in 1775 and then to the Pittsfield area around 1814. The inability of the English speaking settlers to spell the Pochard family name correctly resulted in a variety of phonetic variations e.g. Pushard, Pushaw, Pushor, and Pushan.

They lived in Fairfield, Canaan, Warsaw (Pittsfield), and Passadumkeag, Maine.

John applied for a Revolutionary War pension on March 12, 1834, which reveals that he was born in 1755 in Halifax, N.S.  The pension application was denied due to his apparent desertion near the end of the War.

Passadumkeag, Maine incorporated as a town in 1835. When they did their first Town census after incorporation, Jane was listed as widow Jane Sibley.  So we know that John died about 1835.

John and Jane had twelve children, four girls and eight boys, including my 4th great grandmother Margaret Sibley-Burrill, who married Benjamin Burrill of Fairfield, who was 4th great grandson to John Alden of the Mayflower.

The Burrill Family of Fairfield Maine

The Burrill (also written as Burrell) surname is purportedly rooted (at least for our ancestry) in the Anglo-Saxon name Burwell, which is derived from the Old English byrig-wiellw, which means 'town well' or 'fort by a spring'.

Early origins of the name stem from those families that resided in the township of Burwell, as such township was located in each of Northampton, Cambridgeshire, and Lincolnshire.  Anyone with this last name would have ancestors originating in one of these three East England counties.

According to Ancestry trees (which can be dubious in nature), my 13th great grandfather was Edmund Burwell (1485-1549), from Suffolk (closest to Cambridgeshire), and is the furthest I've been able to trace the line.  Edmund's grandson Thomas Burwell, along with Thomas' son John, sailed to Connecticut about twenty years after the Mayflower arrived, but later migrated up to Plymouth Colony.  Many other Burwells from England had sailed directly to Virginia Colony at the same time.  Our branch of the Burwell family name had changed to Burrell/Burrill.  Several of these settlers married into lines that descended directly from Mayflower passengers, much like all colonial families. 

With reliable records, however, I've been able to trace as far back as John Burrill (1609-1711), who came at the age of 26 on the ship Blessing July of 1636.  He settled in Weymouth, MA in 1639. He was granted 26 acres. He had two lots of five acres granted 'in the Rainge' and 1 acres 'in King oke hill.' He also had lot 33 of 5 acres in the First Division and lot 41 of 15 acres in the second division granted 14 Dec 1663.

He was provided arms and ammunition for King Philip's War on 1 Dec 1675, one of 13 Weymouth men in Capt. Johnson's Company in Oct 1675.

His son, John Jr. (1658-1731), married Mercy Alden, granddaughter to Mayflower passenger John Alden.

GRAVE OF BELA BURRILL
EMERY HILL CEMETERY
FAIRFIELD, ME

Bela Burrill (1756-1816) was my 5th great grandfather, and a direct descendant of the Burrell family from Weymouth, MA.  At the age of nine, while the family was living in Abington, in Plymouth County, his mother (Anna Vinton) was in Maine and died giving birth to Bela's youngest brother Ziba.  According to online trees, Bela's father John Burrill died in Abington on the same day (12 Mar 1765).  I have yet to find any backup records for this date coincidence (so it could be an error), but if true it could prove to have been a sad tale.  

Bela fought in the Revolutionary War for five months, in Capt. James Lamont‘s Company. Private 22 July 1775 to 31 Dec 1775.  Afterwards, he somehow found his way up to Somerset County, Maine, where he met Hannah Colemore, a Sagadahoc, Maine native.   Bela fought in Captain James Lamont's Company from 22 Jul 1775 to 31 Dec 1774.  Bela's brother John fought in the Revolutionary War, in Capt. Gould's company, Col. John Greaton's regiments, among others, and fought five and a half long years. His father John was a Sergeant and his grandfather John was a Captain.

Bela and Hannah settled in Fairfield, and had approximately nine children.  Their son Hull Burrill was a veteran of the War of 1812 and a prominent attorney from nearby Canaan, and father of 10.  He appeared in many Somerset County court records going after people for failure to pay him money.  Their son Jonas lived in nearby Clinton, and their son Bela Jr. lived in nearby Albion (now China).  Another son Benjamin Burrill (1782-1857), 4th great grandfahter, grew up in Fairfield and took on farming, just like the Colemores, Emerys, Sibleys, and Osborns who were his neighbors.  I have yet to establish proof that Benjamin is the son of Bela (an established John Alden descendant), but other applications to the Mayflower Society have succeeded for Benjamin's descendants in the past. 

In 1803, Benjamin married Margaret Sibley, daughter of English, French Huguenot and Nova Scotian immigrants, and they had five children.  In July 1825, he sued his brother Hull for a fraudulent conveyance of 82 acres of land in Canaan Hull had sold to him when he didn't actually own the property.  Hull never showed up in court, and Benjamin was awarded his money back. [Source:  Somerset County Court Records].

Benjamin's daughter, Lydia Burrill (1806-1854) married local farmer Jacob Osborn, son to sea captain Isaac Osborn (Rev War veteran and transplant from East Hampton, Long Island) and Sarah Wyman (Isaac's brother Ephraim married Sarah's sister Lydia - who was a cousin to Polly Wyman, Hull Burrill's wife!). 

Jacob died very young, and only a few years after marriage.  A couple of years later Lydia married Jacob's own younger brother Timothy Osborn (1805-1898), pictured below:

Their daughter Lydia Osborn married Charles Samuel Fuller (who was Timothy's cousin!).  Lydia and Charles were my 2nd great grandparents.

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As is often the case with early New England families, another set of Burrills figure in to the family:

My third great grandfather, John Holland, whose nephew, James Madison Bell, married Sylvia Belle Burrill, who was also a descendant of immigrant John Burwell (Sylvia was also a descendant of the same Bean family from Scotland as the ancestors of Samuel Bean Fuller, father to Charles Fuller mentioned above!

Below is a pedigree chart of Lydia Burrill-Osborn-Osborn.  She was 25% French, 75% English.