A Traitor in my Family Tree?

Boston Massacre

On this date, 22 February, in 1770 a mob had gathered outside of Theophilus Lillie’s shop in Boston to protest his importation of British goods. This was during the “Intolerable Acts” when the folks in Boston decided to stop drinking tea and buying British goods, rather than pay the intolerable taxes on imported goods.  While reading about this incident in history, I was struck by the name of the shopkeeper and (thank you internet!)  I was researching his genealogy to find a link to my LILLIE ancestors of Reading, Massachusetts.  I wasn’t finding any links.

As I read further, I learned that the man who lived next door to the shop in the story was named Ebenezer Richardson.  He tried to disperse the crowd by firing bird shot into the crowd, which was mostly young boys and teenagers.  One teen was injured, and a 10 year old German boy named Christopher Sneider was killed.  Again, being a genealogist, I stopped at the name of Ebenezer Richardson.  I had a long line of Ebenezer Richardsons in my family tree, from the town of Woburn outside of Boston. It only took me a minute to confirm that one of these cousins in my tree was the same Ebenezer Richardson whose shot out his bedroom window foreshadowed the Boston Massacre, which took place soon after on 5 March 1770. 

Who was Ebenezer Richardson?  Well, it turns out that his hot temper which led to this incident was not the first time he had displayed tawdry behavior.   In 1752 his wife’s sister gave birth to his child.  He married his own sister-in-law in Boston in January 1754 (his wife didn’t die until 1782).   

Ebenezer Richardson, upon fleeing Woburn, went to work for the British as an informer in Boston.  When he was found out, the British made him a Boston customs officer. His job was to collect the new  taxes from the hated Stamp Act and Townshend Acts. 

After the little Sneider boy died,  two thousand people attended his funeral.  On 20 April 1770 Richardson was found guilty of murder by a Boston jury. I’m not surprised- he was a very unpopular figure in Boston and rumored to be tarred and feathered.  The British judges thought the sentence unfair and didn’t sentence him to hang, and London sent a pardon.  The British also found him a new job in 1773 in Philadelphia.  But the good folks of Boston “informed” on Richardson and told the people of Philadelphia his story, including the scandal with his second wife.  He fled to London.

No more is known of Ebenezer Richardson.  Did he die in London?  Change his name?

Ebenezer Richardson, son of Timothy Richardson and Abigail Johnson, was born on 31 March 1718 in Woburn, Massachusetts.  He married first to Rebecca Fowle about 1740.  She was the widow of Phineas Richardson (she was the second cousin once removed of Phineas, and the second cousin twice removed of Ebenezer).   He married second to Kezia Fowle, sister to Rebecca and widow of Thomas Henshaw.   I have no further information on Kezia, and Rebecca died on 6 November 1782 in Woburn, long after the scandal.

The two Fowle sisters, Rebecca and Kezia, are my 1^st cousins 8 generations removed.  Their parents, John Fowle and Elizabeth Prescott are my 8^th great uncle and aunt.  John’s parents, James Fowle (1643 – 1690) and Abigail Carter (1648 – 1718) are my 8^th great grandparents.

Ebenezer Richardson is further removed from me.  He is my 3^rd cousin, 8 generations removed.  His great grandparents, John Richardson and Elizabeth Bacon, are my 9^th great uncle and aunt. His 2x great grandparents, Samuel Richardson (1602 – 1658) and Joanna Thake (1606 – 1666), are my 9^th great grandparents.  Interestingly, Elizabeth (Bacon) Richardson’s grandparents, Michael Bacon (1579 – 1648) and Alice Blower (1681 – 1648), are my 11^th great grandparents.

For more about this story:

Don't miss Part Two of this blog post:
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2018/02/a-traitor-in-my-family-tree-yes-part-two.html

The Richardson Memorial: Comprising a Full History and Genealogy of the Posterity of these Three Brothers, Ezekiel, Samuel and Thomas Richardson, by John Adams Vinton, 1876, pages 242-244, page 265.

J.L. Bell, “Ebenezer Richardson Custom’s Informer”, Boston 1775, posted May 22, 2006, (http://boston1775.blogspot.com/2006/05/ebenezer-richardson-customs-informer.html: accessed 22 February 2018).

J. L. Bell, “Ebenezer Richardson as Cause of the American Revolution”, Boston 1775, posted April 9, 2015, (http://boston1775.blogspot.com/2015/04/ebenezer-richardson-as-cause-of.html: accessed 22 February 2018).

