Adshead

Adshead One-Name Study

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Study details

Study: Adshead

Variants: Adsett, Adshade, Adsit

Category: 3 - A study where research using core genealogical datasets and transcriptions is well under way on a global basis.

Website: www.adshead.com/adshead

DNA website: www.familytreedna.com/public/Adshead

Contact: Mr H Gordon Adshead

About the study

A world-wide study of all known references to ADSHEAD. Started in 1995: Registered with the Guild 3331 in 2000Oct including ADSHADE, ADSETT and ADSIT. In practice the study is a collaborative effort with important contributions from members of the ADSHEAD Yahoo Group.

Variant names

Earliest known (year 1350) references are to DE ADDSHEAD, DE ADSHEADDE etc.in the Macclesfield Hundred in NE Cheshire. In the early records all sorts of random mispellings or typos occurred such as ADSHEADE, HADSHEAD, ADZEHED etc. We have a list of some 95 deviant spellings of this type. The most common typo in current times is ADSMEAD - addressed on envelopes, but never used by individuals. Currently the only forms in use today beside ADSHEAD appear to be ADSHADE (mostly in Canada and and South Africa) and possibly ADSHED (mostly in the USA) - though it is quite common for newspaper and other technical references to be made to ADSHED even though the individuals do not spell it this way themselves. Surnames ADSET(T)(E)(S) used to be considered to be a separate origin and hence outside the scope, but there is good evidence to suggest much overlap and interchange of spellings with ADSHEAD especially in the county of Sussex. There is a hamlett ADSETT is SW Gloucestershire. It is quite likely that the fairly large cluster of early ADSETTs in Sussex were preceded by an ADSHEAD reaching the county in around 1450. A recent DNA result strongly suggests that ADSIT(T)(E)(S) is also related to ADSHEAD / ADSETT. ADSIT has rarely been used in the UK, but there are a large number in the USA, nearly all descended from one John ADSIT thought to have been born in Sussex in 1680. A significant cluster using the spelling ADSETTS arose in NE Derbyshire and SW Yorkshire in the 1800s, again with much evidence of interchange with the spelling ADSHEAD as they moved in or out of this region.

Name origin

There are several possible theories on the origin of the surname ADSHEAD. Early (1350) records are all to found in the Macclesfield Hundred and the earliest (year 1500) BMD references are all to be found in the Prestbury / Macclesfield area of Cheshire UK. Hamlets in this area include Adswood, Adlington, Adders Moss and an Adshead Green. Adshead Green is no longer on the modern maps, but at this site there is still a farm named Adshead Green and a listed building Adshead cottage. The year 1350 court references to DE ADSHEDDE suggests an origin from a place eg Adsheude or Adsheade, An Anglo Saxon word meaning 'settlement'. One possibility is from such a site in North Lancashire. There is a possible Celtic association with Adzehead (where an adze is an axe with its blade set at right angles to the shaft to assist cutting side branches off a tree trunk). One early poem describes Saint Patrick with a nickname 'Adzehead'. Apparently the Celtic monks in the 7th century shaved their heads across the front from ear to ear, thus resembling an axe. Celtic Monks were not celibate.

Historical occurrences of the name

There are very few 'notable' ADSHEADs prior to the 20th Century. One Thomas ADSHEAD of Birchencliffe near Pott Shrigley in Cheshire was in 1580 the only ADSHEAD to receive a visitation by the armorial heralds (but did not qualify for a coat of arms). Another Thomas ADSHEAD of Milwich was appointed a commissioner for Staffordshire by Oliver Cromwell in 1653 but fled to Ireland when King James was resored. Joseph ADSHEAD published Adshead's Atlas of the Township of Manchester in 1848. The National Dictionary of Bibliography contains only two ADSHEADs, father and daughter, viz:- Stanley Davenport ADSHEAD who was an architect and based in the University of Liverpool and became a pioneer on Urban Renewal. His daughter Mary was a celebrated artist who completed several murals and won the competition in 1953 to design the high value postage stamps for Queen Elizabeth 2nd. One family of ADSHEADs (probably descended from the ADHEADs of Birchencliffe) ran the Silk Dying industry in Macclesfield and went on to brew ADSHEADs ALES in the first half of the 20th century. There are 5x ADSHEAD Roads in the world - in Liverpool, Dudley and Redcar in the UK plus two in Canada (BC and Vancouver Island). There were a few ADSHEAD farms, but often these have now been converted into sets of residences with an adddress such as ADSHEAD Close or ADSHEAD Crescent. There was an ADSHEAD House in Hazel Grove and there is an ADSHEAD Hall in Pleasant Hill, Tennessee USA. In 2010 an large house ADSHEAD Park was built on the banks of the Thames near Henley by a Sir John Robert Madejski a wealthy businessman and chairman of Reading FC who understands that his father was an ADSHEAD. There is a hamlet ADSETT in South Gloucestershire on the edge of the forest of Dean.

