Charles Howland Russell
Published: 2013-09
Total Pages: 30
Get eBook
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1903 edition. Excerpt: ... Several of the inhabitants of Charlestown, among them being John Russell, met at the house of Mr. Thomas Graves, in Charlestown, on December eighteenth, 1640, and upon that day agreed upon a series of " Town Orders" for the proposed new town of Woburn; and these " Town Orders" are subscribed by thirty-two persons, including John Russell.1 He within two years. This condition had besn fulfilled." (Id. p. 23.) 1 Whence Woburn derived its name appears not to be known. Woburn, in Bedfordshire, in England, then was and still is the site of Woburn Abbey, the seat of the Duke of Bedford, whose family name is Russell. Sewall, the historian of Woburn, conjectures that a Richard Russell, who came to Charlestown from Herefordshire in 1640, and later became prominent in the colony, may have been a member of the family of which the Duke of Bedford was the head and that the name Woburn therefore may have been chosen out of respect for him. But this hardly seems probable, and at best is mere conjecture, as necessarily also must be any opinion as to the part which may have been taken by John Russell in the choice of the name. No Russell, other than John Russell, was among the subscribers to the "Town Orders" of 1640, above referred to, in which the new town is called "Woburn." Some of the descendants of John Russell used the goat crest, which is the crest of the Bedford Russells. This crest appears upon Jonathan Russell's seal, accompanying his signature to the treaty of Ghent in 1814 (infra, p. 40). Mr. Charles H. Russell in his youth understood, -from family tradition, that his family was connected with the Bedford Russells, and he and his brother William from early life used the goat crest. Hastings Russell, the ninth Duke of Bedford, whom Mr. Charles...