"Like leaves on trees of man is found, Now green in youth, now withering on the ground; Another race the following spring supplies, They fall successive and successive rise. So generations in their course decay, So flourish these when those are passed away." POPE.Never was there a time since the settlements of this country when the public mind has been so much interested in genealogical research as at present. There is, and has been for a long time, a growing desire to know more of our ancestry. With some this feeling has increased from a desire to trace themselves back to the Pilgrim Fathers. In other, there is a wish to connect their name with some distinguished personage in favor with royal power, -- to some noted warrior, or celebrated statesman, of the older countries.
In many the love of curiosity induces them to toil hard in pouring over old, musty records, examine inscriptions on ancient gravestones and monuments. In gathering such Information, many facts have been brought to light and recorded that might otherwise have been lost or forgotten. It is to the efforts of this class of persons that we are indebted for nearly all of the history of our country; for the history of a nation is nothing else than a collective history of the families that compose that nation. It is through their efforts that the history of the past is rescued from oblivion, whereby materials are gathered for our town histories, family memorials, and other works of the kind, that enable biographers, and historiographers to do justice to their works.
These are the persons that form our historical associations and societies, the value of which is beginning to be appreciated by nearly all classes in the community. Within a few years several of these organizations have been formed in different sections of the country, and people are just awaking to a sense of the importance of pursuits like these. Young people are beginning to enquire into the history of those that preceded them; ant I rejoice in the belief that the interest in this kind of study is increasing, and ere long hope to find the number of such to be very numerous.
Daniel Webster has well and truly said, "It is a noble faculty or our nature which enables us to connect our thoughts, our sympathies, and our happiness with what is distant in place or time, and looking before and after, to hold communion at once with our ancestors, and our posterity. There is also a moral and philosophical respect for our ancestors, which elevates the character and improves the heart. Next to the sense of religious duty and moral feeling, I hardly know what should bear with stronger obligation on a liberal and enlightened mind than a consciousness of an alliance with excellence which is departed; and a consciousness, too, that in its acts and conduct, and eyen in ite sentiments and thoughts, it may be actively operating on the happiness of those that come after it."
I am, however, well aware that there are many who regard memorials like these as dry and uninteresting. To me they are exceedingly interesting, not merely as a collection of names and dates, but for the associations connected with them. The birth, marriage and death, of an individual are the most important events in his history. "Each in itself is a memorial, not of death only, but of life, -- of a heart that once lived and loved, a being that lived a certain period of time and then returned to dust, -- of an individual human life, that had its shares in the joys and sorrows, its cares and its burdens, its afflictions and its hopes, its conflicts and its achievements, its opportunities wasted and improved, and, finally, its hour of death."
In the following notices of North Bridgewater families, I have intended to bring them down to the present time, and especially those who were residents of the town previous to 1800. In all works of this kind writers have to depend upon the assistance and co-operation of others, and he must take the fads as they appear on record, or are communicated to him personally; statements have to be compared with records, and each with the other have to be carefully examined to discover any errors that may exist. The sources of Information are numerous, and there is a great variance in names aud dates. One ff the principal and most reliable is that found in the folds of the family Bible; next, is the records of the town, which are supposed to have them from the parents' own pen, or by oral communication, or by a personal consultation with the parents. In gathering the information for the foregoing lists, I have traveled from house to house, at great expense, and copied the names, dates, etc., as given from their records, or, as in many instances, where families had no record, from their memory. I have consulted the town records thoroughly, have written hundreds of letters of inquiry to different sections of the country, have copied inscriptions in every graveyard in the town, and, when I had all of them before me, I carefully compared them, and arranged them for the printer. I have labored to include all the families, with their descendants, of the earliest settlers in the town, among the most numerous of whom are the Packards, Howards, Keiths, Kingmans, Snells, Snows, and Reynolds. Should some of the family records appear meagre and imperfect, the friends of the name may charge themselves with the blame in part, and not to me; for, besides examining the records above mentioned, I have consulted all the published works upon genealogy and town histories that have come to my notice (and which are now quite numerous) that would be likely to aid me in my efforts to make the work complete.
