Tombstone Tuesday ~ Colonel Joseph Blanchard, Nashua, New Hampshire

These tombstones were photographed at the Old South Cemetery in Nashua, New Hampshire, which is also known as the Old Dunstable Cemetery, from the days when this area was once part of the town of Dunstable, Massachusetts.

Colonel Joseph Blanchard and "Madam Rebecca Blanchard"

Here lies ye

Body of Madam

Rebecca Blanch

ard Relict of

Joseph Blanchard

Esqr.  AET 65 who

Died April the

17th 1774

details from Madam Rebecca Blanchard's gravestone

Here lyes Buried

the Body of the Honble

JOSEPH BLANCHARD Esqr.

Who Departed this Life

April the 7th 1758

Aged 53 Years

Genealogical information on the families interred at the Old Dunstable Cemetery can be found in the book Early Generations of the Founders of Old Dunstable: Thirty Families, by Ezra S. Stearns, Boston: George Littlefield Publishers, 1911

 

Also see the book History of the Old Township of Dunstable: Including Nashua, Nashville, Hollis, Hudson, Litchfield and Merrimac, NH,  by Charles James Fox, 1846.  On page 79 are the funeral expenses of James Blanchard who died in 1704.

 

“Paid for a winding sheet                0 pounds   18 shillings     0 pence

 Paid for a coffin                            0 pounds    10 shillings    0 pence

Paid for digging grave                    0 pounds      7 shillings     6 pence

Paid for gloves                               1 pound       1 shilling      0 pence

(to distribute at the funeral)

Paid for the wine, segars, and spice  1 pound    5 shillings      9 pence

(at the funeral)

Paid to the Doctor                           0 pounds     14 shillings   9 pence

Paid for the attendance, expenses     1 pound      17 shillings  5 pence

                                      -------------------------------------------------

                                                         6 pound    19 shillings   5 pence"

Also on page 238

“BLANCHARD, COL. JOSEPH – son of the preceding [Capt. Joseph Blanchard]; born 11^th. Feb., 1704: married Rebecca Hubbard; died 7^th. April, 1758:  she died 17^th. April, 1774.  His children were 1. Sarah born 1706: died 30^th. Nov. 1726; 2. Joseph, born 28^th. April, 1729; 3 and 4. Eleazer and Susanna, born 15^th. Nov. 1730: Eleazer died 19^th March 1753, aged 22; 5. Rebecca, born 20^th. July, 1732; 6, Sarah, born 7^th. Oct. 1734: died in infancy; 7. Catherine, born 11^th Nov. 1736; 8 Jonathan, born 18^th Sept. 1738; 9. Sarah, born 2d. Aug., 1740; 10. James, born 20^th. Sept. 1742: in army; 11. Augustus, born 29^th. July, 1746; died at Milford, 1809; 12. Caleb, born 15^th. Aug., 1749; 13. Hannah, born 21^st. Oct., 1751: married Dr. Ebenezer Starr, of D., 21^st. April, 1776: died 22d. March, 1794, aged 42.”

Click here to read a biography of Colonel Joseph Blanchard (1704 – 1758) at Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Blanchard

Click here to see a map drawn up by Colonel Joseph Blanchard and Samuel Langdon

http://www.masshist.org/maps/2729_Atlas_33/2729_Atlas_33.html#

I stopped to take a photo of this tombstone because I had never seen a New England epitaph that read "Madam" ever before this.  When I was home I realized that Madam Rebecca Blanchard's maiden name was Hubbard.  She is a 3rd cousin to me, many generations removed, but not through the Hubbards - our common ancestor is the Reverend Edward Bulkely (1614 - 1696)  and his wife Lucyann Coy of Concord, Massachusetts.  Her husband, Colonel Joseph Blanchard, is also a 3rd cousin, many generations removed, to me through our common ancestor Peter Bracket (about 1580 - 1616) of Sudbury, England.  His wife Rachel came to America on the Planter  in 1635 with her second husband Martin Sanders and all her children. Rachel (Unknown) (Brackett) Sanders died in Braintree, Massachusetts on 15 September 1651. 

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Copyright 2013, Heather Wilkinson Rojo