Arnold Burrell
Born 5 May 1766 Sheffield Massachusetts
Married Lois Butler 1787
Married Mary Hitchcock 1812
Married Eliza
Died 6 June 1842 Sheffield Ohio; Age 76
Buried Garfield Cemetery Block B, Lot 11
Arnold Burrell was the seventh child of the family patriarch Abraham, and his wife Mary Austin.
Arnold was born in Sheffield, Massachusetts in 1766 in the house his father had built in the Berkshires
where a turnpike was proposed to pass. Later Abraham learned that the planned route had changed.
The ground was rocky, difficult to cultivate, and wooded, leaving little grazing land. Great numbers of
Berkshire County residents were moving west into New York as roads were completed and towns
established. Arnold decided to follow them.
He married Lois Butler and got his family started then headed northwest, skirting the Catskill
Mountains, and reaching Stephen Town (Albany New York) by 1790. The 1800 census shows him in
Middlefield New York just east of Lake Otsego, about 40 miles southwest of Schenectady. His family
numbered 10 with six children under the age of 10 and two teenagers.
Census records for 1810 reveal Arnold and his family living in Chenango Point, New York. They
had continued down the Susquehanna River into the newly organized county of Broome, which was
formed from Herkimer and Tioga Counties. He settled along the Chenango River in the “Glimmerglass
area” of James Fennimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking Tales. Arnold built a home on Chenango Street in
1809 according to the Annals of Binghamton. The original settlement was renamed Binghamton.
Arnold most likely headed to this location because nearly all the settlers were from towns in Berkshire
County Massachusetts.
Encouraged by his brothers Jabez and Isaac as they passed through New York, Arnold decided
to follow them and take up land in Sheffield Ohio. He and his family, which including several adult sons,
arrived in Sheffield from Binghamton New York in July 1817. They settled on Lot 68, located on East
River Road near the present intersection with 31st Street. Arnold was a wagon builder, a skill that was
welcomed in Sheffield.
Arnold apparently kept his ties to Binghamton where the family had joined the First
Presbyterian Church. The family may have returned there for baptisms as indicated by church records.
Lois Butler, Arnold’s first wife, and daughters Mary Ann, Sarah, and Sophia, are all listed as being
baptized in 1823, followed by Frederick (1825), Lois (1827), Abraham (1829), Ewen (1831) and Aurora
(1832). The family may even have stayed in New York for an extended period of time.
In any event, in the late 1820s Arnold returned to the Sheffield with his second wife, Mary
Hitchcock, daughter Mary, and sons Daniel, Abraham and Isaac. Arnold’s first wife died in New York in
1823. Arnold established a homestead in nearby Elyria Township where he and his sons lived in
neighboring farms close to his nephew Lyman Burrell. Arnold and his eldest sons are listed on the 1827
registry of men over the age of 21 living in Lorain County.
Prepared for Sheffield Village Historical Society by Marty Miller-Leveillee August 2015
Arnold’s fifth child was named Arnold Isaac Burrell. The fact that people dropped the Isaac in
census lists created confusion and several records assign the son’s wife to the father. Thanks to some
early genealogy research by John Burger, we have records that place children in the correct family.
In 1830, Arnold still had five children under the age of 10 supporting the family legend that he
had at least twelve children and several wives. Arnold’s son, Abraham, who had started a newspaper in
1818 called The Republican Herald in Binghamton, followed his father to Elyria and partnered in
printing the first newspaper in Lorain County—The Lorain Gazette. Abraham also published The
Buckeye Sentinel, Elyria Advertiser, The Elyria Courier, The Lorain County Eagle and The Independent
Democrat.
Arnold’s grandson George P Burrell married Marionette Barnes. Census records show him living
on the same road in Ridgeville with many Terrells. Son Edward Edmond worked on Albert Terrell's
farm. There is confusion among family trees due to the misspelling of George’s son Elbert as Albert. In
a totally different Burrell line, George Paul Burrell had a son named Albert who married Phebe Smith.
This family is probably the intersection of the Ridgeville Terrell family and the Burrells. Edward
Edmond Burrell is listed as the grandson of George Albert Terrell. The connection might have been Ann
Conrad (Daniel Higby Burrell’s wife) if her birth name was Terrell--still unknown.
Arnold Burrell’s extended family included marriages into several other settler’s families
including the Days, Smiths, Hecocks, Kinneys and Myers.
Descendants include:
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Elbert Julian Burrell developed an improved process for making commercial alcohol in the
late 1870s.
William Graves Sharp was ambassador to France in 1915.
Arthur Avery Burrell was an executive with Ingersol Rand in New York City.
Charles Alvah Burrell was president of The Burrell and Fowler Company in Cleveland.
Abraham Burrell published the following newspapers: The Republican Herald of Binghamton
New York, Lorain Gazette, Buckeye Sentinel, Elyria Advertiser, Elyria Courier, The Lorain
County Eagle and the Independent Democrat.
Claude Douglas Smith ran a wholesale drug company with his sons in Grand Junction
Colorado in the 1940s.
Prepared for Sheffield Village Historical Society by Marty Miller-Leveillee August 2015