English
The surname Cawdell is of English, Scottish and Northern Irish in origin. It is a habitational name from any of the several places in England and Scotland, variously spelled, that get their names from the Old English 'c(e)ald', cold and 'well(a)', spring, stream. The name thus signifies 'cold well or spring'. Caldwell in Northern Yorkshire is one major source of the surname, as is Caldwell in the Strathclyde region of Scotland; and parishes in the diocsese of Ripon and Peterborough. A family could acquire a place name as a surname if the man lived or worked near some topographical feature; he formerly lived in a village and thus acquired the reputation of being from that place; or he owned or was lord of the village or manor designated. However, it is safe to say that in most cases a manor or village name merely identifies the place where the original bearer of the name formerly resided; bearers of this name would thus have an ancestor who once lived in one of the places so named in England or Scotland. The name dates back to the eleventh century were a Adam de Caldewella is recorded in historical archives. This surname has ramified in an extraordinary manner in the United States. One or two early settlers must have bred a healthy family of boys, who thrived and married. One of the first fore fathers to bring this name to America is that of a David Caldwell, who emigrated to America in 1769; he settled in the Carolinas. This name is the two-hundredth and sixty-third most common surname in America.