Monday Is for Mothers: Martha Woodward (1676 - 1775)

My maternal eighth great grandmother Martha Woodward is named in her her father Richard's will and she survived her husband Joseph Baker Jr. by more than 20 years.

It seems there's only one mention of Martha in Quaker records for the Chester Monthly Meeting it doesn't specify what she had done that merited a visitation but Lewis Woodward, the author of a family history of the Woodwards, thought that was likely that the complaint referred to something to do with her marriage.*

[Genealogy of the Woodward family of Chester county, Pennsylvania, with an appendix giving a brief account of the Woodwards of some other portions of the United States by Woodward, Lewis, b. 1848; Publication date 1879. Digitizing sponsor Boston Public Library.

Source: The Internet Archive.]

[From "Our Family Ancestors" by Thomas Maxwell Potts. Cannonsburg, Pennsylvania, 1895.

Source: Internet Archive - original at Allen County Public Library, Ft. Wayne, Indiana ]

*I tried to locate the original of this Chester Monthly Meeting record but didn't have any luck.


© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

From the Probate Files: Richard Woodward - Chester County, Pennsylvania - 1706

Ancestry's online databases weren't very helpful in regard to the will of my maternal ninth great grandfather Richard Woodward. All I could find was this:

[Ancestry.com]

And I found nothing at all on FamilySearch.

But I persisted because, as you will note, one of his children was "Martha, wife of --- Baker" and therefore my 8th great grandmother. Fortunately an earlier Woodward published a book in 1879* about the family (available through the Internet Archive) which includes a transcription of Richard's will.

[Genealogy of the Woodward family of Chester county, Pennsylvania, with an appendix giving a brief account of the Woodwards of some other portions of the United States. by Lewis Woodward, b. 1848. From the collection of the Boston Public Library. Internet Archive.com]

(As you can see Martha's bequest was "five pounds in monys or a Cow equivalent to the sum" while her sisters Jane, Mary and Sarah each were to receive twenty pounds, perhaps because Martha was already married which they were not.)**

It appears that the house in Thornbury Township that Richard lived in before he removed to Middletown is still standing and it was documented in the 1930s by the Historic American Buildings Survey which stated that "Significance: This house, although much altered, is of interest because the original section was possibly built in the last decade of the 17th century."

[SOUTH FRONT AND EAST SIDE - Richard Woodward House, Concord Road (Thornbury Township), Westtown, Chester County, PA

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. ]

[ WEST AND NORTH SIDES - Richard Woodward House, Concord Road (Thornbury Township), Westtown, Chester County, PA.

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.]

[FIRST FLOOR, EAST WALL FIREPLACE - Richard Woodward House, Concord Road (Thornbury Township), Westtown, Chester County, PA.

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.]

[SECOND FLOOR, HALL - Richard Woodward House, Concord Road (Thornbury Township), Westtown, Chester County, PA.

Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.]

Here's how I'm descended from Richard Woodward:

[Ancestry.com]

*Here's the title page:

**Of his sons, only Joseph (not the eldest) inherited property. The others had to settle for "four shillings or a pair of gloves".



© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Working on Wednesday: Joseph Baker, Jr. (1667 - 1735) Yoeman

It seems there were two men known as Joseph Baker, Jr. in late 17th century Pennsylvania only one of whom was the son of Joseph Baker Sr. who arrived in the colony in 1684 with his older brother John. And that Joseph Jr. isn't my direct ancestor.*

Of course, historically the appellation of Junior could be applied to the younger of two men with the same given name without it signifying a father-son relationship and that what happened here. My Joseph Baker is believed to be the nephew of Joseph Sr. and John, therefore he would have been a grandson of John Baker, Sr. of Edgmond in Shropshire (about 2 miles west of Newport). His father's name is unknown.

['Shropshire by John Seller' Seller, J. (c. 1703) Furneax Antique Maps]

It's unclear when Joseph Jr. left Shropshire for Pennsylvania--he may have traveled with his uncles but the reason they all left was because they were Quakers** and hoped to find greater religious freedom in the New World. The township they ended up living in was named Edgmont, originally in Chester County, now in Delaware County.

[From "Our Family Ancestors" by Thomas Maxwell Potts. Cannonsburg, Pennsylvania, 1895.

