Holbrook line: William White, Immigrant (but not on the Mayflower)

I've wanted to write about William White for a long time.  Well, actually, I've wanted to learn about him for a long time.  I knew he was not the William White of the Mayflower, and that's about all I was sure of.  Today I found a very well written and referenced profile of him on WikiTree and I'm going to borrow from it rather shamelessly, in order to provide a brief sketch of this most interesting ancestor.   Any errors of course are mine. 

William White is a most interesting man.  We don't know when or where he is born but conjecture is that he may have been the William White who was born about June 8, 1604 in Derbyshire, England.  Both the date and the location make sense based on his marriage date and on his future occupation(s), but the first date that we really can say "this is probably our William White is his marriage to Elizabeth Jackson in 1629 at St. Gregory but St Paul's in London, England.  This would put WIlliam at 25 years of age, and also puts him in London, where he apparently lived from his marriage until his emigration to England. 

William and Elizabeth's first three children, Elizabeth, William, and Margaret were born in London.  Margaret was born in 1635 and Ursula was born in Providence, Rhode Island in 1639 so the family must have emigrated between 1635 and 1639.  I would tend to think it was earlier because most families didn't travel directly to Providence, but were in Massachusetts at first.  There is a possibility that the family, or at least William, went back to England because he is again noted in 1645, as having emigrated to Massachusetts in the company of Dr. Robert Child who had recruited him to work in the New England Iron Works for five shillings a day. 

William was not a common laborer, however.  He seems to have had special skills and knowledge because Samuel Hartlibs "Ephemerides in 1643 says "?Mr. White has amongst many other things invented a new kind of Furnace which will save charges and coales.  William White's "Catalogue of Inventions reveals him to have been involved in an exceptionally wide range of activities and to have been actively thinking about involvement in colonization. 

William was employed at the Saugus Ironworks from 1646-1648 but was not a model employee.  He was fined four pounds for selling beer without a license.  (It was about this time that his daughter Elizabeth married Benjamin Herendeen, an ironworker, and may have had cause to regret it, as he was found guilty of beating his wife.)  Perhaps the family was somewhat dysfunctional.

Next we find William White, and presumably his family, leaving Boston, where he had lived, and going to Bermuda to help a Bermudian merchant, William Berkeley, salvage a sunken Spanish treasure ship.  (The term 'Bermudian merchant' may imply that Berkeley was involved in the slave trade in one way or another.)  William supported himself and his family by repairing stills the Bermudians used for making liquor, as well as by fishing aand gardening.

Trouble developed between the White family and William Berkeley.  In 1654, one daughter, Margaret, charged that Berkeley had raped her.  Margaret had been a servant in Berkeley's home.  Another daughter, Ursula, said that he had given her a shilling and tried to get her into his bed.  Berkeley supposedly retaliated by accusing Elizabeth, William's wife, of putting a spell on his cattle, and accusing William of saying "the devil take them".  Both charges implied witchcraft, at a time when this was a serious charge.

It was time for the Whites to end their efforts in Bermuda and go back to New England.  He stopped first in Warwick, R.I., having underestimated the time it would take him to join John Winthrop Jr in Pequot.  He had intended to work for Winthrop in his "major alchemical/industrial enteerprise that he was planning on Fishers Island near New Haven.

William was granted land at Pawtucket in 1656, next to his son in law Benjamin Hearndon/Herendeen, and later was granted meadowlands.  It appears that he had at least something to do with a bridge that was at Weybosset.  He sold this land to Hearndon and went back to Boston, where he was described as a bricklayer.  William signed his will October 13, 1673, and he had died by December 30 of that year.  The inventory, found on American Ancestors, (Suffolk County #676) is difficult to make out but it clearly is more than just a typical household inventory.  One item alone is valued at 1000 pounds.  Since much of this appears to do with his industrial/alchemical business, one wonders who actually bought the equipment and what the family actually received as proceeds.

There is more to William's story than I have been able to write in this short sketch, but I hope it shows us that not everyone came to New England and farmed or fished.  Some helped build the industrial complexes of the day.  Some spent time on Bermuda, or Barbados, or other islands.  Some were truly interesting, even if they weren't famous.  Such was William White.

The line of descent is

William White-Elizabeth Jackson
Elizabeth White-Benjamin Hearnden
Alice Hearnden-Daniel Brown
Hosanna Brown-Mary Hawkins
Othniel Brown-Deborah Brown
Sarah Brown-Enos Eddy
Enos Eddy-Deborah Paine
Joseph Brown Eddy-Susan Lamphire
Susan Eddy-Hiram Stanard
Louis Stanard-Mary Alice Hetrick
Etta Stanard-Loren Holbrook
Gladys Holbrook-Richard Allen
Their descendants

Holbrook line: Benjamin Hearnden Harrington Herendeen

For simplicity's sake, I'm going to use the spelling Hearnden in this post, but Benjamin's name was spelled in many different ways during his lifetime; he was apparently illiterate as he signed his name with an X on legal documents.

