A lot of genealogical research has been carried out by descendants of people called Hadrill, Hadderell etc. using standard genealogical sources such as birth certificates, census records and parish registers. These records make it clear that, in some cases at least, the various spellings of the surname were used interchangeably and don’t indicate different ancestry.

Standard genealogy can be thwarted by many factors such as there being more than one person of the same name born within a year or so, or missing records, or unusual circumstances (such as children not being baptised until they were several years old), or people moving far from the parish they were born in.

In October 2015, Julian Hadrill (United Kingdom) and Stuart Hadrill (Tasmania) took Y-chromosome DNA tests to see if they could throw any light on two such situations.

In Julian’s case, he knew he was descended from a William Hadrill born in Wiltshire around 1786. There was more than one William born around that time and no clear indication which one had moved to Trowbridge.

In Stuart’s case, he knew he was descended from a Peter Hadrill who lived in London in the late 1700s. No record of a Peter Hadrill being born in London has been found and it was assumed (but not proven) that he came from Wiltshire. His age at burial suggests he was born in around 1747, but no baptism of a Peter has been found for that year. However, there is circumstantial evidence to suggest that he was baptised in Bremhill, Wiltshire, when he was about 8 years old.

The DNA result proved that Stuart and Julian do indeed have a shared “Mr Hadrill” ancestor. It didn’t, however, prove who that shared ancestor was or when he lived.

Contact the project administrator, Dave Bindon, if you would like details of the circumstantial evidence about Peter Hadrill and a hypothesis about William Hadrill.

In December 2016, FamilyTreeDNA authorized the creation of this dedicated Project to promote DNA testing to achieve our goals.