James Munroe Rockwell (b. 16 Apr. 1817, at Newport, Rhode Island, during his father's military service). He married twice, the second being on 4 Mar. 1848, to Ann Eliza Williamson, daughter of Samuel and Louisa Williamson of Union, Wisconsin. They lived at Sun Prairie, WI, where their two sons were born. James also did some work on the railroad. He died 26 Sept., 1893 at Union Center, Wisconsin.
Jeremiah Rockwell, born 23 Nov. 1781, Lanesborough, Mass.); married 18 Jan. 1803 to Anna Coburn, daughter of Parish and Phylonica (Brown) Coburn; died 3 June 1851 at Berlin, Ohio.
Jeremiah Rockwell, b. 19 July 1756, Ridgefield, CT; settled at Cornwall, Vermont ca. 1777 and married there, 15 Aug. 1778, Hannah Stearns, daughter of Ebenezer and Mary (Gould) Stearns. She died 15 Aug. 1801 at Cornwall, and he married twice more. He was a soldier in the Revolutionary War and was at the Battle of Bennington. He died at Brandon, NY, 27 or 28 Aug. 1852.
John Rockwell, born 12 May, 1734, at Ridgefield, CT; married there 16 Apr 1754, Hannah Scott, daughter of Capt. James and Hannah (Hyatt) Scott of Ridgefield. They moved to Lanesborough, Mass., where Hannah died 8 May 1778. John later went to Cornwall, VT, where he died 6 Sept. 1825.
John Rockwell, b. Apr. 1706, Ridgefield, married on 3 Sept. 1731 to Elizabeth Keeler (b. in Norwalk, CT, 18 Nov. 1708 to Joseph and Elizabeth [Whitney] Keeler). The moved to what became the Ridgebury parish in the north of Ridgefield Town, where he died 4 July 1773.
Jonathan Rockwell, b. ca. 1665 at Stamford, CT, married in April of 1700 at Norwalk, Abigail Canfield, daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth [Merwin] Canfield. They were among the founders of Ridgefield, Conn., to the northwest of Norwalk. He died there 19 June 1731, she died 8 July 1734.
John Rockwell, who appeared in Stamford, Connecticut, in December of 1641, receiving a lot in its second land distribution. He married perhaps ca. 1657-1660 to Elizabeth Weed, daughter of Jonas and Mary Weed, who were among the founders of Stamford earlier in 1641. The Rockwells relocated ca. 1669 to Rye, now in the State of New York but then considered an outpost of Connecticut, where John is often said to have died early in 1673, though land records show that in early 1673 he had moved back to Stamford. He probably died within the following year, as probate records begin in 1674. His widow is still alive by 1684, and perhaps died in Norwalk, where her sons settled.
John is quite possibly that John born at Fitzhead, co. Somerset, England, to John Rockwell, Jr. (b. 5 July 1588, Fitzhead), who immigrated in 1635 to New England on the ship Hopewell and soon settled at Windsor, Conn., where his brother William also lived. This John (son of John and Honor [Newton] Rockwell) and his wife Wilmot [Cade] both died in 1662 at Windsor.
Documentation is lacking in the historical record to definitively tie John of Stamford and Rye to John of Windsor. However, a new approach to the problem comes to us from the world of molecular biology: DNA testing. There is a type of DNA found in the Y chromosome, which is passed from father to son, unchanged over the generations. If two men have a test which compares their Y-chromosome DNA, and they match, this means that their paternal lines meet in some male ancestor.
Applying this to the Rockwell question, a match between a direct-male-line descendant of John of Stamford and William of Windsor would prove that those two share a common male ancestor. The simplest solution is for the common ancestor to be John of Fitzhead, father of William and John of Windsor. But it isn't absolute proof that John of Stamford is the son of John of Fitzhead; he could instead be a son of another brother, Richard; or the common ancestor could be many generations in the past, previous to the start of record-keeping in Somersetshire.
But assuming our American line starts with John of Windsor, one can remember the descent (most of it at least) by memorizing a string of J-names: It goes