Ezekiel Worthen and Hannah Martin of Amesbury, Massachusetts

This is a continuation of the George Wathen (Worthen) Story.....
Ezekiel

So, Ezekiel, George's son, is now a grown man, his apprenticeship to blacksmith Thomas Avery is finished, and he's ready to strike out on his own.  According to Joyce Pendery in her article on the Worthen Family, Ezekiel was friends with Samuel Foote, who married Hannah the daughter of Richard Currier. Ezekiel also married a Hannah, she was the daughter of George Martin and his first wife Hannah Unknown. They were married on 4 December 1661 in Salisbury.  Hannah's mother died when she was 2-3 years old.  She was raised by her step-mother Susanna North Martin. George Martin was also a blacksmith, it is not known when he came to the colony, but he was living is Salisbury by 1643.

Move to Amesbury
The father-in-laws of the two young men had lived in Salisbury, Mass, but by that time the town had grown beyond its boundaries and a new town of Amesbury was underway.  In 1666  Amesbury was incorporated and all four men were listed as citizens of the new town. As with most men, Ezekiel became more active in the running of town as he grew older. By his forties he served on juries and took his turn as town constable. He took the Oath of Allegiance in 1677. Ezekiel bought and sold land for the remainder of his life. He also deeded land to his children.

Members of the Amesbury Church

The Tithing Mans church stick

In 1667 Ezekiel was assigned his spot in the meeting house, next to his father-in-law, George Martin. During the church service the men sat on one side, the women on the other.  Everyone had an assigned spot based on social standing in the community. The Deacons of the church sat beneath the Minister and faced the congregation.  A "tithing man" walked around the building with a long stick, prodding people who appeared asleep.  Apparently George Martin objected to the seat assigned to his wife, Susanna, possibly he felt that she was slighted and should have been assigned a better seat. This was the beginning of a long series of skirmishes which would eventually end badly for Susanna Martin.

Susanna North
Susanna North Martin was born in Olney, Buckinghamshire, England.  Her parents were Richard and Joan Bartram North.  Joan died when Susanna was young and her father remarried in England to Ursula Unknown.  The family immigrated by 1639 and lived in Salisbury, Massachusetts. Richard had the lot next to Abraham Morrill. Susanna married the widower George Martin on August 11, 1646.  (George Martin is NOT the son of Christopher Martin, a pilgrim on the Mayflower!)

Accusations
Susanna was first accused of witchcraft in 1669 by William Sargent, Jr. and his brother Thomas Sargent (both ancestors). Her husband in turn sued them for slander. Both cases went to court.  Charges were dropped against Thomas Sargent, but William Jr. was found guilty and given a nominal penalty. Charges were also dropped against William Sargent Sr. but the court disagreed with this decision.  The proceedings and outcome of the case against Susanna is unknown, the court records are lost.

In October 1669 George was sued by Christopher Bartlett because Susanna had called him a liar and a thief.  Their son Richard Martin was also in court that year for assaulting and threatening his father, he was sentenced to be whipped. Obviously 1669 was not a good year for the Martins.

memorial stone for Susanna Martin

Susanna's father Richard North died in 1668 and she and her sister Mary expected to have a large share in his estate. However his Widow Ursula produced what they considered a fake will which left almost all the estate to her. George, Susanna and Mary took Ursula to Court. Their lawsuit went back and forth several times but they finally lost in 1674, another blow for the family. Things seemed to settle down for a while. George, Susanna's husband, died in 1686, leaving his estate to her to manage. His death also left her to defend herself against any further charges, making her an easy target for unhappy neighbors.

Susanna and the Witch Trials
1692 is the year that the witch trials in New England reached their zenith.  The girls involved in the Salem Witch Trials spread their accusations to neighboring towns.  No one, irrespective of position, whether high or low, was safe from the accusers. Eventually the girls accused Susanna once again of being a witch, with her past history, it's not a surprise. Luckily for her daughters, none of them were accused unlike other families where the females were all under suspicion.

