This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: Russell Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/oZEBAIB/5761 Message Board Post: Who was my grandfather? He worked as an insurance salesmen the whole time I was a child and I thought the sun rose and set on him. We loved sharing peanut logs. When I went to do the family history as I grew up I found out he was not William S. Russell. He was Willard Levi Russell. But was he? there is no record of him anywhere. He was a merchant marine at one time. He was married to Mae Louse Williams and they placed thier children in St. Christophers in Dobbs Ferry NY. But only three sons. There were allegedly three daughters that no one knows where they are or what the names are. He divorced Mae . Or did he? he married another Rose Cohen and had at least one child. Priscilla. He left them and came to VA to live with my father. He married Callie Burcham who he stayed with until his death as William. Shortly before her death Callie told me the truth about his name and why he changed it. He was hiding from women who had children by him. So does any of this sound like your weird Russell Family? Do you know if you had a Willam Russell who had a brother named Frederick and his parents were Wesley and Minnie? The parents are buried in Danbury CT. No wonder the Russells have such a great sense of humor. Sometimes you just have to laugh at all that you dig up.