Origins of surname
This name appears to be peculiar to Normandy, where it is still quite common today. It has its origins either in the French word vieille (old), or the medieval personal name which was a popular form of 'Vital', of whom there were several saints. The Latin root suggests someone alive or lively, which is almost the opposite of the other derivation.
Early records
There are just three Viel households in Jersey today. Church records start with the marriage of Nicollas to Marguitte Piouet (Pirouet?), daughter of Mathieu, in St Brelade in 1572, but there are no baptism records until the children of Elie, Mathieu and Jean in St Peter in the 1630s.
However, other records show that the name was present in Jersey as far back as the 13th century, and the alternative spellings lend weight to the theory that this family at least can trace its origins to the French word vieille.
Variants
- Viel, 1299
- Viell, 1528
- Le Veeil 15c
Family records
Family trees
Church records
- Viel baptisms in Jersey
- Viel marriages in Jersey (groom)
- Viel marriages in Jersey (bride)
- Viel burials in Jersey
Great War service
- Charles Francis Viel (1894-1918) (St H) son of Walter and Julia Viel, Private, Machine Gun Corps, died
- Sidney John James Viel (1901- ) (St S) Private, Canada
- Ernest Walter George Viel (1899- ) (St H) son of Walter John and Mary Ann Julia Trolley, Mercantile Marine Reserve (not born in Southampton as shown in digital RoS)
Family wills
These wills created by members of the Viel family are now held by Jersey Archive. By visiting the archive site and using the names, dates and reference numbers shown here, it is possible to view a copy of each will. You will have to subscribe to the Archive's online service to do this. To find out more about this collection, which covers the period from 1663 to 1980, and how to search for your family's wills there, visit our Jersey wills page
- Abraham Viel, 37 Pier Road, St Helier 12 June 1915 28 August 1915- 7 August 1918, D/Y/A/78
- Charles Viel - 22 August 1936, D/Y/A/99
- Elie Viel 23 March 1706 - D/Y/A/3
- Eugenie Viel, Mont Les Vaux, St Aubin, St Brelade - 22 March 1921, D/Y/A/81
- George Viel residing near Les Niemes, Croix-au-Lion, St Peter - 11 June 1925, D/Y/A/85
- Georgina Viel née Sebire, 10 Craig Street, St Helier - 19 February 1937, D/Y/A/100
- Jacques Viel of Picauville dit Le Pont L'Abé, Department of Manche, now of St Helier, bequeaths to the poor of St Helier 10s 19 January 1828 - D/Y/A/21
- Jeanne Viel, widow of William Le Boutillier, of St Peter, bequeaths to the poor of St Peter, £20 tournois of the order of the King, desires to be buried in St Peter's cemetery 4 February 1826 - D/Y/A/20
- Marie Viel, St Brelade - 27 March 1895, D/Y/A/54
- Susan Viel, 5 Stopford Road, St Helier - 5 October 1945, D/Y/A/114
Burial records
Family album
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Family businesses
1886 advert
1887 advert from L'Almanach de la Gazette de Jersey for builder Abraham Viel
1890 advert
Family gravestones
Click on any image to see a larger version. See the Jerripedia gravestone image collection page for more information about our gravestone photographs
St Brelade Church cemetery
The grave of Great War casualty Charles Francis Viel at Cologne Southern Cemetery
Tips
The church record links above will open in a new tab in your browser and generate the most up-to-date list of each set of records from our database. These lists replace earlier Family page baptism lists, which were not regularly updated. They have the added advantage that they produce a chronological listing for the family name in all parishes, so you do not have to search through A-Z indexes, parish by parish.
We have included some important spelling variants on some family pages, but it may be worth searching for records for a different spelling variant. Think of searching for variants with or without a prefix, such as Le or De. To search for further variants, or for any other family name, just click on the appropriate link below for the first letter of the family name, and a new tab will open, giving you the option to choose baptism, marriage or burial records. You will then see a list of available names for that type of record and you can select any name from that list. That will display all records of the chosen type for that family name, and you can narrow the search by adding a given name, selecting a parish or setting start and end dates in the form you will see above. You can also change the family name, or search for a partial name if you are not certain of the spelling
The records are displayed 30 to a page, but by selecting the yellow Wiki Table option at the top left of the page you can open a full, scrollable list. This list will either be displayed in a new tab or a pop-up window. You may have to edit the settings of your browser to allow pop-up windows for www.jerripediabmd.net. For the small number of family names for which a search generates more than 1,500 records you will have to refine your search (perhaps using start or end dates) to reduce the number of records found.
New records
Since August 2020 we have added several thousand new records from the registers of Roman Catholic, Methodist and other non-conformist churches. These will appear in date order within a general search of the records and are also individually searchable within the database search form
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