Daily AncestorWidower
A widower is a man whose wife has died and who has not remarried.
A widower is a man who has lost his wife by death. Like widow, the word stops applying once he remarries, so a man called a widower in one record and married in a later one had a second wife.
A deed or court paper that names a widower may be dealing with his rights in his late wife's land (see Curtesy).
As seen in a recordMarriage register entry, 1860s
Nimrod Satterlee, widower, aged 47, to Miss Abigail Rooke
How to cite this page
Daily Ancestor. "Widower." Dictionary of Old Record Words. https://dailyancestor.com/dictionary/relationships/widower. Last checked 2026-10-12.