52 Ancestors: #43, Herbert Gardner Howes, Deceased on Halloween

Herbert Gardner Howes¹ was almost born on Halloween: he arrived just a day early, on 30 October 1868,² in Liberty, Waldo County, Maine.³ Herbert was the eighth child of Robert Everson Howes and Martha Sukeforth.⁴

Unlike several of his brothers, Herbert did not follow his father into farming. Instead, he became a carpenter and builder.⁵ He moved to Taunton, Massachusetts by 1893, where he married Annie L. Perry on the 11th of March.⁶ In 1902, he was admitted to membership in the Masonic Lodge of Massachusetts.⁷

Herbert Gardner Howes, Masonic membership card, Grand Lodge of Massachusetts

Annie died in childbirth on 27 April 1904,⁸ after giving birth to their only child, Everson Perry Howes⁹ (who survived, and indeed lived to the age of 76). Herbert remarried on Christmas Day the same year, to Oriola S. Boynton,¹⁰ who died in 1916.¹¹ Herbert and Oriola apparently had no children, at least none who lived. By the time of the 1920 census, Herbert had married for the third and final time, to Emily A. ______,¹² who also had no children. She died sometime after 1930; Herbert was a widower by 1940.¹³

He lived another 14 years after the 1940 census, dying at the age of 86 years and one day, on Halloween: 31 October 1954. He is buried with his first two wives in Westville Cemetery in Taunton.¹⁴

Monument for Herbert G. Howes and wives, Westville Cemetery, Taunton, Mass.²

Herbert G. Sukeforth is my second cousin twice removed, with Robert Suckforth as our common ancestor:

Relationship chart for Herbert Gardner Howes and The Down East Genealogist

(Note: This post is in response to Amy Johnson Crow's "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" challenge at No Story Too Small.)

---

SOURCES

1. His middle name was almost certainly from his uncle, Gardner E. Sukeforth, who captained the first steamship through the newly opened Panama Canal in 1914.
2. Find A Grave, database and images (http://www.findagrave.com : accessed 27 Apr 2013), memorial #96280215 for Herbert G. Howes, with photo of family marker, memorial and digital photo by “jtb” (30 Aug 2012); citing Westville Cemetery (Taunton, Bristol County, Massachusetts).
3. “Grand Lodge of Massachusetts Membership Cards, 1733-1990,” database and digital images, New England Historic Genealogical Society, AmericanAncestors.org (http://www.americanancestors.org : accessed 29 Apr 2013), Herbert Gardner Howes membership card, Vol. Hol-Hyz Surnames, p. 5351; citing “records held by the Grand Lodge of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of Massachusetts”.
4. Martha Sukeforth was only 17 when she married, and she gave birth to an astounding 14 children (eight boys and six girls) by the time she was 45. Even more astounding for the time, all 14 children lived to adulthood – many to ripe old ages in their 80s and 90s, with the earliest death at 40.
5. “Grand Lodge of Massachusetts Membership Cards, 1733-1990,” Herbert Gardner Howes membership card. Also, 1900 U.S. Census, Bristol County, Massachusetts, Taunton, ED 218, sheet 2D (penned), p. 124A (stamped), dwelling 30, family 34, Herbert G. Howes household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://search.ancestry.com : accessed 27 Apr 2013). Also, 1910 U.S. Census, Bristol County, Massachusetts, Taunton, ED 229, sheet 9A, dwelling 174, family 221, Herbert G. Howes household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://search.ancestry.com : accessed 29 Apr 2013).
6. “Massachusetts Vital Records, 1841–1910,” database and digital images, New England Historic Genealogical Society, AmericanAncestors.org (http://www.americanancestors.org : accessed 29 Apr 2013), Vol. 433, p. 253, Herbert G. Howes-Annie L. Perry marriage, Taunton, MA, 1893; citing “original records held by the Massachusetts Archives”.
7. “Grand Lodge of Massachusetts Membership Cards, 1733-1990,” Herbert Gardner Howes membership card.
8. “Massachusetts Vital Records, 1841–1910,” Vol. 1904/90, p. 489, Annie L. (Perry) Howes death, Taunton, MA, 1904.
9. Ibid., Vol. 542, p. 358, Everson Perry Howes, Taunton, MA, 1904.
10. Ibid., Vol. 548, p. 510, Herbert Gardner Howes-Oriola S. Boynton marriage, Worcester, MA, 1904; also Vol. 546, p. 314, Herbert G. Howes-Oriola S. Boynton marriage, registered Taunton, Mass., 1904.
11. Find A Grave, memorial #96280215 for Herbert G. Howes.
12. 1920 U.S. Census, Bristol County, Massachusetts, Taunton, ED 182, sheet 8B, dwelling 150, family 202, Herbert G. Howes household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 27 Apr 2013).
13. 1930 U.S. Census, Bristol County, Massachusetts, Rehoboth, ED 3-205, sheet 3B, dwelling 68, family 69, Herbert G. Howes household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://search.ancestry.com : accessed 27 Apr 2013). Also, 1940 U.S. Census, Bristol County, Massachusetts, Rehoboth, ED 3-86, sheet 5B, household 106, Herbert G. Howes household; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://search.ancestry.com : accessed 27 Apr 2013). Emily appears in the 1930 census and Herbert is widowed in the 1940 census.
14. Find A Grave, memorial #96280215 for Herbert G. Howes.

