Ezra P. CARRELL was educated until his thirteenth year in the public schools of the township. After a two years' course at the Excelsior Institute of Hugh MORROW, in Hatboro, Pennsylvania, his education was finished by a four years' course at the private school of Rev. George HAND of the same place. He is by occupation a farmer, as has been his ancestors for at least four generations before him. He was located first in Warminster, next at Willow Grove, and for the last fourteen years on his present farm near Jamison, Pennsylvania, which he purchased at that time. Although a Republican, he has always been very independent in politics and always ready to vote for a better man on the opposite side. He has never held a political office, never wanted nor would accept one, yet has always been ready and willing to serve his fellow citizens in any other capacity, and through their choice has served in many positions of trust, as manager and director in various associations and companies. A busy, progressive farmer, he has not allowed his occupations to dwarf his other attainments nor his educational advancement, but has kept himself abreast in all matters which tend to the betterment and enrichment of the lives of those about him. Interested in genealogy he has in later years devoted much time to research into the history of his family, and is the secretary and genealogist of the CARRELL Reunion Association. In religion a Presbyterian, as has been his family for many generations, he has always interested himself in church work, taking an active part in it. At present he is a Sunday school teacher, Sunday school superintendent, and ruling elder in the Neshaminy Presbyterian church in Warwick. On December 22, 1881, he was married to Mary McCARTER, daughter of James and Rebecca A. McCARTER, of Ivyland, Pennsylvania. The McCARTER family is an old English family which has lived in Cheltenham township, Montgomery county, Pennsylvania, for many generations. Rebecca Aikley (SHOEMAKER) McCARTER, the mother of Mrs. CARRELL, is of the well known SHOEMAKER family of Shoemakertown, (now Ogontz) also in Cheltenham township. Three children have blessed their union: Esther, died in infancy: Margaret L., and Edith.

Mr. CARRELL is the son of Ezra Patterson CARRELL and Margaret Long (BEANS) CARRELL. Mr. CARRELL, Sr., who died a few years ago, was one of the substantial men of Warminster township, always taking an active interest in the affairs of the vicinity. A man of education and refinement, hospitable, generous and honored by his neighbors for his probity and integrity, he held for many years the office of ruling elder in the Neshaminy church in Warminster, and later in Neshaminy in Warwick. Always interested in church work, he served long and well in the capacities of teacher and superintendent in the Sunday school, and for many years as chorister in his church. He fully justified in his life the words of his paster, who prefaced his remarks at his funeral by these words; "Before me lies the remains of an honest man. The world says that no man can be honest and successful, but the life of Mr. CARRELL fully refutes this." Margaret Long CARRELL, his wife, is the daughter of John C., BEANS and Elizabeth YERKES. The BEANS family have been residents of Warminster for many years. Mrs. CARRELL's grandfather, Thomas BEANS was the keeper of the old hotel at Warminster, then a post station on the mail line between Philadelphia and New York, and was a breeder of running horses, having a half mile track on the large tract of land which he owned. The holdings of the contiguous estates of the BEANS and YERKES families was the largest in this section, several hundred acres of which is retained in the families. The BEANS family trace their genealogy back to Donald (BANE) of Scotland, immortalized by SHAKESPEARE. Mrs. CARRELL was educated by a private teacher, and later finished her education by a course at a young ladies' seminary in Wilmington, Delaware. She is still living at the home place in Warminster. Mr. and Mrs. CARRELL had five children; Joseph, who is a farmer in Warminster township; John Beans, one of the lead physicians of Hatboro; Stacy Beans, in the wholesale and retail grocery business in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Ezra P., the subject of this sketch; and Emily, who died in infancy.

James CARRELL, the pioneer ancestor of the family, settled in Bucks county about 1700 and possibly came from Rhode Island in 1683 with Rev. Thomas Dungan, whose daughter Sarah he married. Tradition, however, relates that he was a weaver, and had a mill or loom, in Philadelphia, where he wove linen and linsey-woolsey; some products of his loom remaining in the family until recently. He purchased one hundred acres of land in Southampton in 1704 and lived thereon until his death about 1730. In 1711 he purchased of his brothers-in-law, Thomas and Clement DUNGAN, a tract of land in Warminster which is still the property of his descendants, descending from father to son down to the present owner, Isaac CARRELL. The children of Thomas and Sarah (DUNGAN) CARRELL were six in number; James, the eldest son; Benjamin, who died in 1733; Elizabeth, who married Samuel GILBERT, of Warminster; Sarah, who married Silas McCARTY; and Lydia, who married Robert TOMPKINS, of Warminster, later of Warrington, Bucks county; and another daughter of whom we have no record. In 1732 the other heirs of James CARRELL conveyed the homestead in Southampton to the eldest son James and in 1734 he also purchased the Northampton homestead on which he settled and lived until his death in 1750, conveying the Southampton homestead on his purchase of the Northampton farm. The family were of Scotch-Irish Presbyterian stock, and are supposed to have emigrated from Scotland or Ireland in the seventeenth century. Tradition relates that James CARRELL, Sr., was imprisoned in Londonderry during that memorable siege of one hundred and five days, and soon after came to America. The family is probably of the branch of the house of CARROLL who were rulers in the northern counties of Ireland, which Dr. William CARRELL in his history of the family traces back to the beginning ot the third century.