Among the most prominent works published, I should not fail to mention Moses Cary's History of the North Parish, published in 1824, and Mitchell's History of Bridgewater, published by Hon. Nahum Mitchell, of East Bridgewater, in 1840, both of which have served as valuable aids in connection the earlier families in the North Parish previous to 1800.
Among such a mass of names, figures, and items as are here presented, it would be strange if errors did not find their way into the list; and the writer does not wish to be understood that he has a perfect work, for that is impossible. He does claim, however, to have used all his industry, sagacity, and care, and has spared no pains to render those memorials as full and accurate as possible, and, in the main, correct.
Those persons who are not mentioned at all, or imperfectly given, must attribute the fact to the information rendered, or to their entire neglect, as the case may be, and not criticise too harshly upon the labors of the author, who has had no other object in view than to present a work that should be creditable alike to the town and to himself. No one not having had experience in a work of this kind can realize the care needed to avoid mistakes, or the labor required in correcting them; and they who have made a trial of the task will be sure to grant all indulgence for the inaccuracies here found.
Many of the families here published had never resided in the town, but are descendants, and are inserted as a mattor of interest to their friends, who are now residents of the town. Some of these families are found in the western part of Massachusetts, and many in different parts of Maine. As is stated in another part of the work, many of the early families removed to Minot, Winthrop, Winslow, and other towns in Maine.
The reader will not�ce in the latter portion of this work that double names are very common. I have endeavored to give middle names in full when I could find them. In a large proportion of the letters written to me from a distance, only an initial letter for the middle name is given, and in many of such cases I have written a second or third time for such items, that there might be as little perplexity in the names as possible. The labor of the genealogist to get the records of the past few years is very much increased by the fact that there is such a variety of peculiarly odd names, and such a curious method of spelling them, that it is a difficult matter to tell what they are; as, where one member of a family is named Adelaide, a portion of the family call her Addie, another by her full name. Others might be mentioned, and the number of them is numerous, that are pronounced by the contracted name; as Hattie, for Harriet; Lizzie, for Elizabeth; Abbie, for Abigail; Susie, for Susan; Fannie for Frances; Carrie, for Caroline.
Much confusion is caused by two persons bearing the same Christian name in different branches of the same family, so that a person if left in doubt which is meant. Another trouble arises from a person being known in one place by one name, and in another by a different one; as, Polly or Molly is often recorded for Mary, Sally instead of Sarah, and many others.
We also find upon town records the names of parents as heads of families; for example, "children of John and Sarah Ames." Now, supposing there are two families bearing the same names as above, it would be difficult, in many instances, to arrange them in their proper order in the absence of other information. Much of this difficulty is obviated by the law of 1845, which require Town Clerks to give full details in a complete system of registration.
There has been in times past a general complaint among persons unused to examining genealogical tables or registers, that they have been too complicated in their arrangement. In the following Register I have endeavored to make them as simple as possible, and have adopted a plan which, I hope, will commend itself to the readers, being simple ws well As useful.
The column of figures on the left margin of the page are consecutive numbers, denoting the number of persons in each name, commencing with number one as the first of the name in the town, or as the original ancestor, and so running through the entire name.
The head of each family is printed in small capital letters, while the children's names are printed in italics, and are placed each above the other in the order of their birth, with the date of the same; also, on the same line, to whom they are married, if known, or date of person's death, when such person is deceased.
The reference numbers, inclosed in parentheses thus (00), refer back to a corresponding number in the consecutive column of figures, where may be found the parent's name aud his children.
The number inclosed in brackets thus [00], on a line with the children's names, refers to the number in the consecutive column, where he is represented as the head of a family, and where his children are found.
Where there are no reference numbers inclosed in brackets, in connection with the sons' names, it shows that he either has no family, or that it is not known; while the children of the daughters that are married may be found under the name of their husbands, in another part of the work, or not at all.
That this plan may be more simple, I will illustrate it by the following example; namely:-- If you wish to trace the ancestry of Bela Keith, of Campello, look on page 555. We find at number 159, in the consecutive column of figures, the name of Bela (son of Benjamin 91); following back to number 91, in the consecutive column, we find Benjamin, the father of Bela, also his brothers and sisters; running back to number 38, we find the name of Levi (son of Timothy 11), and his children, who was son of Rev. James Keith, the first of that name in the country.
