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Early Sanford Ancestors in Essex and Hertfordshire, England
Our earliest known ancestor, Richard Sanford, is known to have lived in Stanstead, just north of Bishop's Stortford though his origins were most likely in Much Hadham, just west of Bishop's Stortford. (Just to give you a sense of scale and location, this map is about twelve miles across, and central London is just over 30 miles southwest of Bishop's Stortford on the M11 motorway. If you drive to London, you would begin to hit London suburbs just beyond the bottom of this map.) Several references to Sanfords in documents suggest that Richard's ancestors had been in the area for at least several generations. Richard and his wife Elizabeth had five sons and a daughter, probably all born in Stanstead.
The eldest son Thomas, born 1556, was probably a glover, like many others in his family. At age 25, Thomas married Friswith Eve (yes, that was really her name -- first name "Friswith," last name "Eve"), who died just 64 days after the wedding. In his grief, Thomas moved to Much Hadham (just east of Bishop's Stortford), a town where an uncle had lived and where he perhaps had other relatives.
Within three years, by 1584, he remarried, to Mary (last name probably Lewes), and by 1594 had two sons and three daughters, all born in Much Haddam.
Thomas's eldest son Ezekiel, born 1586, in 1607 married Rose Warner, who lived in Hatfield, about six miles from Much Haddam. They apparently lived for several years there with her parents, and sons Thomas and John were born in Hatfield. Sometime before 1612 they moved to Stanstead where the other eight children were born.
Thomas began his voyage to America from Stansted in 1631 or 1632, his brothers in the several years after that.
As you can see on the map, Stanstead is now spelled Stansted.
"Much" is also sometimes spelled "Mutche." "Hadham" is also often spelled "Haddam." It is also called "Great Haddam" or (in Latinate legal documents) "Haddam Magna." The name, in whatever form, distinguishes it from nearby Little Hadham.
Stortford is the location of a ford over the Stort River (surprise!). The Bishop of London established a residence in Stortford in the 1400s and owned most of the town, so it became Bishop's Stortford.
To see the entire family history/genealogy of the Sanfords (as far as we know it) around Stansted and neighboring villages, please click here.
The county line runs just west of the M11 highway. Much Hadham is in Hertfordshire; Stansted is in Essex but pretty much on the line; Hatfield is well over into Essex.
