What did Genea-Santa Bring? Christmas Books 2022

For many years I have posted the books that Genea-Santa has put under my Christmas tree.  You can see below for a list of links going back to 2014!  This year was a small haul, but enough to keep me very busy reading.  

I hope you find a few books on this list for yourself and your own family history research!

The first book is Robert Goodby's A Deep Presence: 13,000 Years of Native American History. We were very lucky that in November Professor Goodby of Franklin Pierce College was the featured speaker at the Compact Day Luncheon held by the New Hampshire Mayflower Society.  We were able to purchase an autographed copy of his newest book about the Native Abenaki who lived in our part of New England. He was a wonderful speaker, and if you hear about him speaking near you I would recommend you attend.  I can't wait to read this book!

Santa found this book on the history of Eastham, Massachusetts.  I have many ancestors from this town - Crosby, Bangs, Lumpkin, Mayo, Osborn, Mayhew, Davis, Hawes, and more.  It will be fun learning more about their hometown, and perhaps finding additional information on my ancestors.

In 2021 we stayed at a campground on Cape Cod, and this book of essays by Henry David Thoreau was in our little Airstream trailer.  During our weekend on the Cape I read several of these essays about Cape Cod and one about Mount Wachusett (near where I grew up and graduated at Wachusett Regional High School).  I was hooked and hated to leave the book behind.  Thank you, Santa!  Now I can read all the other essays.  (Purchased at the Concord Museum gift shop in Concord, Massachusetts)

This book looks like fun!  New England's Hidden Past: 360 Overlooked, Underappreciated, and Misunderstood Landmarks by husband and wife Dan and Leslie Landrigan is a surprise.  If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know how much I like to post about unsual New England historical sites. This book might send me off on a few local road trips.  Stay tuned!

For the truly curious: 

Christmas Books 2021

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2022/01/what-did-genea-santa-bring-christmas.html  

Christmas Books 2020

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2021/01/what-did-genea-santa-bring-christmas.html  

Christmas Books 2019

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/12/what-did-genea-santa-bring-christmas.html   

Christmas Books 2018  

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2019/01/christmas-books-from-santa-2018.html   

Christmas Books 2017

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2018/01/christmas-books-from-santa-2017.html 

Christmas Books 2016:

 https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/12/christmas-books-from-santa-2016.html   

Christmas Books 2015:

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/01/genealogy-gifts-from-santa-2015.html  

Christmas Books 2014:

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2014/01/new-books-for-christmas-santa-was-very.html

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To Cite/Link to this Blog Post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "What did Genea-Santa Bring?  Christmas Books 2022", Nutfield Genealogy, posted January 2, 2023, (  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/01/what-did-genea-santa-bring-christmas.html: accessed [access date]). 

Day Three of the "Path of the Pilgrims" Tour by the GSMD

 Click here to see Day One of the tour:  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2022/07/on-path-of-pilgrims-tour-from-general.html   

Click here to see Day Two of the tour:  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2022/07/day-two-on-path-of-pilgrims-tour-by-gsmd.html  

Day Three - The Aptuxet Trading Post in Bourne, Massachusetts, Provincetown, Corn Hill, First Encounter Beach, Cove Cemetery in Eastham, and the Forefathers Monument in Plymouth, Massachusetts - see below

Day Four  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2022/07/day-four-on-path-of-pilgrims-tour-by.html  

Day Five   https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2022/07/day-five-of-path-of-pilgrims-tour-by.html  

Aptucxet Trading Post, Bourne, Massachusetts

Wampum was the currency of choice at Aptucxet
in the 17th century

Interior of the Aptucxet Trading Post

The Aprucxet Trading Post is a replica of the building erected in 1627 by Plymouth Colony in what is now the town of Bourne.  It was built for trade with the native Wampanoag people and with traders from the Dutch colony in what is now New York state.  The building was contructed according to descriptions in journals and archaeological digs in the area.  The building is situated on the Cape Cod Canal, but in the 1600s this was the banks of the Manomet River.  

The interior of this two room structure replicates the trading post.  There are also displays about the Wampanoag people from this area, and information about wampum, which was the trade item of choice between the Dutch, English and Wampanoag.  They also traded items for corn, beans, fur, and other items for survival and to repay debts to the English companies that financed the Plymouth Colony.  The colonists also operated the Cushnoc Trading Post in what is now the town of Augusta, Maine.  Several of my Mayflower ancestors were instrumental in establishing this trading post - Myles Standish, Isaac Allerton, and John Howland.  

Provincetown, Massachusetts

We ate lunch here, of course!