52 Ancestors: #42, John Washburn, Plymouth Colonist

John Washburn, my tenth great grandfather, was born in Bengeworth (later annexed to Evesham), Worcestershire, England, to John and Martha (Timbrell) (Stephens) Washburn.¹ He was baptized on 2 July 1597. On 23 November 1618, at Bengeworth, he married Margery Moore, the daughter of Robert and Ellen (Taylor) Moore.²

John and Margery had four children, all born at Bengeworth:

1. Mary, b. 1619, probably died young³
2. John Jr., b. 1620, married Elizabeth Mitchell⁴
3. Phillip, b. and d. June 1622⁵
4. Phillip, b. ca 1624, married Elizabeth Irish⁶

John migrated to the Plymouth Colony in New England about 1632, with his family remaining in England until he was established in the colony. The earliest mention of him in colony records is on 2 January 1632/3, when he sued a man for stealing a hog from him (he lost).⁷

When the Elizabeth & Ann set sail from London on 13 April 1635 bound for New England, her passengers included Margery Washborn and her sons, John Jr. and Phillip.⁸ (Mary did not accompany them, so it is assumed she probably died young, though possibly she had married by then.) Once joined by his family, John acquired land in Duxbury and made his home there. He took the oath of fidelity there and was admitted as a freeman on 2 June 1648. A tailor by trade, John served Plymouth Colony and the town of Duxbury in various capacities – among others, on a grand jury, viewing boundaries, and as surveyor of highways.⁹

In 1645, both John and John Jr. were among the 54 original proprietors of the plantation of Bridgewater when it was granted to Duxbury. (The land wasn't actually purchased by Miles Standish from the sachem Ousamequin, also called Massasoit, until 1649.)¹⁰

On 26 May 1666, he deeded his property at Duxbury to his son Phillip, and moved to Bridgewater, where he died probably soon after 22 May 1671.¹¹

My descent from John Washburn:

• John Washburn Sr. + Margery Moore
• John Washburn Jr. + Elizabeth Mitchell
• Samuel Washburn + Deborah Packard
• Noah Washburn + Elizabeth Shaw
• Noah Washburn + Mary Staples
• Nehemiah Washburn + Ruth Egerton
• Jeremiah Washburn + Hannah Orcutt
• Samuel Orcutt Washburn + Mary Palmateer
• Mary Washburn + Uriah Sawyer Woodward
• Eva May Woodward + Peter Louis Rabideau
• Glenna Marie Rabideau + William George Murphy (my maternal grandparents)

(Note: This post is in response to Amy Johnson Crow's "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" challenge at No Story Too Small.)

