updated February 2010
Martin is connected to the Simmonds family through the marriage of his granddaughter, Georgiana to William Simmonds in 1856.
The proof that Georgiana was the Granddaughter of Martin is not 100%, I am confident that Georgiana's father was Richard Burnell and that Martin Burnell had a son named Richard but I can find no document positively confirming that the two Richard's are the same person.
I believe that Martin BURNELL and Martin BYRNELL are the same person because the ecclesiastic Burial record for Martin BURNELL's funeral matches the information on the Casualty Roll giving Martin BYRNELL's date of death.
Martin came from Ireland and enlisted in the HEIC army in 1783, arriving in Madras on the ship
"Foulis" on 9 June 1784. The Muster Rolls from about 1808 give the name of ship that Martin arrived on
as the "Contractor". It could be that Martin left India at some time and returned on the Contractor.
This could explain the long period between Martin arriving in India and his marriage to Mary Ann.
I found records of the voyages of the ships Foulis and Contractor on the A2A website indexes, they both had voyages which arrived in Madras in June 1784 and the Contractor made other voyages which which could explain why two different ships are mentioned in the muster rolls.
The children of Martin and his wife Mary Ann were born from 1808, when Martin had been in India for more than 20 years, it is possible that Mary Ann was not Martin's first wife.