On 30 April 1692 a warrant was issued for Susanna's arrest.  Her friend and neighbor Orlando Bagley, town constable, came to arrest her.  After a preliminary hearing she spent time in prison.  Her trial was held on June 26th, her neighbors came out in droves to spin wild stories of her guilt. Some of those neighbors are also ancestors.  She was a tough woman who stood her ground; she refused to plead guilty and possibly save her life as others had done.


The Rev. Cotton Mather said about Susanna, "This woman was one of the most impudent, scurrilous, wicked creatures of this world; and she did now throughout her whole trial discover herself to be such a one. Yet when she was asked what she had to say for herself, her chief plea was that she had led a most virtuous and holy life." Mr. Merrill, in his History of Amesbury described Susanna differently, "The idea of snatching this hardworking, honest woman from her home to be tried for her life by those who never knew her, and witnesses who were prejudiced against her....is almost too much for belief. ...Allowed no counsel, she was her own lawyer, and her answers are remarkable for independence and clearness. She showed herself to be a woman of more than ordinary talent and resolution."    Bonnie Johnson Family Website.

Having been found guilty, Susanna Martin and four others were taken to Gallows Hill and hung on July 19, 1692. Only after the Salem accusers pointed their fingers at the very top of society, including the family of the above Cotton Mather, did the trials stop. In 1696 Rev. Mather issued a statement that the trials were a travesty and that innocent people lost their lives.  In 1711 the General Court issued an apology and compensation for many of the survivors.


Conversion to the Quakers
According to Samuel Copp Worthen in his history of the Worthen family, Ezekiel left his Congregational Church after the witch trials and joined the Quaker Church. On at least two occasions he had possessions or animals confiscated to pay his rate for the Congregational Minister.  Eventually the Quakers were allowed to opt out of the tax.

Despite their trials Ezekiel and Hannah lived long prosperous lives.  They had ten children, who all lived to adulthood.


Ezekiel and Hannah had the following children:
1. Hannah, born April 21, 1663, married, December 5, 1684, Samuel Fowler.
2. John, born February 12, 1664, married, December 30, 1689, Mary Hadlock
3. Thomas, born October 31, 1667, married Hannah Annis.
4. George, born December 15. 1669,
5. Ezekiel, born May 18, 1672, married, December 26, 1704, Abigail Carter.
6. Margerite, born September 24, 1674, married George Weed.
7. Samuel, married, November 17, 1701, Deliverance Heath.
8. Dorothy, married, October 5, 1702, Joseph Hoyt.
9. Judith, married, February 19, 1707-08, Abraham Page.
10. Deborah, born December 9, 1686, married, November 15, 1714, Eliezer Well


RIP
Ezekiel wrote his will in 1715 and died the following year. Hannah, stayed in the family home for some years afterwards but eventually moved in with her daughter Hannah Fowler.  She died in 1730.


Sources:
The English Background of George and Margery (Hayward) Wathen of Salem, Massachusetts by Clifford L. Stott, F.A.S.G. 1996, The Register

Descendants of George and Margery Wathen of Salem, Massachusetts, by Joyce S. Pendery, c.g. 2000, The Register

The Devil in the Shape of a Woman, Carol F. Karlsen

Wikipedia

Ancestry.com

The History of Amesbury, Joseph Merrill

Old Families of Salisbury and Amesbury, Hoyt

George (Worthen) Wathan of Bristol, England and Salem, Massachusetts

background

Early bios of George Wathen (Worthen) are brief and sometimes give his name as John. Luckily, a great amount of research was done by Clifford L. Stott  and published in 1994 in the New England Historic and Genealogical Society magazine known as The Register. George and his family immigrated to the Massachusetts Bay Colony possibly by 1638, but definitely by 1640. He was one of thousands of immigrants who did not survive long in New England despite being a relatively young man, only in his early 40s when he died. Unfortunately, his wife Margery died only two years after him, leaving very young children without family to care for them. Here's their story.