---

SOURCES

1. "The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633, Volumes I-III," database and digital images, New England Historic Genealogical Society, American Ancestors (http://www.americanancestors.org : accessed 9 October 2014), pp. 1937-39, sketch of John Washburn; citing Robert Charles Anderson, The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633, Volumes I-III, 1995.
2. "Plymouth Colony, History and People," database, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 10 October 2014), search results for "John Washburn"; citing Eugene Aubrey Stratton, Plymouth Colony: Its History and People 1620-1691 (Salt Lake City, Utah: Ancestry Incorporated, 1986); search results on this database present sections of text with general headings, which do not include page numbers from Stratton.
3. James Davenport, The Washbourne Family of Little Washbourne and Wichenford in the County of Worcester (London: Methuen & Co., 1907), pp. 35-58; digital images, Google Books (http://books.google.com/books : accessed 10 Oct 2014). 
4. "The Great Migration Begins," pp. 1937-39.
5. Ibid.
6. Ibid.
7. Ibid.
8. "Plymouth Colony, History and People," search results for "John Washburn."
9. "The Great Migration Begins," pp. 1937-39.
10. Nahum Mitchell, History of the Early Settlement of Bridgewater, in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, Including an Extensive Family Register (Boston: the author, 1840), pp. 10-11, 338; facsimile reprint as Mitchell's History of Bridgewater, Massachusetts (Bridgewater: Edward Alden, 1897); digital images, Internet Archive (https://archive.org/details/historyofearlyset00mitcch : accessed 10 Oct 2014).
11. "The Great Migration Begins," pp. 1937-39.

52 Ancestors: #41, Nathaniel Woodward Sr. and Jr., Father and Son Carpenters

In my Woodward line, I can't really say I have an immigrant ancestor; I actually have two immigrant ancestors: my eleventh and tenth great grandfathers, Nathaniel Woodward and his namesake son.¹

Nathaniel Woodward Sr. was born in England, say 1587. Judging from the ages of his sons, he must have married in England around 1610. No details are known about his first wife, who died by 1635, and probably before he came to Boston, Massachusetts Bay Colony, about 1633. Around 1638, he married Margaret Jackson.

Nathaniel had at least three sons, possibly four, all born in England, by his first wife:

1. Nathaniel Jr., b. ca 1613
2. John, b. ca 1615
3. Robert, b. ca 1618
4. Ezekiel, b. ca 1622 (parentage not certain)

Nathaniel had one daughter with his second wife Margaret Jackson:

5. Prudence, b. ca 1638, probably Boston, married Christopher Mosse

He was a carpenter by trade, but also worked as a surveyor running boundary lines, including those between Massachusetts Bay Colony and its neighbors, Plymouth Colony and Connecticut, and was sometimes called a "mathematician." By 1661 he and his wife Margaret had sold all of his property in Boston. It isn't known whether they went to live with one of the sons, or perhaps returned to England, and they don't appear in any records after a deed executed in 18 July 1661.

Nathaniel Woodward Jr. was born in England about 1613 and emigrated to Boston with his father around 1633. His first wife was Mary Jackson of Boston, Lincolnshire, England. It's uncertain whether he married her in Old England or New England, but likely the latter, around 1640, when she was admitted to the Boston church as "Mary Woodward the wife of our Brother Nathaniell [sic] Woodward."

About 1648, they removed to Taunton, Massachusetts. By 1655, Mary had died, and Nathaniel Jr. returned to Boston for a time. By 1664 he had married Katherine ______ and moved back to Taunton.

Nathaniel Jr. had five children with Mary Jackson:

1. [unknown child], b. before Aug 1642, Boston
2. Elisha, b. 1644, Boston,
3. Nathaniel, b. 1646, Boston
4. Israel, b. ca 1648, Boston
5. John, b. ca 1650, Taunton

Nathaniel Jr. had one child with Katherine ______:

6. James, b. say 1665, Taunton

Like his father, Nathaniel Jr. was a carpenter. (It's also possible that he was the surveyor, and not his father, but it's difficult to sort out the records for the two Nathaniels.) Both Nathaniel Jr. and his wife Katherine died sometime after 14 September 1686, when they deeded property to their son James. The deed was acknowledged by the witnesses on 1 February 1694/5, which probably means that Nathaniel and Katherine had both died by that date.