A Mayflower window over the door of the Mayflower Cafe

Next our tour took us to the tip of Cape Cod, the town of Provincetown, Massachusetts.  This is where the Mayflower made landfall after 66 days at sea.  The ship moored in Provincetown Harbor after failing to navigate the shoals off Cape Cod.  The passengers wrote and signed the Mayflower Compact here, establishing a New England settlement and forming a civil union while they waited for a new patent (permission to settle outside of the original plan near the Hudson River).  

We had time to explore Provincetown and have lunch, before boarding a trolley for a short tour.  The tour gave us a great history of the town, and some of the neighborhoods built over the last 400 years.  I especially liked learning about the fishermens' homes that were floated off the sandbars to line the streets near the harbor.  We had a chance to view the harbor with its breakwater and lighthouse.  Except for a few buildings, it probably looked like it did back in 1620.  

Our tour took us to view the Pilgrim Monument.  This 252 foot tower was dedicated in 1910 to honor the Pilgrims' landing in Provincetown.  It is visible from Plymouth (on a clear day) and from all over Cape Cod.  Years ago Vincent and I climbed to the top, all 116 steps and 60 ramps.  This time we did not climb!  Trivia fact:  President Teddy Roosevelt laid the cornerstone in 1907, and President Taft led the dedication ceremony three years later. There is a museum at the base of the tower, too.  When you are in Provincetown, just look behind the town hall for the funicular to the top of the hill where the tower is lcated. 

The Mayflower Compact was signed here in Provincetown Harbor

The Pilgrim Monument in Provincetown

Corn Hill Monument, at Corn Hill Beach
in Truro, Massachusetts

The inscription at Corn Hill monument

After visiting Provincetown, we went to Corn Hill Beach in Truro, Massachusetts.  This is a lovely beach, considered one of the nicest beaches on Cape Cod.  At the public parking lot you will find this little fenced in enclosure with a marker acknowledging the place where the Pilgrim explorers found a cache of Indian corn in November 1620.  According to Bradford's journal, they did not know if they should steal the corn, but decided to take it because they were starving after the long voyage from England.  This is a controversial part of the Pilgrim story.  Not only because of the theft of the seed corn, but also because the corn was NOT FOUND IN THIS SPOT!

The actual spot where the corn was found is up the hill on private property.  The road to this hill is a private road.  So the first monument (photograph above) is as close as possible to the real spot.  However there is a very small marker on the actual spot, owned by the General Society of Mayflower Descendants who maintain a right of way.  Since we were all members, we took tools to clear out, weed, and visit the monument! 

Tools for maintaining the "real"
Corn Hill marker

Yours truly at the site of the actual corn cache found
on Corn Hill.  It is hidden behind overgrown vegetation. 

The small Corn Hill Marker before clearing the vegetation

The stone is now visible due to everyone helping
to clear the weeds, branches and vegetation. 

Vincent and I hard at work clearing Corn Hill

The monument at the very windy
First Encounter Beach, Eastham, MA

The First Encounter marker

First Encounter Beach

After Corn Hill we went to see First Encounter Beach.  This is the site of another controversial event between the Nauset people and the Mayflower passengers.  The Nauset members of the Wampanoag nation were very wary of the new English men who had arrived in 1620 because several years earlier some of their tribe members had been kidnapped and taken as slaves to Europe (including Tisquantum "Squanto").  When the Pilgrims and the native people met on this beach, arrows and bullets flew but no one was hurt.  The Nauset retreated and the English went back to the Mayflower.  Fortunately, by the spring of 1621 the relations between the two groups improved. 

We were here at First Encounter Beach on a very windy day.  The tide was low, and there were few visitors even though this beach, like Corn Hill Beach, is a very popular site for swimming and boating. It was easy to imagine how it looked in 1620.  

Cove Burying Ground, Eastham, Massachusetts 

The gravesite of Mayflower passenger Constance Hopkins Snow
died 1677 Eastham, Massachusetts

The gravesite of Giles Hopkins, Mayflower passenger,
died 1690 Eastham, Massachusetts 

The gravesite of Joseph Rogers, Mayflower passenger,
died 1673 in Eastham, Massachusetts

While we were in Eastham, we also stopped at the Cove Burying Ground, where three Mayflower passengers are buried.  This cemetery dates to 1646.  There are no 17th century markers surviving, but descendants of the passenger interred here have placed memorials.  See the link below for a listing of burials here, including the Mayflower passengers Constance Hopkins Snow, Giles Hopkins, and Joseph Rogers.  