english origins

c.1500 map of Bristol 

George Wathen was born in Bristol, England around 1597. His father, also  George, was born c. 1563 in or around Bristol, Gloucestershire, England.  He married Joyce White on  9 August 1589 at St. Nicholas, Bristol. By 1600 he and his family were living in the parish of St. Stephen, Bristol. By then George and Joyce had three sons: William, George and Edmund, who were to follow in the footsteps of their father and become Joiners (Woodworkers) and a daughter Mary. William apprenticed himself to his father, George was apprenticed to John Browne on 12 Nov 1612 for a period of eight years.  He was in a nearby town called Trowbridge in 1624/1625. He and Margery Heywood were married in Trowbridge, her hometown on 15 April 1624. 

On 16 July 1626, I admitted George and his brother Edmund as a burgess in the city of Bristol.

George and Margery's first child, a daughter Deborah, was baptized at Trowbridge on 11 March 1624/5. The rest of the children were born in Bristol.  Deborah was followed by John, b. 1627, Dorothy b. 1630, twins William and Elizabeth bapt. 21 Sept. 1632, both buried by Aug. 1634, and Ezekiel (ancestor) bapt. on 15 April 1636 at St. Nicholas, Bristol.

Bristol is an ancient port city in the West of England. Many ships left the Bristol harbour for the New World, presumably George, Margery and their children, Deborah and Ezekiel, sailed for New England from their home city. George's skill as a joiner was in great demand in the colony as towns and settlements sprung up and houses and municipal building needed to be built. 

George in Salem

town sign

There was a ---- Wathen recorded in Lynn, Mass in 1638, this is possibly our George, but he was definitely in the Colony by 1640 when he was given a house and a lot in Salem and on 4 April 1640 he was appointed surveyor of fences. On 23 May 1641 he was admitted to the Church of Salem. He was twice in Court once for a land dispute and again for trespassing. The court date of 29 June 1641 is the last time George's name was recorded. He died shortly thereafter.  

Death of George

The death of a husband and father is a tragedy at anytime but for a young family, without the support of extended family, it had to be a nightmare.  But, the story gets worse, on 20 July 1644, the inventory of the estate of Margery Wathen, the widow, was recorded.  The children were now orphans, Deborah was around 17 but Ezekiel, the youngest, was 8 years old. According to Joyce S. Pendery, who followed  Clifford Stott with an article in 2004 on the family of George Wathen in the Register, Margery had a very large wardrobe. She speculates that Margery and possibly Deborah were seamstresses, that would explain all the lace and ribbons and material that was inventoried. Also in her inventory were a bible, a testament and 24 old books.  So someone in the family could read, although Joyce Pendery points out that Deborah and Ezekiel made their mark when they signed their names.   

Orphan
Administration of Margery's estate was turned over to two members of the Salem Church and on 27 August 1644 Ezekiel was ordered by the Quarterly Court of Salem to be bound as an apprentice to Thomas Abree for 12 years. Thomas was a blacksmith who had come to the Colony on the "Mary and John" in March 1633/4.  On 24 June 1656, Ezekiel was freed by the Quarterly Court, he was 21, a trained blacksmith and free to make a life for himself.

Cousin William

Prince Rupert

Here's an interesting side note, George Wathen's sister Mary, married Andrew Sargent, and they had a son William Sargent who immigrated. He was the William Sargent of Gloucester, Massachusetts who is and was sometimes confused with our ancestor William Sargent of Salisbury.  George's brother Edmund had a son Thomas Wathen who also emigrated for a while, but returned to England to fight in the Civil War. He died fighting with Prince Rupert, a cousin of Charles II, who was the commander of the Royal Calvary. I think it unusual that Thomas choose to fight for the King and not Cromwell, but maybe that was not uncommon.  Anyway, Deborah was in Court in Ipswich in September 1652 where she was deposed concerning her cousin Thomas' estate.  She said that William Sargent, their cousin was the closest male relative and should be appointedadministrator of Thomas' estate. William must not have done anything because in the Salem Quarterly Court of September 1657 Ezekiel was appointed to replace William.