Name frequency

There were 725 ADSHEADs in the 1841 UK Census and 1300 ADSHEADs in the 1881 UK Census (rank order 2963) and thus about 13,000 persons with this surname since year 1500. Today (2013) there are about 3000 ADSHEADs in the World. Including the registered variants, the Index of recorded ADSHEADs (and variants) contains approximately 10400 Births, 7000 Marriages and 7700 Deaths.

Distribution of the name

In the late 1500s one in fifty recorded deaths in Prestbury churchyard was an ADSHEAD. By 1881 ADSHEADs were still very localised but the registration district with the most ADSHEADs had moved 10 miles North to Stockport on the Lancashire / Cheshire border following the growth of the cotton industry. Even today the majority of ADSHEADs in the World live in Lancashire or Cheshire most with a Post Code starting SK. There are pockets of ADSHEAD families in Walsall and Sheffield and there are still counties in the UK (eg Devon) where there has never ever been a recorded ADSHEAD event. There are about 150 in the US: 200 in Canada: 50 in Australia and some in New Zealand and South Africa. There are a few ADSHEAD families in India all descended over 7 generations from a single soldier from the 22nd Dragoons who went there from Manchester in 1807. A few ADSHEADs have begun to retire across Europe, notably to France and Spain.

Data

Data on all registered ADSHEAD Births, Marriages and Deaths is mostly complete, but there are still some missing Spouse Forenames and probably many more non-UK records are to be added (notably the ADSITs un the US). The ADSHEAD group are steadily trying to identify the parents of most ADSHEADs and to identify each person's earliest known ADSHEAD ancestor. This data is held in the File Area of the ADSHEAD Yahoo Group E-mail Forum. Several members of the Yahoo Group have mounted files on all sorts of subjects. Other data includes Census Data, Court Records, Patents, Authors, Sports, Wills, WarGraves, Family Group Trees, Photos,Cemeteries, Migration, Convict ships etc. A key role of the ADSHEAD Yahoo Group, is the collaborative creation of family group Trees, collecting together all ADSHEADs descended from a common ancestor. 97% of all ADSHEADs listed in the 1901 UK Census have been placed into trees, but this still leaves a large number of individuals still to be asigned. Currently only about 46% of the Marriages and some 54% of the Births and 47% of the Deaths have been grouped into about 100 separate trees, mostly starting from the early 1700s.

DNA

We have registered ADSHEAD DNA studies with FTDNA also covering the three main variants ADSHADE, ADSETT and ADSIT, but so far (Mar 2019) we have only 26 relevant Y-DNA results at 37 markers of which most have now extended to 67 markers. 23 of these testees have the surname ADSHEAD or ADSIT. The other three are definitely related through "non paternity" situations. Apart from three "0ddballs" and two known NPEs, these ADSHEADs can be divided into 2 completely separate groups that could not possibly have a common male ancestor. It has now become apparent that one group is complosed of the earlier families and trees originating from the Macclesfield area, whereas the the other group are much more closely related and all originate in Manchester and may well all be descended from an NPE from Macclesfield thus indicating that that ADSHEAD may well be a single origin surname. Following the discovery that one large family in Sussex registered children with surnames that migrated from ADSHEAD to ADSETTS it would be very interesting to see to what extend these surnames are directly related. Also it may be possible to determine which branch of the ADSHEADs founded the large group of ADSHADEs to be found in Canada and to a lesser extent in South Africa. A 2015 DNA result from a person with the surname ADSIT in the USA has proved most interesting as he has a solid match with the the largest DNA group of 9 ADSHEAD trees centred on Cheshire origins. This does spur us to try to confirm that he is descended from an ADSET or ADSIT born in Sussex in 1680. The second group of 7 were originally thought to be in separate trees originating in Manchester but three of them have been shown by DNA to be descended from the same John ADSHEAD born in 1710.

If any person with any of these four surnames (ADSHEAD, ADSHADE, ADSET* or ADSIT* ) is interested to take part in some Y-DNA measurements this would be much appreciated as it could well lead to a better understanding of how the different trees may be related. Please contact me - Gordon Adshead. .

Links

The closed Yahoo Group also contains several Index's, Trees, Photos, Files etc relating to ADSHEADs, mostly contributed by members of the ADSHEAD Group. Anyone with an interest in the ADSHEAD / ADSETT / ADSIT or ADSHADE surnames is invited to join the ADSHEAD Yahoo Group E-Mail Forum. Just send a request EMail to me (Gordon Adshead) and I will send you a Yahoo Invitation.

Last udated 29May2019

Contact Details

Mr H Gordon Adshead

General Search Results

Occurrences of the surname Adshead in the Guild Indexes

(Click on the number to view the search results in each index. Indexes marked by * are only accessible by logged in Guild members.)

Marriages of the World (public) 11
Marriage Index 1837-1945* 1417
Probate Index* 3
World Wide Marriages Index* 6
BMD Index* 100
Members' Data Stores in which the name Adshead appears* 5
References to the name Adshead in the Guild Journal 13

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