My RICHARDSON "Surname Saturday" post:
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/01/surname-saturday-richardson-of-woburn.html

My FOWLE "Surname Saturday" post:
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2012/12/surname-saturday-fowle-of-charlestown.html


The image above is from Paul Revere of Boston. The print was copied by Revere from a design by Henry Pelham for an engraving eventually published under the title "The Fruits of Arbitrary Power, or the Bloody Massacre," of which only two impressions could be located by Brigham. Revere's print appeared on or about March 28, 1770. - http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/ppmsc.00174, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4415919

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To Cite/Link to this post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, “A Traitor in my Family Tree?”, Nutfield Genealogy, posted February 22, 2018, (  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2018/02/a-traitor-in-my-family-tree.html: accessed [access date]). 

Surname Saturday ~ LAMBERT of Boston

LAMBERT / LOMBARD / LAMPORT / LAMPERT / LUMBARD

Lambert family, probably of Boston, is one of my biggest brickwall mysteries in my family tree.  My 5^th great grandmother, Elizabeth Lambert (about 1775 – 1834) was described as a Boston debutante by her grandson, Governor John Owen Dominis of Hawaii.  However, I am unable to find out anything about her LAMBERT family except for one tantalizing clue.  She had a possible sister, Sarah, who married a John DARKE/DARGUE in 1796.   Elizabeth named her eldest daughter, Sarah Dargue Jones (about 1794 – 1875) after this sister. 

Elizabeth and Sarah Lambert would have been born in Boston around the time of the Boston military occupation by British troops prior to 1775. They probably were not even born in Boston at all.  Civilians fled Boston during the occupation.  In 1768 the British had deployed two regiments, or 2,000 soldiers, to restore order.   A fleet of British war ships crowded the harbor, which was closed.  Then, in 1775, the British retreated from the battles of Lexington and Concord to Boston, which was held under Seige by militas and the Continental Army.  Most civilians fled, or at least sent their wives and children out of the city.  Most of those left behind were Loyalists.  If the Lamberts were here before or during the military occupation and the Seige, where did they go during the conflict?  This might be where Elizabeth and Sarah were born, or where their parents married. 

Bostonians reclaimed Boston after “Evacuation Day” on 17 March 1775 when the British fleet departed Boston Harbor with troops and Loyalists aboard.   Citizens returned to Boston to rebuild the city, which had been ransacked.   The population of Boston in 1765 had been about 15,000 people.   The number of people in Boston fell by 2/3 during the 1770s to a low of less than 6,000. 

In 1793 Elizabeth Lambert married Owen Jones, the son of a British customs official.  Were they loyalists? I have no proof one way or another.  They had eight children, six daughters who all married well, and two sons who died young.  One son died as a young child, the other died unmarried at sea.  My Lambert lineage daughters out, and my 4^th great grandmother was Catherine Plummer Jones (1799 – 1828) who also died young after giving five children to her mariner husband, Levi Younger, of Gloucester.

The Lamberts and the Joneses lived in Boston’s North End neighborhood.   Owen Jones lived on Ship Street,  Hanover Street, and Tileston Street.   Records were found in the New North North church and at the 2^nd Baptist Church. 

Interestingly, Elizabeth (Lambert) Jones’s obituary was carried in the Nantucket Inquirer on 11 February 1834.  Did she have relatives on the island of Nantucket?  

Unfortunately, It is difficult to find vital records or any other type of information on Boston families during and before the Revolutionary War.  And LAMBERT and all its spelling variations were very common.  There were many LAMBERT families in Boston and other parts of Massachusetts.  I have had some luck searching church records, newspapers, and other sources. 

If anyone has a clue as to the identity of this LAMBERT family, please leave a comment or email vrojomit@gmail.com

My LAMBERT genealogy:

Generation 1:   Unknown Lambert; married and had two daughter (probably more children)  1.) Elizabeth 2.) Sarah Lambert born about 1776 and died 3 September 1796, married on 1 Dec 1793 to John Darke/Dargue

Generation 2:  Elizabeth Lambert, born about 1775, died 6 February 1834 in Boston; married on 11 May 1793 at the 2^nd Baptist Church, Boston, Massachusetts to Owen Jones, son of Owen Jones and Ann Unknown.  He was born about 1678 in Wales, and died 22 April 2850 in Dorchester, Massachusetts.  Eight children.

Generation 3:  Catherine Plummer Jones, born about 1799, died 2 May 1828; married on 23 October 1816 in Gloucester, Massachusetts to Levi Younger as his first wife.  He also married Jane Unknown, who died 26 November 1845 in Boston;  and Margaret Unknown, who died 21 February 1895. Five chidren.

Generation 4:  Mary Esther Younger, born 17 Feb 1826 and died 7 January 1913 in Boston.  Eight children.