My Worthen Line with links:
George Worthen and Margery Hayward
Ezekiel Worthen and Hannah Martin
Ezekiel Worthen and Abigail Carter
Ezekiel Worthen and Hannah Currier
Jacob Worthen and Mary Brown
Rachel Worthen and Enoch Rowell

William Sargent and Elizabeth Perkins of Salisbury, Massachusetts

When looking at the lives of my ancestors who were early immigrants to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the name of my blog, The Family Connection, begins to really ring true.  With limited numbers of marriageable men and women, the very real need to be married and the distance between some settlements it is easy to see how so many close family connections were made. Siblings from one family married siblings in another, stepchildren, stepparents, half siblings abounded.  One of my great grandmothers married three of my great grandfathers, not all at once of course, but with the death rate rather higher than it is now, many people had more than one spouse over the course of their lives.

I am descended from not one, not two, but from three of his children. What are the odd? Pretty good actually. 

William Sargent was one of the three husbands of Joanne Pinder. (see Henry Pinder)  She married first Valentine Rowell, second William and thirdly Richard Currier. She outlived them all. William was a widower when he married Joanna, his first wife was Elizabeth Perkins, but this is starting in the middle of the story, so back to the beginning. Here is what I know about William Sargent.

english origins

William Sargent was born in England around 1611, the exact date and place is unknown. [1] Many sites have his place of birth as Bath, probably based on the book by Richard William Cutter. [2] 

William Sargent, the immigrant ancestor, was born in England, about 1600. The latest investigation points to the probability that he was the William Sargent who was baptized in the Abbey Church, Bath, England, June 28, 1606, son of Richard and Katherine (Stevens) Sargent. There is a tradition that William was born in 1602. As the father-in-law of Sargent, Quartermaster John Perkins, came from Bath, it is probable that this record belongs to the immigrant, William Sargent, of Salisbury, Massachusetts. 

The problem with the above text from Cutter's book, is that John Perkins, his father-in-law, was not from Bath, he was from Hillmorton, Warwickshire, England. [3] In the end, there is no proof of William's English birthplace.

William is known in the records as a seaman, but he was not the average sailor.  He was able to sign his name, and he was addressed as "Mister", which was a mark of respect in those days. He was made a Freeman on 22 May 1639, so he must have been a good Puritan as a man had to be a member in good standing with his local church to qualify for Freemenship. (is that a word?) [4]

rambling man

William arrived in the colony in 1632, and settled in Ipswich, then known as Agawam, where in 1634 he was given 12 acres of land. Sometime afterwards he removed to Newbury, and in 1638 he along with a group of petitioners were given the right to begin a new plantation called Hampton. Just when you think he's going to settle in one place he ups and moves again, this time in 1640, to the new settlement of Salisbury. Although the distances between moves was not much, each time he moved, it was to a new settlement.  This meant starting completely over, building a house and clearing land for planting, I'm sure the wife was thrilled. 

elizabeth

Speaking of the wife, William, married sometime prior to 1636, Elizabeth Perkins, daughter of John Perkins of Ipswich.  Her sister Mary Perkins married Thomas Bradbury. Elizabeth and her sister would be next-door neighbors in Salisbury.(see the Salisbury plat map) Elizabeth did not live to see her sister tried for Witchcraft in 1692. 

children of william and elizabeth

William and Elizabeth's first child was born in 1636.  They lost two children, both daughters at a very young age. Of the five children that lived to adulthood, three are my ancestors. 