The National Monument to the Forefathers
Plymouth, Massachusetts

A detail on the monument showing the Mayflower Compact

One of the panels on the monument lists the Mayflower passengers

Our last stop for the day was the National Monument to the Forefathers, on Allerton Street in Plymouth, Massachusetts.  This is a solid granite monument standing 81 feet tall.  It was erected by the Pilgrim Society, and dedicated in 1889.  It was deeded to the Massachusetts government, and the monument and Plymouth Rock are both part of Pilgrim Memorial State Park.  It is not a federal or national park. 

It was nice to visit this monument near sunset.  The most popular part of the monument with our tour group was the panel listing the Mayflower passengers.  Everyone wanted to find the name of their ancestor or ancestors!

For the truly curious:

The Aptucxet Trading Post:   https://www.bournehistoricalsociety.org/aptucxet-museum/   

Provincetown, Massachusett Tourism:  https://ptowntourism.com/   

The Pilgrim Monument in Provincetown:   https://www.pilgrim-monument.org/   

Corn Hill Beach, Truro, Massachusetts:  https://www.truro-ma.gov/beach-office/pages/corn-hill-beach  

The two Corn Hill plaques (markers):   http://www.cornhillcottages.org/Cottage10/Corn_Hill_Cottage_10/History.html  

First Encounter Beach, Eastham, Massachusetts:   http://www.capecodgravestones.com/easthampixweb/firenccove.html  

Cove Burying Ground, Eastham, Massachusetts:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cove_Burying_Ground  

A listing of burials at the Cove Burying Ground:   http://www.capecodgravestones.com/easthamcove.html  

National Monument to the Forefathers:   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Monument_to_the_Forefathers  

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To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Day Three of the "Path of the Pilgrims" Tour by the GSMD", Nutfield Genealogy, posted July 25, 2022, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2022/07/day-three-of-path-of-pilgrims-tour-by.html: accessed [access date]).  

Surname Saturday ~ OSBORN of Cape Cod and Boston

OSBORN


The Eastham, Massachusetts Windmill

In 1737 Reverend Samuel Osborn deposed that he was educated in Glasgow, Scotland and came to Massachusetts through Ireland, and graduated from the University of Dublin.  His origins are still unknown.  He was teaching school at Sandwich, Massachusetts, and preached a few times at Plymouth when he was invited in 1717 to Eastham, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod, as minister.  Another local minister, Nathaniel Stone, was opposed to ordaining Osborn. 

Nathaniel Stone spent twenty years trying to unseat Samuel Osborn from his church at Eastham.  As Osborn’s church grew bigger, Stone’s shrunk in members.  He inveigled some illiterate Cape Codders church to sign papers against Osborn, but when they were questioned by a church council they either admitted they did not want Osborn to leave or admitted they had never even met him. Stone tried other unethical tactics to defame Osborn, but they all backfired. Osborn’s parishioners loved him, and didn't want him to leave.

Finally, as many of the ministers and deacons who originally appointed and ordained Osborn died off, Stone’s complaints found some sympathetic ears. Another church council met to hear the old charges against Osborn.  One serious charge was that he fathered an illegitimate child. Another serious charge was that he was “venting erroneous doctrines”.  Some theologians believe that Osborn was an early Unitarian, and that his Arminian beliefs were too unorthodox for the Cape Cod community.  He was removed from his ministry in 1738.

Samuel Osborn went to Boston, remarried, and taught school for many years. By 1800 Reverend Nathaniel Stone’s own church became Unitarian. I descend from Reverend Osborn’s illegitimate son.

My Osborn Genealogy:

Generation 1: Reverend Samuel Osborn, probably born in Ireland about 1690 and died in 1774 Boston, Massachusetts; married on 1 January 1710 to Jedidah Smith, daughter of Benjamin Smith and Jedidah Mayhew.  Six children.  He was married second on 19 October 1743 in Boston to Experience Scudder.  No children.  He had an illegitimate son with Mercy Norton, and the child was named Samuel Osborn (see below)

Generation 2: Samuel Osborn, born 1711 at Edgartown, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, died after 8 October 1753; married on 9 September 1731 in Edgartown to Keziah Butler, born about 1710 in Edgartown and died in October 1768 in Edgartown.  Ten Children.  Keziah remarried to Samuel Pease in 1752.

Generation 3: Samuel Osborn, born about 1732 in Edgartown, died in Nova Scotia; married on 28 April 1755 to Sarah Wass, daughter of Wilmot Wass and Rebecca Allen, born 24 January 1738 in West Tisbury, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, died about 1813 in Nova Scotia.  Five children.