To follow the descendants of Bela Keith, look at the number inclosed in brackets thus [00], in line 160, in connection with his eldest son, which is Lewis, and we find number 236. Turn forward to that number in the consecutive column, and we find the name of Lewis, following which are his children; thus we find a complete system for the youngest person to trace their ancestry to the first one published.
In the following tables the different branches of each family are separated by a line, ----------, and the various families are separated by a longer line; thus, __________________________.
M. stands for married, b. for born, d. for died, dau. for daughter, wid. for widow; and where the names of towns are abbreviated, they are as follows:--
A. for Abington, S. for Stoughton, N. B. for North Bridgewater, E. B. for East Bridgewater; W. B. for West Bridgewater, B. for Bridgewater, E. for Easton.
For many years after the settlement of New England, the people called the days of the week by numbers and not by the names we have for them; The Sabbath they called the First, and so on to Saturday, the Seventh and last.
The months were also called by numbers, beginning with March, which was the first, and ending with February, the twelfth and last in the year.
Previous to 1752, many persons styled the year from the first of January, as at present, and others from the twenty-fifth day of March.
To avoid the uncertainty and want of uniformity in dates, the practice of double dating was common to mark the intervening time between the above dates. The double date was used thus, 1751-2, thereby saving any confusion. The manner of computing time by the Julian Calendar was in use from the year 325 to 1751. By that calendar every fourth year was a leap year of 366 days, which at length was found to be erroneous, and was corrected by statute in 1752.
"SECT. 1. And be it enacted by the King's most Excellent Majesty, &c. That the first day of January, 1752, shall be taken for the first day of the year then and ever afterwards. That the third day of September, 1752, shall be reckoned and accounted to be the fourteenth day of September," etc.
Previous to that time, the year was considered as beginning on the twenty-fifth of March, and accordingly March was reckoned the first month, and February the last month in the year. Thus, if we wish to write the date of February 12th, 1750, it would read 12th mo., 12th day, 1750-1.
To change Old Style to New Style, add ten days to all dates previous to 1700. Add eleven days to all dates from 1700 to 1800, and twelve days from 1800 to 1900.
In the following list of dates, where they occur between January first and March twenty-fifth, the year conforms to the New Style, the days remaining unchanged.
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Ames | 437-443 | Allen | 446 |
Alden | 443-446 | Atherton | 446-447 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Bacon | 461 | Blanchard | 462 |
Bartlett | 461 | Borden | 459 |
Bassett | 463 | Bradford | 461 |
Battles | 457-459 | Brett | 452-457 |
Baxendale | 462-463 | Brown | 459-460 |
Baxter | 460 | Bryant | 448-451 |
Beal | 447-448 | Bumpas | 461 |
Bennett | 460 | Bunker | 461 |
Billings | 463 | Burke | 462 |
Bird | 462 | Burns | 462 |
Bixby | 460 | Burrill | 462 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Carr | 469-470 | Copeland | 470-472 |
Cary | 463-469 | Cowell | 479 |
Chesman | 474-475 | Crafts | 473-474 |
Clapp | 476 | Crocker | 480 |
Clark | 473 | Crosby | 479 |
Cobb | 475-476 | Cross | 481 |
Cole | 477-479 | Curtis | 476-477 |
Cooper | 477 | Cushman | 479-480 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Dailey | 490 | Downie | 490 |
Davis | 492 | Drake | 490-491 |
Dickerman | 487-488 | Dunbar | 481-487 |
