Ricketts is also spelled Rickeots, Rickeotts, Rickett, Rickets, Ricket, Rickel, Rickle, Rickels, and
Rickles.
The first European settlements in Maryland were made in 1634 when English settlers created a permanent colony.
Zadoc Ricketts was born about 1772 in Maryland. His parents were Anthony and Mary Ricketts. His father mentioned him in his 1793 will.
He married Anne Groome on July 20, 1797 in Montgomery County, Maryland.
The History of Western Maryland gives us some idea where the family lived. When new boundaries of the Cracklin Election District, No. 1. were laid out in 1821 the description included:
Beginning at Mershberger's old mill on Patuxent, and running down Patuxent to the mouth of Hawling's River; then running up said river to the mouth of Reed's Branch, from thence to the head of the late Gerard Brooke's spring; thence to the pole bridge near where Cyrus, a black man, formerly kept a blacksmith-shop; then with a small road, leaving the house formerly owned by Surrett Dickerson on the right, until it intersects the road passing in front of Mrs. Magruder's house at the corner of her fence; thence with said road leaving the house where the late Capt. Benjamin Ricketts [probably Zadoc's brother] did live on the right, until it intersects the Bladensburg road at the lower end of said Ricketts' plantation; then with the road through the place where Zadok Ricketts once lived to the head-waters of Muddy Branch. . .
Two of their children were recorded at Prince George Parish, Montgomery County, Maryland
Mary Ricketts (1799) Zedekiah Ricketts (1807, married Margaret Dews)