My descent from Nathaniel Woodward, Sr.:

• Nathaniel Woodward Sr. + ______ ______
• Nathaniel Woodward Jr. + Mary Jackson
• John Woodward + Sarah Crossman
• John Woodward + Deborah [Thayer?]
• Thomas Woodward + Anne Young
• Nathaniel Woodward + Mary Brittain
• Jeptha Woodward + ______ ______ [some uncertainty here – see footnote²]
• Apollos Woodward + Rachel Runnels/Reynolds
• Royal W. Woodward + Mary Hawley Sawyer
• Uriah Sawyer Woodward + Mary Washburn
• Eva May Woodward + Peter Louis Rabideau
• Glenna Marie Rabideau + William George Murphy (my maternal grandparents)

(Note: This post is in response to Amy Johnson Crow's "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" challenge at No Story Too Small.)

---

SOURCES

1. Most of the details here are from Robert Charles Anderson, The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633, 3 vols. (Boston: NEHGS, 1995), pp. 2061-4, Nathaniel Woodward [Jr.]; database and digital images, NEHGS, American Ancestors (http://www.americanancestors.org : accessed 8 Oct 2014). Some of the details concerning Nathaniel Sr. are from a photocopy of several pages of a typescript publication, unidentified but quite likely Harold Edward Woodward, Some Descendants of Nathaniel Woodward Who Came from England to Boston About 1630 (Boston: 1984).
2. The linkage Nathaniel > Jeptha > Apollos is still somewhat uncertain. It is possible, though not as likely, that Apollos was the son of Nathaniel's son Benjamin rather than Jeptha; it is also just barely possible that Apollos was actually the youngest son of Nathaniel himself. But the line through Jeptha and an unknown first wife (according to family lore, possibly an Indian woman, but I take all such claims with a large fistful of salt) seemed the most likely possibility to my late brother, Marshall Kirk (unpublished research, ca 1998-9).

52 Ancestors: #40, Nicholas Hodsdon, Admonished for Entertaining Quakers

Hingham, Mass., land grant to Nicholas Hodsdon, 1637

Nicholas Hodsdon, my 8X great-grandfather, was born around 1604-1614 in England. There is no record of exactly when he came to New England, but he was in Hingham, Massachusetts, by 9 March 1636/7, when he was made a freeman.¹

On 5 March 1637 the town of Hingham granted Nicholas Hodsdon "half an acre" of meadow and "3 & half" of upland;² later he was granted additional lands in Hingham.

He married Esther Wines on 10 December 1639 in Hingham.³ They had five children:⁴

1. Esther, b. 1640, married Edward Weymouth
2. Mehitable, b. 1641, married Peter Welcome
3. Jeremiah, b. 1643, married Anne Thwaits
4. Israel, b. 1646, married Ann Thompson
5. Benoni b. 1647, married Abigail Curtis

Marriage of Nicholas Hodsdon (presumably to Esther Wines), 1639, Hingham, Mass.

Esther (Wines) Hodsdon died 29 November 1647, probably in childbirth; her last child, Benoni, was baptized six days later.⁵

Death of "Nicholas Hodsdon's wife" and baptism of Benoni Hodsdon, 1647

Map of Berwick showing Nicholas Hodsdon land⁶

Nicholas remarried ca 1649, to Elizabeth (Wincoll) Needham.⁷ About 1650, he removed to the Boston area, and purchased land in Cambridge Hill (later Newton), Massachusetts. In 1651 he was selling those lands and by about 1655 had removed to Kittery, Maine, where he received his first land grant on 15 October 1656. He received additional grants in Kittery in 1669 and 1673, and also purchased a farm in 1674 from John Wincoll in what is now South Berwick. That farm became the Hodsdon family homestead.⁸

While Nicholas must have been admitted to the church in Hingham (that being a prerequisite to freeman status at the time), after his move to Kittery he and his wife were more than once reprimanded and fined for "not frequenting of the public meeting on the Lord's Days". And he was ordered to appear at the May 1660 "General Court of Election" in Boston, where he was admonished "for entertayning & concealing ye Quakers...", despite his explanation that "coming from worke, he found them at his house, not knowing them to be such till in discourse with them, when he warned them to be gonne..."⁹ (This was at a time when Quakers had been banned from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and were subject to arrest and even execution if they returned.)

