Thomas Willett1,2,3

M, b. circa 1620, d. 1646
     Thomas was born circa 1620 in Bristol, Gloucestershire, England. Thomas was a soldier in the employment of the West India Company. He is of record as having been a part of and/or a witness to events concerning the Pavonia Indians. There are two affidavits in which he is named, the second of these dated July 7, 1644, he describes himself as being three and twenty years of age.4 Thomas married Sarah Cornell, daughter of Thomas Cornell and Rebecca Briggs, on 1 September 1643 at the New Amsterdam Reformed Dutch Church in the City, County & State of New York.5,6 He apparently lived in New York only a short time as he first appears there in 1643. Land was granted to him in 1645, which was located in a block which now would be on Pearl Street between the house numbers of 75 & 89, he in all likely hood lived there before the official grant. It was situated on a lot across a side street from the building that would become City Hall. The proof of the lineage of this family comes in the way of various land records for differing parts of this property as it was transferred to various members of the family.7 Thomas departed this life in 1646 in the City, County & State of New York, at his home on Pearl Street. This home would now be located at 79 - 85 Pearl Street.

Citations

  1. [S103] Clarence E. Pearsall, History of the Pearsall Family, Chapter 27: section 3, pages 1013-1014 - Thomas Willet was an Englishman born in Bristol, England, who came from Virginia to New Amsterdam. His family in Virginia were among the richest & greatest landed proprietors. They were heavily interested in the tobacco trade. Thomas Willet married Sarah Cornell, the daughter of Thomas Cornell. He was partner with Jorien Blanck & Joclen Keirsted, but their business dealing were not without considerable friction and finally their disagreement brought them into court. Thomas Willet died before 1647 when his widow married Charles Bridges of Canterbury, England, who was also a Dutch English merchant. In 1653, he was made provincial secretary. He died in August of 1682. And she married John Lawrence Jr. of Flushing. Long Island, who was a Dutch English trader of the highest rank. … ; … the conveyance to Thomas Willets in 1645, was really a quick claim of the government’s rights to the land since1640.
  2. [S1302] Corrections & Additions to Published Genealogical Works, page In the History of Me New York City, by Mrs. Schuyler Van Rensselaer, vol. ii, p. 133, it is stated that " Thomas Willett— one of the original patentees of .the town of Hempstead," was also " high sheriff of Long Island under Governor Andros." The patent was granted by Gov. Kieft, Nov. 14, 1644, to Robert Fordham, John " Stricklan," John " Larnoree" (Lawrence), John Carman, John Ogden and Jonas Wood, and Thomas Willett does not appear among the patentees. In the " Division of Land" made in 1647 appears the name of a Thomas Willett, but it is not clear who he was. According to The Early' History of Hempstead, L. I., by Charles B. Moore (N. V. Gen. & Biog. Record, vol. x, p. 14), it is stated that this proprietor, Thomas Willett, was Thomas Willett, the Mayor of New York, and according to others he is made to be the Thomas Willett who married at the Reformed Dutch Church in N. Y. on Sept. 1, 1643, Sarah Cornell. It is certain that some time before Nov. 3, 1647, Sarah Cornell's husband died, as on that date she married Charles Bridges (Carel Ter Brugge), so it remains uncertain which Thomas Willett was proprietor in 1647. The point however, which I wish to make, is that neither of these Thomas Willetts was High Sheriff of Long Island in 1676. Thomas Willett, the Mayor of New York, retired to Barrington, R. I., in 1673, and died there Aug. 4, 1674; and Thomas Willett who married Sarah Cornell, died between Nov., 1645, and Nov., 1647. The High Sheriff of Long Island in 1676 was Col. Thomas Willett, son of Thomas Willett and Sarah Cornell.
  3. [S1303] Notes on Books, WILLETT.—Genealogical Errors .-In the second edition of the History of Westchester County, recently published, it is stated (vol. ii., p. 275, and appendix, same vol,. p, 765), that Colonel Thomas Willett, of Flushing, from whom descended the Willetts of Cornell's, or 'Willett's Neck, Westchester Co., was the second son of Captain Thomas Willett, of Plymouth, first Mayor of New York under the English. It is also asserted this Colonel Thomas Willett married Sarah, daughter of Thomas Cornell.
    It is evident these mistakes of the laborious historian were occasioned by his not having discovered, or of his having overlooked the fact that there was another Thomas Willett then residing in New Amsterdam, who was from Bristol, Eng., and who was married in the Dutch Church on the 1st of September, 1643, to Sarah Cornell, the daughter of Thomas Cornell, the patentee of Cornell's Neck Thomas. Willett, the son of Captain Tbornas Willett, of Plymouth, was not born until October 1, 1646. Ile was never married, and died before his father. Captain Thomas Willett, of Plymouth, had no son named William
    The chi:dren of the above-named Thomas Willett, from Bristol, and of Sarah Cornell, were William, bap. in Dutch Church, June 29, 1644, and Thomas, bap. in same, November 26, 1645. The latter is the person afterward known as Colonel Thomas Willett, of Flushing. His wife was Helena. Stoothoff, dau. of Elbert Elbertse Stoothoff, of Brooklyn.
    Thomas Willett (the father) died about 1645-46, and his widow Sarah married, December 3, 1647, Charles Bridges, otherwise called in the Dutch Records Carel Brugge, or Vanbruggen. Bridges died August, 16S2, and she subsequently married John Lawrence, Jr_, of Flushing.
  4. [S1292] Rosalie Fellows Bailey, The Willett Family of Flushing, Long Island, page 1 -.
  5. [S461] M.A. Rev. John Cornell, Genealogy of the Cornell Family: Being An Account of the Descendants of Thomas Cornell of Portsmouth, Rhode Island, page 31 - The marriage record of the Dutch Church of New Amsterdam, the only church in the city in 1643, translated into English, reads: "On the 1st day of September, 1643, were married Thomas Willett, previously unmarried, of Bristol, England, and Sarah Cornell, not before married, of Essex, England. (See History of the Mott Family, by Thomas C. Cornell.).
  6. [S519] New Amsterdam Reformed Dutch Church Marriage Records, 1 September 1643 - Thomas Willet, jm. van Bristol in Engelt; Sara Cornell, jd van Essex in Engelt.
  7. [S1292] Rosalie Fellows Bailey, The Willett Family of Flushing, Long Island, page 1-3.