Generation 5:  Mary Katharine Emerson m. George E. Batchelder

Generation 6:  Carrie Maude Batchelder m. Joseph Elmer Allen

Generation 7:  Stanley Elmer Allen m. Gertrude Matilda Hitchings (my grandparents)

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Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Surname Saturday ~  LAMBERT of Boston", Nutfield Genealogy, posted January 21, 2017,  ( http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/01/surname-saturday-lambert-of-boston.html: accessed [access date]).  

Tombstone Tuesday ~ Jean HOLLAND, died 1768 in Londonderry (now Derry), New Hampshire

This tombstone was photographed at the Forest Hill Cemetery in Derry, New Hampshire.

HERE LYES THE BODY

OF JEAN HOLLAND

DAUGHTER TO STEPH^N

HOLLAND AND

JEAN HOLLAND DE-

PARTED THIS LIFE JANRY

10^TH 1768 AGED 7 MONTHS

7 DAYS

Stephen Holland was born about 1733 in Coleraine, Northern Ireland.  He was a member of Roger’s Rangers and was wounded at the battle of Fort William Henry and wounded again at the battle of Quebec.  He received a pension for her service and wounds, and removed to Londonderry and lived on a plot of land in East Derry across from the present day First Parish Church.  Colonel Holland opened a tavern here.

He married Jane/Jean Stinson around 1751 and they had nine children live to adulthood.  Jane/Jean is the only one buried in Derry (then known as Londonderry, New Hampshire). 

In 1773 the town of Londonderry proclaimed allegiance to Governor Wentworth, an appointed Royal Governor during the midst of pre Revolutionary War unrest. Holland was suspected of being the author of this proclamation. When the town of Londonderry called a town meeting to send delegates to the Exeter Congress that same year, Holland, as Justice of the Peace, ordered the meeting closed.  Holland was a very unpopular man while the rest of Londonderry’s inhabitants were patriots. Some suspected that Holland was a British spy.

To save face Holland stood up at a town meeting in 1775 and proclaimed his allegiance to the patriot cause.  The men at the meeting voted they were “satisfactory for his conduct” and a month later they elected him as moderator in place of the usual moderator, Matthew Thornton, who was at the Provincial Congress.  On June 18, 1775 Holland secretly went to the seacoast to recruit a militia of 200 men to assist the British.  He even signed the Association Test in 1776, which swore allegiance to George Washington.  He had fooled the town one more time!

Later, in 1778, he was found out and his property was confiscated and sold by the Committee of Safety.  On the same day the following other men were banished, too:  Richard Holland, John Davidson, James Fulton, Thomas Smith, and Dennis O’Hala.   There was a Captain Stephen Holland in the Prince of Wale’s American Volunteers in 1782.  His final burial place is unknown (and probably not in the Derry or Londonderry area!) 

You can read more about Colonel Stephen Holland “Spy Master” at this link to an article written by Richard Holmes, the Derry Town Historian:  http://www.londonderrynh.net/2014/08/stephen-holland-spy-master/75199

The recantation of Stephen Holland:  http://amarch.lib.niu.edu/islandora/object/niu-amarch%3A83278

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Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Tombstone Tuesday ~ Jean HOLLAND, died 1768 in Londonderry (now Derry), New Hampshire", Nutfield Genealogy, posted  July 26, 2016, (  http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/07/tombstone-tuesday-jean-holland-died.html: accessed [access date]).  

A Door with History

This door is located at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

in the new American Wing

Nathaniel Sparhawk was born about 1717 in Boston and he

married Elizabeth Pepperell on 1 May 1742 in Kittery, Maine.  

His great aunt, Anna Sparhawk (1623 - about 1717) married 

James Convers, my 8th great grandfather, as his second wife. 

"Doorway from the

Sparhawk house

Maine (Kittery), about 1742

Painted wood, glass

This doorway comes from one of the grandest 

eighteenth-century houses in Kittery, Maine, on

the New Hampshire border.  The house was

owned by Nathaniel Sparhawk, whose portrait

by John Singleton Copley is on view in gallery 128"

a close up of the door knocker

This house at Kittery, Maine was known locally as Sparhawk Hall.  It was built in 1742 (one year after Nathaniel Sparhawk's marriage) as a wedding gift from his father-in-law, Sir William Pepperell.  Nathaniel Sparhawk was a wealthy merchant.  His portrait by Copley is one of the artist's few life sized paintings.  In 1758 Sparhawk had to declare bankruptcy, and his property was auctioned, except for this house.  When his wealthy father-in-law died, he was not named in the will.  His wife inherited in her own name.  This was all lost after the American Revolution because the Sparhawks and Pepperells remained loyalists and everything was confiscated by the new government.