Source: Internet Archive - original at Allen County Public Library, Ft. Wayne, Indiana ]

Thomas Maxwell included a "fac-simile" of the page of the Baker family bible.

[From "Our Family Ancestors" by Thomas Maxwell Potts. Cannonsburg, Pennsylvania, 1895.

Source: Internet Archive - original at Allen County Public Library, Ft. Wayne, Indiana ]

And here's a reminder of how I'm descended from him:

[Ancestry.com]

*Joseph Sr.'s son Joseph had four children we know of: Robert, Sarah, Hannah and Joseph.
**There are numerous mentions of "Joseph Baker" in the Chester Monthly Meeting Minutes but I don't know which ones might refer to my ancestor.





© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Monday Is for Mothers: Dorothy "Dolly" Gates (1742 - 1805)

Dorothy was born on March 25, 1742, in Preston, Connecticut, the daughter of Daniel Gates and his wife Mercy Heald. She was their youngest daughter and didn't marry until after her father's death in 1767 when Dorothy was 27.

[To the right honourable, the Earl of Shelbourne, His Majesty's principal Secretary of State for the Southern Department. This plan of the colony of Connecticut in North-America. 1766. Source: Library of Congress Geography and Map Division Washington, D.C. ]

[Ancestry.com. Connecticut Town Birth Records, pre-1870 (Barbour Collection) [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006. Original data: White, Lorraine Cook, ed. The Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records. Vol. 1-55. Baltimore, MD, USA: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1994-2002.]

Her first husband was Jesse Seaton, a resident of Plainfield (in neighboring Windham County about 12 miles north of Preston), whom she married on November 15, 1769.

[Ancestry.com. Connecticut, Town Marriage Records, pre-1870 (Barbour Collection) [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006. Original data: White, Lorraine Cook, ed. The Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records. Vol. 1-55. Baltimore, MD, USA: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1994-2002.]

Less than a year and half later, on March 23, 1771, Jesse Seaton died before he was able to sign his last will which one of his doctors had written at his direction and this noncupative will was admitted to probate. Except for a token sum "that he gave to his Brothers & Sisters to Prevent them from Braking his will in the disposing of his Estate," Jesse gave everything to his 28-year-old wife. There is no mention of any children.

[Notes : Probate Packets, Pope, Seth-Shepard, John, 1747-1880. Ancestry.com. Connecticut, Wills and Probate Records, 1609-1999 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. Original data: Connecticut County, District and Probate Courts.]

Five years later Dorothy married her second cousin Joseph Gates,* a 54-year-old widower with six children (five daughters and one son). The couple had three sons, the oldest of which, also named Joseph (1776-1854), is my direct ancestor.

In 1795 when Joseph Sr. died at the age of 75, he had made provision in his will for his "loving wife Dorothy" including a life estate in his dwelling house, all his household furniture, and "one Good Riding Horse, Side Saddle & Bridle, & a Cow."

[Ancestry.com. Connecticut, Wills and Probate Records, 1609-1999 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. Original data: Connecticut County, District and Probate Courts.]

Dorothy survived Joseph by ten years, dying on February 9, 1805, at the age of 62. The first entries in the inventory of her estate give us a view into her style of dress. She owned cotton dresses made of "callico" and chintz** for everyday wear but Dorothy could deck herself out in a black silk gown with a silk "cloke" and bonnet when she chose.

[Notes : Probate Packets, Gardner, David-Geer, H, 1748-1880. Ancestry.com. Connecticut, Wills and Probate Records, 1609-1999 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. Original data: Connecticut County, District and Probate Courts.]

And among her household goods there was a mirror and a rocking chair with a cushion for comfort.

[Notes : Probate Packets, Gardner, David-Geer, H, 1748-1880. Ancestry.com. Connecticut, Wills and Probate Records, 1609-1999 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. Original data: Connecticut County, District and Probate Courts.]


She and Joseph are buried in Hopeville Cemetery in Griswold, New London County, Connecticut.

My descent is through their granddaughter Mary "Polly" Gates whose daughter Mercy Ann Darling was the mother of Jesse David Webb, the father of my maternal grandmother Anna Delilah Webb.

