My name is Mike White and as of May 2024 I took on the role of Guild of One-Name Studies representative for the Wooster Family group, following in the footsteps of our former long-standing member, the late Mike Day.

Several years ago, six of the Wooster descendants met to exchange information and help each other with family history research. Since then, the group has increased and includes members not only in the UK, but also in America, New Zealand and Australia.

The study collects data on anyone with the name Wooster and its main variants, Worster, Woster, Worcester, Wocester, Worcestre, and Worceter.

The Wooster Family has its roots in Buckinghamshire. In the early part of the sixteenth century Richard and Agnes Wooster married and set up home in Aston Clinton. From them stem the many descendants alive today.

Other sources claim the surname is derived from the geographical locality, 'of Worcester.' Source: Forebears website

General David Wooster (1711-1777) - A Largely Forgotten Hero of the American Revolution. The town of Wooster, Wayne County, Ohio, USA was named after him.

Quincy Adams Wooster (1839-1908) - Founder of the Town of Wooster, Texas.

Louise Catharine Wooster (1842-1913) - Madam, Brothel Owner and Cholera Epidemic Hero.

Note: Bertram Wilberforce Wooster is a fictional character created by the author P.G. Wodehouse in the Jeeves stories.

For England and Wales the frequencies of the name Wooster in the Census records are: 1841(167), 1851 (267), 1861 (312), 1871 (392), 1881 (427), 1891 (521), 1901 (599), and 1911 (799) (Total 3484). Source: Your Family History website.

For the United States 1940 Census the frequency of the name Wooster is 1959. Source The Genealogist

For the year 2014 the top five countries for the occurrence of the surname Wooster are: United States (3,304), England (927), Australia (441), New Zealand (155), and Canada (110). Source: Forebears website.

In England and Wales the 1941 Census distribution of the name Wooster was: Buckinghamshire (105), London (38), Hertfordshire (7), Yorkshire (5), Warwickshire (5), Surrey (2), Worcestershire (1), Lancashire (1), Middlesex (1), Somerset (1). By 1911 the name had spread to most counties of England with the main concentrations in Middlesex (234), London (187), and Buckinghamshire (125).

The distribution of the Worcester variant in the 1841 Census does not show any weighting towards Worcestershire.  The top five counties being London (36), Staffordshire (16), Yorkshire (13), Warwickshire (11), and Sussex (9).

 Source: Your Family History

The Wooster Family group collects records of Wooster people from all over the world and aims to research their genealogy to see if they can be linked to any of the family trees on our website. The website includes the Great Wooster Tree plus 27 other trees (as of May 2024) containing unlinked families and individuals, stories, military information, gravestones and memorials, and links to other family history websites.

We do not have a Y-DNA project at present but several of our members have taken autosomal DNA tests and have found links to other Wooster descendants.

More information can be found on the Wooster Family website

The purpose of the website is to encourage contact and exchange of information between people who have an interest in the name Wooster and its many variants.

We have bi-monthly worldwide Zoom meetings (10pm UK time in UK summer and 9pm in winter) which are open to all. If you wish to join in please contact us at admin@woosterfamily.co.uk

Membership of the Wooster Family group costs just £6 per year. Details of how to join can be found in the Membership area of the website.

For this you will receive our biannual newsletter, which is circulated late June and early December, and access to the members area of the website which contains contact details for all members of our group, newsletters, publications, photos, the Great Wooster Tree and lots more.

In our members area you will find the full Great Wooster Tree containing over 7000 people plus other trees containing a further 3000+ people.