The Martello family of Ustica rank 17th in size putting them at the top end of the moderate sized families from Ustica. The dynamics of this family are quite different from other families of Ustica. While most have one or two ancestors that show up in the early Ustica church registers, the Martello family has six. Seems like the whole family was moving en masse. They would also prove to be very mobile. In the mid to late 1800s, they made there way to the island of Lampedusa south of Sicily near the African coast, and also to French North Africa in Algeria and Tunisia. Both areas were actively recruiting Italian settlers to boost their populations, and the Martello family were aggressively taking advantage of the opportunities afforded them. Many ultimately made their way to the US settling mostly in New Orleans and a few in California.

The Martello family is a first family of Ustica appearing in the Ustica church records in 1765 and 1767 with the births of children of Angelo Martello and Angela Lauricella, and also of Antonino Martello and Angela Palamara. Let's call this group 1. Angelo and Antonino were brothers that were married and having children in Lipari before coming to Ustica. Their descendants together make up 38% of all of the Martello family of Ustica.

Slightly later in the Ustica church records, there are the 1768 marriage of Natale Martello and Francesca Picone, the 1776 marriage of Gaetano Martello and Nunziata Basile, and the 1779 marriage of Francesco Martello and Francesca Cafarella. Group 2 were also brothers from Lipari. Descendants of Natale and Gaetano make up 43% of the Martello family of Ustica. Francesco does not appear to have had any children.

And finally there is Giuseppe Martello and Caterina Polverino. He's group 3 all by himself. Giuseppe Martello dies on Ustica in 1776, and while he left no descendants bearing the Martello surname, his daughter Anna is the matriarch of a large chunk of the Basile family of Ustica.

So connecting them all together, group 1 and group 2 were first cousins and Giuseppe Martello was their uncle. Put another way, the fathers of group 1 and group 2, and Giuseppe Martello were brothers. The common ancestors to all of them were Francesco Martello and Giovanna Ristuccia, who were married in Lipari in 1689. The family traces back one more generation in Lipari to Giovanni Martello and Anna Pizzo. The very first appearance of a Martello in the Lipari church records is for the baptism of a child of theirs in 1664. That baptism record clearly records Giovanni Martello as being from Furnari and Anna Pizzo from Patti. Both are towns on the northern coast of Sicily just south of Lipari.

1664 Lipari baptism record of a child of "Joanne Martello di Furnari" and Anna Pizzo "Pattensis".