*They shared great grandparents Stephen Gates (1634-1707) and Sarah Woodward (1642-1707).
**For an illustrated discussion of these fabrics look here and here.

© 2016 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Monday Is for Mothers : Freedom Woodward (1642 - 1681)

This paternal eighth great grandmother died in her late thirties on May 10, 1681, just a week after the birth of her 14th child.*

Freedom was born in Dorchester in about 1642, the daughter of Henry and Elizabeth (Mather) Woodward. The family moved to Northampton in the Connecticut River Valley of eastern Massachusetts and that's where she married Jedediah Strong (1639-1733), who was originally from Hingham, in 1662.

[1677 Map of New England by William Hubbard.

 Source:http://www.histarch.illinois.edu/plymouth/images/1677map.jpg]

[Ancestry.com. U.S., New England Marriages Prior to 1700 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2012. Original data: Torry, Clarence A. New England Marriages Prior to 1700. Baltimore, MD, USA: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2004.]

Jedediah** outlived two more wives, finally dying in his 96th year in Coventry, in Tolland County, Connecticut.

Northampton has had a rich history since it was first settled by the English in 1654.*** The view of it painted by American landscape artist Thomas Cole (1801-1848) shows the how the area looked 179 years ago.

[View from Mount Holyoke, Northampton, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm—The Oxbow. Artist: Thomas Cole; Date: 1836.

Medium: Oil on canvas. Metropolitan Museum of Art: Gift of Mrs. Russell Sage, 1908]

*Her children were Elizabeth, Abigail, Jedediah, Ford, Hannah, Thankful, John, Sarah, Lydia, Mary, Experience, Preserved, John (again) and a baby who was unnamed. Of the children, four were known to have died as infants and another died at age 17. Hannah is my direct ancestor through her granddaughter Esther Carpenter who married Benjamin Porter and are thereby my fifth great grandparents. My source for this information is here.
**You can learn more about Jedediah Strong here.
***Historic Northampton has a short video here.

© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Working on Wednesday: Henry Woodward (1607 - 1683), Tavern Keeper, Miller and Selectman

I'm in the habit of saying that my mother's people were all Northerners and my father's ancestors all Southern-born, but that's not strictly true because in each lineage there's one branch that's an exception. My father's maternal grandfather Tracy Darrow Porter's male ancestors can be traced to New England as early as 1630.

[1677 Map of New England by William Hubbard.

 Source:http://www.histarch.illinois.edu/plymouth/images/1677map.jpg]

Henry Woodward, this paternal ninth great grandfather, was born in what is now part of Liverpool, England and is believed to have come to New England on the ship "James" in the fall of 1635. (I haven't found any reference to him so far in The Great Migration Study Project. Perhaps the new Directory will include his name.)

[View of Savin Hill in Dorchester about 1830 from the Dorchester Historical Society]

He settled first in Dorchester, married a young woman named Elizabeth* and became a member of the church, a freeman of the town, and served as Selectman, Constable and on several committees over the years.

In 1659 Henry, Elizabeth and their four children, three daughters** and a son, moved to Northampton (possibly at the suggestion of Reverend Mather) where he repeated his involvement in church and local affairs, again taking on the role of Selectman and acting as Surveyor of Highways among other civic duties.

In 1665 he was granted a license to  open a tavern which remained in business until 1681. As was typical of the time, he also farmed some land and owned a "corn mill." In this transcribed list of deaths in Northampton, we see what happened to him there in 1683.***

[Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. Original data: Town and City Clerks of Massachusetts. Massachusetts Vital and Town Records. Provo, UT: Holbrook Research Institute (Jay and Delene Holbrook).]

If you want to read more about flour milling in the 17th century, look here; and learn more about colonial taverns here. This blog has more information about Henry.

*It's possible that this Elizabeth was the daughter of the influential Puritan minister Richard Mather who founded a religious dynasty that included his son Increase and grandson Cotton Mather, but it's not certain.
**I am descended from their second daughter Freedom who was born in about 1642. She married Jedediah Strong in 1662 and it's through their granddaughter Esther Carpenter who married Benjamin Porter in 1756 that they find their place in my family tree.
***Note that his daughter (and my ancestor) Freedom Strong is the first name on the list above, having died almost two years earlier.

© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.