Nicholas and Elizabeth had six children (dates and order of births are questionable):¹⁰

6. Sarah, b. ca 1650, married John Morrell
7. Joseph, b. ca 1651-1656, married Tabitha Raynes
8. Hannah, b. ca 1654, possibly married Nicholas Smith¹¹
9. John, b. ca 1654-1658, possibly married Rebecca ______
10. Timothy, b. ca 1652-1661, married Hannah ______
11. Lucy, b. ca 1660-1663, married George Vickers

In 1678, he deeded the homestead to his son Benoni, in exchange for his agreement to operate the farm and provide for Nicholas and Elizabeth for the remainder of their lives.¹²

Nicholas died sometime after 20 Feb 1679, in Kittery, Maine.¹³ It is supposed that he is probably buried in a family graveyard on the homestead.¹⁴

Nicholas Hodsdon homestead, Berwick, Maine, ca 1904

My descent from Nicholas Hodsdon:

• Nicholas Hodsdon + Esther Wines
• Benoni Hodsdon + Abigail Curtis
• Samuel Hodsdon + Prudence Scammon
• Samuel Hodsdon + ______ ______
• Samuel Hodsdon + Betsy Hooper
• Jacob Hodsdon + Sally Huston
• Isaac Hodsdon + Abigail Greene
• Silas Marchant Hillman Hodsdon + Kate Rand
• Mary Milliken Hodsdon + Chester F. Kirk (my paternal grandparents)

(Note: This post is in response to Amy Johnson Crow's "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" challenge at No Story Too Small.)

---

SOURCES

1. Lucius R. Paige, "List of Freemen," New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 3 (Jan 1849):89-96, particularly p. 95, "Nicolas Hudson"; database and digital images, NEHGS, American Ancestors (http://www.americanancestors.org : accessed 26 Sep 2014).
2. "Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988," database and digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 26 Sep 2014), Hingham, Land Record Transcript and Town Record Transcript, p. 30, entry 18, Nicholas Hodsdon.
3. "Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988," Hingham, Church Records, sixth leaf (recto), "Nicholas Hodsdon married".
4. Sybil Noyes, Charles Thornton Libby, and Walter Goodwin Davis, Genealogical Dictionary of Maine and New Hampshire (1928-1939; reprint, Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1991), p. 343. Also, "Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988," Hingham, Church Records, sixth leaf (verso), Esther Hodsden baptism; seventh leaf (recto), Mehitabell Hodsdon baptism; eighth leaf (recto), Jeremiah Hodsdon baptism; tenth leaf (recto), Israel Hodsdon baptism; eleventh leaf (recto), Benoni Hodsdon baptism.
5. "Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988," Hingham, Church Records, eleventh leaf (recto), "Nicholas Hodsdon's wife dyed" and Benoni Hodsdon baptism.
6. Everett S. Stackpole, Old Kittery and Her Families (Lewiston, Maine: Press of Lewiston Journal Co., 1903), p. 133, map of Berwick, Maine.
7. Clarence Almon Torrey, New England Marriages Prior to 1700 (Baltimore: Genalogical Publishing Co., 1985), p. 379.
8. Andrew Jackson Hodgdon, Genealogy of the Descendants of Nicholas Hodsdon-Hodgdon of Hingham, Mass., and Kittery, Maine, 1635-1904, Almira Larkin White, editor (Haverhill, Mass.: Press of Nichols, “The Printer”, 1904), pp. 9-11; digital images, Open Library (http://openlibrary.org : accessed 4 Mar 2012).
9. Nathaniel B. Shurtleff, editor, Records of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England, Vol. IV, part I, 1650-1660 (Boston: Press of William White, 1854), p. 427; digital images, Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org : accessed 26 Sep 2014). 
10. Hodgdon, pp. 19-21, for all but Hannah; Noyes et al., p. 343, for Hannah.
11. Stackpole, p. 530, gives a marriage for Hannah.
12. Hodgdon, p. 12.
13. Noyes et al., p. 343.
14. Hodgdon, p. 13; photo of homestead, plate between pp. 10-11.