Generation 4. Sarah Osborn, born 22 July 1760 in Fredricton, New Brunswick, died on 15 July 1848 in Pleasant Valley, Cornwallis County, Nova Scotia; married on 24 November 1774 in New Brunswick to Charles Skinner, son of Aaron Skinner and Eunice Taintor, born 3 January 1748 in Colchester, Connecticut, died before 1837 in Nova Scotia.  Fifteen children.  

Generation 5: Ann Skinner m. Thoams Ratchford Lyons
Generation 6: Isabella Lyons m. Ingraham Ebenezer Bill
Generation 7: Caleb Rand Bill m. Ann Margaret Bollman
Generation 8: Isabella Lyons Bill m. Albert Munroe Wilkinson
Generation 9: Donald Munroe Wilkinson m. Bertha Louise Roberts (my grandparents)

Another blog post about the Osborns:

Sarah Osborn Skinner 1760 – 1848

http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2011/08/amanuensis-monday-sarah-osborn-skinner.html

Two good journal articles about the Reverend Samuel Osborn controversy:

“Ungodly Carriages on Cape Cod: by Gustavus Swift Paine, The New England Quarterly, Volume 25, Number 25, (June 1952), pages 181 to 198.   Available to read online at this link:

http://people.brandeis.edu/~dkew/David/Swift-Cape_carriages-1952.pdf

“A Caution to Erring Christians: Ecclesiastical Disorder on Cape Cod, 1717 to 1738” by J. M. Bumsted, The William and Mary Quarterly, 3^rd Series, Volume 28, Number 3 (July 1971) pages 413 – 438.

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The URL for this post is

http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/11/surname-saturday-osborn-of-cape-cod-and.html 

Copyright © 2013, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Tombstone Tuesday ~ Two Mayflower Passengers

These gravestones were photographed at the Cove Cemetery, in Eastham, Massachusetts (on Cape Cod).

This sign states that there are three Mayflower Passengers buried here at the Cove Cemetery.  We missed the stone of Constance Hopkins, so I haven't a third photograph to show you. 

LIEUT. JOSEPH ROGERS

1607 - 1678

MAYFLOWER PASSENGER

COMMISIONED PLYMOUTH

COLONY MILITIA 1647

PLACED BY HIS DESCENDANTS

1966

GILES HOPKINS

1607 - 1690

MAYFLOWER PASSENGER

PLACED BY HIS DESCENDANTS

1964

The link to an image of the gravestone of Constance Hopkins Snow (wife of Nicholas Snow) at FindAGrave.com  http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=8634  For some reason we couldn't find Constance (but we probably walked right past her!).

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Copyright 2012, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Tombstone Tuesday ~ Captain Jonathan Sparrow

Sorry, this is not Captain Jack Sparrow of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.

These gravestones were photographed at the 

Cove Burial Ground, Eastham, Massachusetts on Cape Cod. 

HERE LYES BURIED

YE BODY OF CAPT

JONATHAN SPROW

AGED 73 YEARS

DIED MARCH YE 21ST

1706/7

HERE RUSTS THE DUST

OF

RICHARD SPARROW

AND HIS WIFE

PANDORA

WHO CAME FROM KENT COUNTY ENGLAND

ABOUT 1633 AND SETTLED IN PLYMOUTH

ABOUT 1650 THEY CAME TO EASTHAM

AND SETTLED NEAR THIS PLACE

WHERE HE DIED JANUARY 8, 1660

HERE ALSO RESTS

JONATHAN SPARROW

ONLY CHILD OF RICHARD

TOGETHER WITH HIS FIRST TWO WIVES

REBECCA BANGS & HANNAH PRINCE

SETTLED IN THE PART OF EASTHAM

NOW EAST ORLEANS WHERE

AFTER FILLING MANY OFFICES OF HONOR

AND TRUST IN BOTH CHURCH AND STATE

HE DIED MARCH 21, 1706 AGED 73 YEARS

IN MEMORY OF

THESE EARLY SETTLERS OF OUR COUNTRY

WE THEIR DESCENDANTS HAVE ERECTED

THIS TABLET IN THIS CENTENNIAL YEAR

OF OUR AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE A.D. 1876

The slate on this stone
has begun to split, but it looks like
it was repaired with resin

Captain Jonathan Sparrow married Rebecca Bangs on 26 October 1654.  She was the sister to my 8x great grandfather Jonathan Bangs (1644 - 1728).  His other wife, Hannah Prince/Prence, was the granddaughter of William Brewster (1566/7 - 1644), a passenger on the Mayflower.  

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Copyright 2012, Heather Wilkinson Rojo