James CARRELL, Jr., married Diana VAN KIRK, of Holland descent, daughter of Bernard and Rachel (VANDEGRIFT) VAN KIRK, and granddaughter of Jan Janse VER KIRK or VAN KIRK, who emigrated to Long Island in 1663 from the little town of Bueer Maetsen, in Gelderland, Holland, and settled at New Utrecht, where he died in 1688. His wife was Maykje GYSBERTS and they were the parents of the following children; Roelof Janse, born 1654; Aert Janse, born 1655; Geertje, married Jan Dirckse VAN VLIET; Barentje, married Nicholas VANDEGRIFT; Cornelis Janse; Jan Janse, Jr. and Bernard or Barnet, the father of Diana, above mentioned, who married Rachel VANDEGRIFT. The maternal ancestor of Diana (VAN KIRK) CARRELL is given in full in this work under the head of "The VANDEGRIFT Family." James and Diana CARRELL were the parents of eleven children, viz; Rebecca, born May 25, 1725, married Robert Weir, of Warrington, and their descendants later migrated to Kentucky. Sarah, born September 25, 1726, married Robert PATTERSON, of Tinicum, whose descendants settled in Virginia, from whence they migrated to Ohio and Missouri. Bernard married Lucretia McKNURE and settled on one of his father's farms in Warminster purchased of the heirs of Rev. William TENNENT, and including the site of the famous log college of which TENNENT was the founder, and which remained in the tenure of the descendants of Bernard until quite recently. James, born March 26, 1730, married Sarah ----- and settled in Tinicum township, Bucks county, in 1765, on land purchased of his brother Solomon and died there leaving four children who have numerous descendants scattered over the whole union. He was a private in the associated company, of Tinicum, Nicholas PATTERSON captain, during the revolution. Jacob and Rachel (twins), born April 27, 1735; Rachel became the second wife of Robert STEWART, of Warwick, Bucks county, and after her husband's death settled with her son Robert in Tinicum, from whence the family migrated to New Jersey. Phoebe, born August 20, 1837, married Andrew SCOUT, of Warminster. Solomon, born May 25, 1740, died 1777, married Mary VAN KIRK, and in 1761 purchased a farm of three hundred and five acres in Plumstead, one hundred and forty-three acres of which he conveyed to his brother James in 1765 and the balance of which he sold in 1774, and then settled in Kensengton, Philadelphia; he went with WASHINGTON to New York, dying of the fever on Staten Island, whence his body was never removed; his widow married Charles RYAN, and died in Wallingford, Chester county, in 1821. Descendants of Solomon now reside in Chester, Pennsylvania, and in Delaware. Elizabeth, born May 16, 1742. Diana married Elias DUNGAN, who was a soldier in the Revolutionary war, and has left numerous descendants; her daughter Rachel married Jesse JOHNSON.

Jacob CARRELL, son of James and Diana (VAN KIRK) CARRELL, born April 27, 1735, was the great-grandfather of Ezra P. CARRELL. He was born and reared on the old family homestead known as Carrellton and lived there all his life. He and his brother served in the Northampton company in the revolutionary war. He was a successful farmer and possessed of considerable means. He devoted himself to home and church affairs, taking little part in public matters outside his own immediate locality. He married Elizabeth JAMISON, daughter of Daniel JAMISON, of Nockamixon, Bucks county, of Scotch-Irish ancestry, and they reared a large family of children who by intermarriage with families in that vicinity brought the CARRELLs into relation with many of the leading families of Bucks county. His children were: Joseph; Benjamin, married Mercy COMFORT; John; Mary, married Lot BENNETT; Sarah, married Mahlon BANES; Jesse, married Mary BENNETT: Isaac; Elizabeth, married John CORNELL.

Joseph CARRELL, the grandfather of Ezra P. CARRELL, was born June 1, 1792, at Carrellton, the old family homestead near Richboro, Bucks county. When a young man he learned the trade of a carpenter under his uncle, Jesse Johnson, and followed it some years. About 1835 he purchased the CARRELL farm in Warminster where he lived the remainder of his life, dying April 25, 1884. When quite a young man he served as corporal in the army during the war of 1812-14, and many were the anecdotes he used to tell of camp life at Camp Dupont, near Marcus Hook, where his regiment was then stationed, Philadelphia at that time only extending as far north as Vine street and south to Pine street. Those who knew him remember him as a portly, white-haired old gentleman, tall and erect, with a military bearing acquired in youth and never forgotten. He was one of the last survivors of the small coterie of veterans of the war of 1812-14 which included General John DAVIS, William BOTHWELL, and one or two others whose relations were very intimate. He was for many years an elder of Neshaminy Presbyterian church, with whose interests he was actively identified during his whole life. He was twice married, to Mary and Anna Gill, sisters, of an old English family who emigrated from London to Philadelphia and later settled in Northampton, Bucks county, where their descendants are now quite numerous. By the first marriage he had three children: Hugh Jamison, Emily and Ezra PATTERSON, and by the second marriage two daughters; Sidney, who became the wife of Thomas B. MONTANYE; and Elizabeth, who married Robert Thompson ENGART.

Text taken from page 299-301 of:

Davis, William W. H., A.M., History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania [New York-Chicago: The Lewis Publishing Company, 1905] Volume III