<p><img src="images/stories/william_nodwell_will.jpg" border="0" alt="William Nodwell Will" title="William Nodwell Will" width="225" align="right" /></p><h2>Pioneers in Ontario</h2><p>William Nodwell was born in Ireland some time around 1775. He had two sons with his first wife, Mary Dawson, whose names were William and Matthew. Sometime after she died, he married again (probably around 1808). His second wife was Letitia Dunn. His eldest son William remained in Ireland when he emigrated, but Matthew had already gone there in 1834. The eldest son of the second family, Andrew was already married before the rest of the family left Ireland but came to Philadelphia the following spring. He went from Philadelphia to Ontario after deciding not to remain in the new United States of America.</p><p>It is these Nodwells we trace through history to present day, the ancestors of (probably) all Nodwells in North America. </p><p>It wasn't easy. Having lost a stock of horses to anthrax in Ireland, the Nodwells came to Quebec City in the fall of 1838 and then traveled by wagon to Erin Township where they bought land and raised a log cabin. It burned to the ground within the year, and all was lost, but they rebuilt and carried on. </p><p>William died in 1845. His will mentions his sons William (still in Ireland), Matthew, Andrew, Thomas, Robert, and Samuel. Samuel is enjoined to care for his mother, and census records indicate that he did just that. To his daughters Mary, Jane and Nancy, he left a cow, each. </p><p><img src="images/stories/grand_valley_church.jpg" border="0" alt="Grand Valley Church" title="Grand Valley Church" width="125" align="left" />Wife Letitia survived William by seven years, and in that time she is listed as a charter member of the pioneer church in Grand Valley, Dufferin County, Ontario. Amongst woods and swamps in the little-developed township of Luther,  was a village called Little Toronto. This name in time became Grand  Valley, because that river rises in the vicinity. At this spot, as an outpost  from Erin Centre and Eramosa churches, some preaching in farm homes  and in schoolhouses was done in 1861, by evangelists James Black and  Alex. Anderson. A church was formed about the fall of 1862, the charter  members being Daniel McLellan and wife, John McDougall and wife,  Hugh McDougall and wife, John King and wife, Stephen Beals and wife,  Amelia Dixon, Letitia Nodwell, Daniel McArthur, Robert Dixon, and  Richard Kin. The church met in the schoolhouse in Grand Valley, this  being the first church organized in Luther township. In 1866, a frame  building was erected in a business block, which was dedicated by James  Black. This building served the needs for twenty-six years, when it was replaced  by a brick and stone structure and re-dedicated in December, 1892. <sup>1</sup></p><blockquote><p>Body of Will: </p><p>In the name of God, Amen. I, William Nodwell of the township of Erin in the County of Waterloo in the Wellington district German, being of sound mind and memory, do make this my last will and testament and hereby revoking all other wills by me at any other times made: I hereby give and bequeath untio William Nodwell, my eldest son now in Ireland the sum of one pound five shillings, Matthew Nodwell my second son</p>