The Lady Pepperell House and Sparhawk Hall were famous homes in Kittery, from the same family.  The Sparhawk house was used in movies and hosted politicians during the Portsmouth Treaty in 1905.  Sparhawk Hall was finally demolished in 1967, and the door was donated to Strawberry Banke Museum.  The interior woodwork was sold off and installed in a private home in Winthrop, Maine.  You can still find Sparhawk Lane in Kittery, near where the home once stood.

Click here to see photos of the Sparhawk Mansion before its demolition:
http://www.seacoastnh.com/Places-%26-Events/Historic-Portsmouth/Sparhawk-Mansion-on-Death-Row/


Museum of Fine Arts, Boston  http://www.mfa.org/

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The URL for this post is
http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/10/a-door-with-history.html

Copyright 2013, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Surname Saturday ~ Lyons, Loyalists from Connecticut to Nova Scotia?

Isabella Lyons (1806 - 1872)
wife of Rev. I. E. Bill

LYONS

This is another brickwall line, and I was reluctant to post it as a Surname Saturday name until I realized that someone out there in cyber space may have the answer to my lineage problems.  So here is the story…

My line begins with David Lyons.   He appears in Nova Scotia records for the first time when he purchased land from Thomas M. Beckwith near the Pereau River on 6 April 1803.   He appears in the 1790 Federal Census of Stratford, Connecticut.   According to an article in Connecticut Ancestry “Connecticut Loyalists Who Went to Canada” 1974, Volume 17, No. 2, a “Daniel Lyon” was granted land in Canning, Nova Scotia.  Is this the same man?

On 25 May 1779 in Cornwallis, Kings County, Nova Scotia David Lyons married Elizabeth Ratchford, the daughter of Thomas Ratchford and Desire Gore, other new Nova Scotia planters from New England.  I know little else about Thomas and Elizabeth. David Lyons and his family are listed in the Cornwallis Township book, which gives the names and some dates for the twelve children’s births.

My line continues through their son, Thomas Ratchford Lyons, who married twice. His first wife, and my 4^th great grandmother, was Ann Skinner.  She gave him seven children.  I only know a little about this generation from vital records in the Cornwallis Township Book and from a journal written by a son-in-law.  Their daughter, Isabella Lyons, married the Reverend Ingraham Ebenezer Bill, who wrote extensively about his life, his family and his conversion to the Baptist faith.  There is also some information about the Lyons family in the family sketches chapters of The History of King’s County, Nova Scotia by Arthur Wentworth Hamilton Eaton, 1910 (available to read online at archive.org at this link http://archive.org/details/historykingscou00eatogoog ).

Other LYONS researchers have uncovered information about a Patrick Lyons in Nova Scotia.  This Patrick Lyons lived previously in Connecticut, where he witnessed a will.  Patrick Lyons left a will mentioning his father’s burial in County Monaghan, Ireland, and a brother Edmund in Castleblaney.  Could he be the father, brother or kinsman of David Lyons? Was the family of Irish descent?  Were they Loyalists?

My LYONS lineage:

Generation 1:  Patrick Lyons?

Generation 2: David Lyons, born about 1759 in Connecticut? Died May 1812 in Cornwallis, Nova Scotia; married on 25 May 1779 in Cornwallis to Elizabeth Ratchford, daughter of Thomas Ratchford and Desire Gore.  She was born about 1764 and died on 18 March 1845 in Nova Scotia.

Generation 3: Thomas Ratchford Lyons, born 3 March 1780 in Cornwallis, died 1859 in Sackville, Nova Scotia; married first on 30 September 1802 in Cornwallis to Ann Skinner, daughter of Charles Skinner and Sarah Osborn.  She was born 9 March 1786 in Cornwallis and died 19 October 1815 in Cornwallis.  He married second to Anne Griffin.

Generation 3: Isabella Lyons, born 28 January 1806 in Cornwallis, died April 1872 in Carleton, New Brunswick; she married on 20 April 1826 in Cornwallis to Reverend Ingraham Ebenezer Bill, son of Asahel Bill and Mary Rand.  He was born on 19 February 1805 in Billtown, Cornwallis and died 4 August 1891 in St. Martin’s, New Brunswick.

Generation 4: Caleb Rand Bill m. Ann Margaret Bollman

Generation 5: Isabella Lyons Bill m. Albert Munroe Wilkinson

Generation 6: Donald Munroe Wilkinson m. Bertha Louise Roberts (my grandparents)

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Copyright 2013, Heather Wilkinson Rojo