Dike | 488-489 | Dunham | 492 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Eames | 496-497 | Eddy | 499 |
Easton | 497-498 | Edson | 492-496 |
Eaton | 498-499 | Emery | 499 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Faunce | 511 | Ford | 503-504 |
Faxon | 509-510 | Freeman | 510-511 |
Field | 499-503 | French | 504-507 |
Filoon | 511 | Fuller | 507-508 |
Fisk | 509 | Fullerton | 508-509 |
Fitz | 509 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Gardner | 516 | Graves | 515 |
Gifford | 516 | Gray | 515 |
Glover | 517 | Green | 516 |
Goddard | 516 | Groves | 515 |
Goldthwait | 515 | Gurney | 511-515 |
Gorham | 515 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Hall | 529-530 | Henry | 532 |
Hamilton | 523 | Herrod | 533 |
Hancock | 531 | Hervey | 529 |
Harden | 533 | Hobart | 532 |
Harlow | 531 | Holbrook | 526-527 |
Harris | 522-523 | Hollis | 529 |
Hartwell | 530-531 | Hollywood | 532 |
Hatch | 531 | Holmes | 527-529 |
Hathaway | 532 | Howard | 533-545 |
Haven | 533 | Humphrey | 524-526 |
Hayden | 521-522 | Hunt | 526 |
Hayward | 517-521 | Huntington | 524 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Jackson | 546-548 | Jones | 549-550 |
Jameson | 548 | Joslyn | 550 |
Johnson | 548-549 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Keith | 551-559 | Kingman | 559-571 |
Kimball | 571 | Knapp | 571 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Landers | 578 | Lilley | 576 |
Lathrop | 578 | Lincoln | 571-573 |
Leach | 573-575 | Littlefield | 576 |
Lemmar | 577 | Loring | 577 |
Leonard | 575-576 | Lucas | 578 |
Lewis | 576-577 | Lyon | 576 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Manly | 578-579 | Merritt | 580-581 |
Marshall | 579-580 | Mitchell | 581 |
Mason | 582 | Morey | 582 |
May | 581 | Morrison | 582 |
McBride | 581-582 | Morse | 582 |
McLaughlin | 582 | Morton | 581 |
Merchant | 581 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Nash | 584 | Noyes | 582-584 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
O'Neil | 584 | Orr | 585 |
Orcutt | 585 | Osborne | 585 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Packard | 585-619 | Phillips | 627-628 |
Paine | 629 | Pope | 628 |
Perkins | 619-623 | Porter | 626-627 |
Perry | 625 | Pratt | 623-625 |
Peterson | 629 | Proctor | 629 |
Pettingill | 625-626 | Puffer | 628 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Reed | 636-637 | Richmond | 635 |
Remick | 637 | Ring | 635 |
Reynolds | 629-635 | Ritchie | 637 |
Rhodes | 635 | Robbins | 636 |
Richards | 635-636 | Robinson | 636 |
Richardson | 636 | Ryder | 636 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Sanford | 661 | Snow | 637-641 |
Sawyer | 661-662 | Soule | 662 |
Severance | 661 | Southworth | 650-658 |
Sewall | 665 | Spaulding | 664 |
Shaw | 641-643 | Spear | 664 |
Shedd | 662 | Sprague | 663-664 |
Shepardson | 665 | Stevens | 660 |
Shiverick | 663 | Stoddard | 658-659 |
Simmons | 664 | Stranger | 662 |
Skinner | 664-665 | Studley | 660-661 |
Smith | 663 | Sturtevant | 659-660 |
Snell | 643-649 | Sylvester | 649-650 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Tarbet | 673 | Torrey | 672 |
Thayer | 665-668 | Torry | 672 |
Thompson | 668-669 | Tower | 674 |
Thompson | 669-670 | Tribou | 671-672 |
Tilden | 670-671 | Trow | 673 |
Tilton | 674 | Tuck | 674 |
Tirrill | 673 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Vincent | 674 |
Family Names | Pages | Family Names | Pages |
---|---|---|---|
Wade | 674-675 | Whitmarsh | 682 |
Waldo | 675 | Whitney | 682 |
Wales | 676-677 | Whittemore | 681 |
Warren | 677-679 | Whitten | 681 |
Washburn | 679-680 | Wilbor | 682 |
Waterman | 680 | Wild | 682-683 |
Watkins | 680 | Wilder | 683 |
West | 680 | Williams | 683-684 |
Wheeler | 681 | Willis | 684-686 |
White | 680-681 | Wilson | 686 |
Whitman | 682 | Wood | 686 |