Waterfall Surname

Waterfall Family Members:

Origins and Meaning

Ancestry.com has this meaning for the name:

English: habitational name from Waterfall, a place in Staffordshire, named from Old English wætergefall ‘place where a water course disappears below ground’. There is another place so called in Guisborough in North Yorkshire and a lost Waterfall in Pontefract, West Yorkshire, both of which may also have contributed to the surname.

It also shows that in 1891, the name was predominantly from the north east: Lincoln/Warwick/Derby/Yorkshire.

On the 1881 Surname Profiler, the name is predominantly from Derbyshire and Staffordshire.

Waterfall Web Resources

John Waterfall emigrated to Salt Lake City after 1861 with his second wife Rebecca. There are many records and stories about the emigration of English Mormons to Salt Lake City at that time. Thanks to Jim, we now have information from the National Society Daughters of Utah Pioneers, including histories of John Waterfall and his 2nd wife Rebecca Mary Langdown. 

• Someone has already traced the Waterfall family: http://worldconnect.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=:254413&id=I874 
• There is a Rootsweb Waterfall message board, including a message from someone who has registered the name for the Guild of One Name Studies: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec?htx=board&r=rw&p=surnames.waterfall 
• There is information on Uppingham here: http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/unit_page.jsp?u_id=10544282 
• Information on emigrants to Salt Lake City: http://www.lds.org/gospellibrary/pioneer/40_Salt_Lake_Valley.html and also more history on the Mormons: http://college.hmco.com/history/readerscomp/rcah/html/ah_061300_mormons.htm
• And here are some wonderful stories about emigrants to Salt Lake City, told by Swedes: http://www.xmission.com/~nelsonb/voyage_desc.htm 
• John Waterfall appears on the Mormon Pioneer Search: http://www.xmission.com/~nelsonb/pioneer_search3.htm. There are many more links to be explored from there.... 
• There is also this website of Reva Wilson, another Waterfall descendant: http://gedcom.surnames.com/wilson_john/wilson.htm 

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Created by: Sam Edwards, 2005.
Email me: samsheep@yahoo.com