Holbrook line: John Trumbull, Immigrant 1612-1657

John Trumbull seems to be more of a mystery than I had thought.  I have his birth information, and his parentage back for three generations.  Or so I thought.  Robert Charles Anderson, of "The Great Migration" series, seems to think that there were two John Trumble or Trumbulls, one in Cambridge-Charlestown, and one who went to Rowley.  Our target is the man who went to Rowley. 

So, we don't know who John's parents are, or where they were from, although the majority of the England births in the supposed time period for James that I could find were from either Yorkshire or Northumberland counties in England. The James Trumble who is frequent given as John's father was a kielsman, or someone who worked on freighters and lighters, small ships that worked around the docks.  It was a low status, low paying job, and it seems to some that he would not have had the means to send his son to school for several years. 

Our John Trumbull or Trumble surely had some education, for he was the first school teacher in Rowley, Massachusetts, where he was situated by 1639.  His wife was Ellen or Elinor Chandler, believed to be the daughter of John Chandler and Ann Swan, and they married July 7, 1635 at Newcastle upon Tyne, Northumberland, England. She emigrated with her husband John and their first son John, but we don't know exactly when.  

As indicated, John was a school teacher.  He was made a freeman May 13, 1640.  He was also town clerk from 1654-1656, (meaning, among other things, that his penmanship was decent) and a selectman from 1652 to 1654.  By trade he was a cooper.  He was also a deacon in the church.  

John and Elinor had six children together.  Elinor died before August of 1650, when John married Ann, the widow of Michael Hopkinson, and they had two more children, besides at least three of Ann's.  It would have been a bustling household!

John's estate is rather interesting. There seems to have not been a will, so the court decided how the money should be divided.   It shows that Ann's children, and Ann and John's children, mostly received more money than John and Elinor's children did.  For instance, Jonathan Hopkinson received 25 pounds, while John, the firstborn of John and Elinor, received 15 pounds.  The other children from that marriage received 8 pounds each.  55 pounds was allowed to the widow.  It would be interesting to understand the reasoning process in deciding who got what, for typically a wife would receive one third of the estate, particularly if she still had children to raise.  Ann got about one quarter of the estate's value.   

The estate was valued at almost 226 pounds, minus debts of about five pounds.  He had at least eight plots of land, including house, garden and orchards, several farm animals, over a pounds worth of books, a halberd, two swords, and a pair of bandoliers, a fowling piece, but just one bed with some additional bedding.  The weapons were likely a requirement of all able bodied men.  We don't know how able bodied John was toward the end of his life.  If he was born about 1612, then he died about 45 years old, on March 16, 1657.  I wonder what else he had hoped to accomplish with his life. 

So we have some idea of John's life in New England, but almost none of his life in England.  Perhaps someone is working right now to determine which John Trumbull is likely to be ours.  It would be nice to know!

Our line of descent is:

John Trumbull-Elinor Chandler
Joseph Trumbull-Hannah Smith
John Trumbull-Elizabeth Winchell
Hannah Trumbull-Medad Pomeroy
Medad Pomeroy-Eunice Southwell
Eunice Pomeroy-Libbeus Stanard
Libbeus Stanard-Luceba Fay
Hiram Stanard-Susan Eddy
Louis Stanard-Mary Alice Hetrick
Etta Stanard-Loren Holbrook
Gladys Holbrook-Richard Allen
Their descendants