Mary b. 1636, married Phillip Watson-Challis

Elizabeth b. and d. in 1641

Thomas b. 11 June 1643, m. 2 Mar 1667/8 Rachael Barnes (found not guilty of fathering Sarah Osgoods' child 1668)

William b. 2 Jan 1645/5 m. 23 Sept. 1668 Mary Colby, dau of Anthony Colby (ordered to be whipped or fined for fornication, 12 April 1670)

Elizabeth b. 22 Nov. 1648 m. by 1668 Samuel Colby (brother of Mary) 

Lydia b. 1650 died between 1660-1662

Sarah b. 29 Feb 1651/2 m. Orlando Bagley 1681

civil duty

William, like many others at that time, bought and sold land for the rest of his life.  He made the move from Salisbury to Amesbury at some point as well. He probably served on the Grand Jury, the Petit Jury and was the Clerk for the Train Band for Salisbury (the militia). There was a second William Sargent who lived in Gloucester and he might have been the William who served on the juries or possible they both did. 

slanderous encounters
In 1669, either William or his son William was sued for slander by neighbor George Martin. The two families obviously did not get along.  George claimed that on 13 April William Sargent called his wife, Susanna, a witch.  George also sued William's son Thomas for saying that his son George was a bastard and that Richard Martin was Goodwife Martin's "Imp".  It may sound silly to us today but, Susanna North Martin was hanged on 19 July 1692 for witchcraft. George Martin is my 9th great grandfather, Susanna his second wife, was stepmother to my 8th great grandmother Hannah. [5]

rip

It is not known when Elizabeth Perkins Sargent died, William married Joanna Pinder Rowell on 18 September 1670. His children were grown, Joanna's youngest was 15. William helped Joanna settle the estate of her husband Valentine Rowell. They sued Christoper Osgood, son of Valentine's widow, Margery Fowler Osgood Rowell.  William lived another five years, dying in the Spring of 1675, leaving Joanna a widow for the second time. She married Richard Currier 26 Oct 1676. Joanna died in 1690. [6]

***********************************************************************

my Sargent ancestry through three of their children:

William Sargent and Elizabeth Perkins

Thomas Sargent-Rachel Barnes      William Sargent-Mary Colby      Elizabeth Sargent-Samuel Colby

Rachel Sargent-William Currier     Jacob Sargent-Judith Harvey     Elizabeth Colby-John Rowell

Hannah Currier-Ezekiel Worthen   Tabitha Sargent-John Foss        Enoch Rowell-Merriam Converse

Jacob Worthen-Mary Brown           David Foss-Ann Richardson       Enoch Rowell-Rachel Worthen

Rachel Worthen-Enoch Rowell        Ann Foss-Reuben Moore 

                                                     Mary Moore-Samuel Moore

                                         

Enoch Rowell - Rachel Worthen

William Rowell-Sally Leavitt                    Samuel D. Rowell-Mary Moore

                           Viola Rowell                                      Enoch C. Rowell

Jennie Clover Rowell-John Clark Thornton

my grandparents 

my parents

me

Sources:

[1] Robert Charles Anderson, "The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England, 1620-1633, Vol 1-3,  database with images, American Ancestors (https://www.americanancestors.org : accessed 26 Feb 2017) p. 1630-1633, entry for William Sargent.

[2] William Richard Cutter, Genealogical and Personal Memoirs Relating to the Families of Boston and Eastern Massachusetts, Volume 2, (Boston: Lewis Publishing Co., 1908) 863, digital images, Google Books (books.google.com : accessed 26 Feb 2017).

[3] Robert Charles Anderson, "The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England, 1620-1633, Vol 1-3,  database with images, American Ancestors (https://www.americanancestors.org : accessed 26 Feb 2017) p. 1431, entry for John Perkins.

[4] Robert Charles Anderson, "The Great Migration Begins," 1630.

[5] George Francis Dow, Records and files of the Quarterly Courts of Essex County, Massachusetts, vol. 4, 1667-1671 (Salem, Mass: Essex Institute, 1914)129, digital images, Archive (https://www.archives.org : accessed 26 Feb 2017.

[6] David Webster Hoyt, The old families of Salisbury and Amesbury, Massachusetts ; with some related families of Newbury, Haverhill, Ipswich and Hampton, (Providence: Snow and Farnham, 1897) 310-11, digital images, Archive (http://www.archive.org).Archive