This Earle & Welford Family History is the result of many hours of painstaking and meticulous research into my own paternal and maternal family lines which meander their way back in time through many of the Yorkshire towns, villages and farmsteads mentioned in the pages on this website. Having broadened my research to include as many instances of Earles and Welfords found living in Yorkshire from the thirteenth century through to the start of the twentieth, my wish is for this study to be the most comprehensive family history of these two great Yorkshire families currently undertaken. However, what you see is by no means the end result and I hope to be able to add to this website for years to come as new discoveries are made.
For the Earle family, I have adopted the most commonly found spelling of the surname in above title, though there have been many variant spellings of the family surname in Yorkshire over the centuries ranging from Earle, Earl, Erl, Erle, Erll, Erell, Erril, Herle, etc. It would appear this has more to do with the literacy of the manor scribe or incumbent parish clergy, or indeed the education (or lack of it) of individual family members, rather than any deliberate attempt to differentiate between families. I forget how many times the particular spelling of my own surname has had an 'e' added to the end.
The Welford surname too has its varient forms in historical documents ranging from Welford, Wellford, Welfoot, Welfit and Wellfoote to name but a few, though by far the most common spelling is the one used in the above title.
For authenticity all transcripts of Wills, Inventories, Parish Registers, etc have been reproduced exactly as they appear in the source text without any attempt made to correct the spelling, or re-write sentences and paragraphs for modernity or readability. For reasons of privacy for those living Earles & Welfords, and just so I had a cut-off date for this project, few records extend beyond the 1911 census and where they do they contain only basic information available to anyone with access to the internet or with time to walk around their local churchyard.
I hope you find this website interesting and useful for your genealogical studies and the information helps to enhance the details, or fill in the gaps in your own family trees.
Richard John Earl
Harrogate