Information abounds about this ancestor, and so do stories that can't be proven.  Also people look at the same set of facts and draw different conclusions.  So, I'll just say that some people think his parents were James Harrington and Ann Clinton-Fiennes, which lines probably trace back to English nobility.  Others say his father was likely Robert Harrington.  It is known that James and Ann had a son named Benjamin and that they all came to Boston in 1630.  James died in 1630 and Ann in 1632 and Benjamin went to live with an uncle, Charles Clinton-Fiennes.  The story goes that Charles was a strict Puritan and Benjamin had become a Baptist.  Uncle Charles severely flogged Benjamin for this, and Benjamin then went to Rhode Island.  Another story says that when escaping to Rhode Island, Benjamin joined a family of Quakers also enroute to Providence Plantation, and that is how Benjamin met his future wife.  These are stories and speculation only, but it seems to be true that Benjamin was a Baptist and Elizabeth White, his wife, was a Quaker.  Choose for yourself how much of the story, or which stories, you want to believe.

What is well documented is that Benjamin had some run ins with the law in Massachusetts.  There was a man of his name presented in court in Lynn, Massachusetts for beating his wife in 1647.  It appears that this was about the same time that the Hearnden's moved to Rhode Island, although it is possible that they shuttled from Lynn to Providence and back again for a few years, while they were establishing crops in Providence to support themselves, and while there was work for a bricklayer (Benjamin's occupation) in Massachusetts.  He took the oath of allegiance in Providence in 1648, and received a land grant in 1651, which may have been the first time he was old enough to receive a grant.  He acquired several more plots of land during his lifetime, so that he was able to pass land on to each of his surviving sons.

Benjamin and Elizabeth each seem to have had difficulties with their neighbors.  Elizabeth was found guilty of stealing clothing from Mary Pray, the wife of Richard Pray.  (Elizabeth would marry Richard Pray as his second wife after Benjamin's death, so it's hard to figure out what was going on here).  Elizabeth's family received a house lot next to that of Benjamin and Elizabeth, and there were court proceedings involving altercations between the two families.  At another time, Benjamin was charged with inciting an Indian to kill John Clawson.  John Clawson was killed by the Indian and the Indian was executed for it, but Benjamin was acquitted of being an accessory to the crime.

Benjamin had several dealings with our ancestor Roger Williams, and one writer says the two families were related.  Another writer hints that it was Clawson that was Benjamin's relation.  I've not found anything to connect Benjamin to either family, except as neighbors.

Benjamin died between February 1686/87 and May 17, 1687.  His estate was probated about a year later and was valued at either 42 pounds and change, or 142 pounds and change (two different amounts reported and I've not yet found the original to judge for myself).  His estate included the typical farm animals and implements as well as land.  As mentioned above, Elizabeth married Richard Pray for her second husband.  Benjamin and Elizabeth had nine children together, all adults by the time their father died.

It's an interesting couple.  Benjamin was a Baptist with a not totally savory reputation, and Elizabeth was a Quaker who perhaps made little defense when charged with stealing clothes from the first wife of her second husband.  It would be interesting to hear their sides of these issues.  It would also be interesting to know what their reputation was in Providence.  I'd also like to know whether it was Benjamin, or Benjamin Jr who participated in King Philip's War. (It appears that the Herendens did leave Providence when the town was burned, but returned fairly soon after.)  Either way, I wonder what Elizabeth thought of her husband or son participating in war.

Our line of descent is:

Benjamin Hearnden-Elizabeth White
Alice Hearnden-Daniel Brown
Hosanna Brown-Mary Hawkins
Othniel Brown-Deborah Brown (yes, cousins)
Sarah Brown-Enos Eddy
Enos Eddy-Deborah Paine
Joseph Brown Eddy-Susan Lamphire
Susan Eddy-Hiram Stanard
Louis Stanard-Mary Alice Hetrick
Etta Stanard-Loren Holbrook
Gladys Holbrook-Richard Allen 

Allen line: Richard Lamb 1696-1736

Richard Lamb's story is short and not so sweet.  He's interesting, though, because he is one of a very few Irish ancestors known to be in the Allen line.

He was born in 1696 in the Coombe, Dublin, Ireland to John Lamb and Margaret Hoult, who were both from Monkstown, Dublin, Ireland.  While we don't know for sure how Richard supported himself, the Coombe area was an area set off for the cloth trade.  Woolen manufacturers set up many firms here, and Richard may well have been a weaver or had some other part in the manufacturing business. 

In 1713, he married Anna White, who was from Clackmannshire, Ireland.  At least, that's what my source said.  I am unable to locate this in Ireland, and wonder if the reference should be to Scotland, instead.  Richard and Anna had eight children, but Anna had died by 1736.

In1736, Richard decided it was time to come to America. He and his eight children set sail but unfortunately, Richard became a statistic, one of those who did not live to see the shores of his new country.  I have variously seen that he died of disease and that he was swept overseas in a storm, so am recording both versions here.  At any rate, his children were orphans when they arrived here.

I haven't yet traced their history but it looks like at least some of them ended up in Maine, likely as indentured servants.  Each would have served until the age of at least 16 for the girls and 18 or 21 for the boys.  William was 24 so he at least may have had his freedom, and would have been able to watch over his siblings to some extent.

That is what I know about Richard Lamb.  He did not realize his dream of starting over in America, but his children did.   .I'd love to ask him a lot of questions, but I'm especially curious about his religion.  Was he Catholic?  There were some Protestants in the Coombe but I haven't yet learned out to research them.   And what did he expect to do in America?  Did he have a plan?  We will likely never know the answers to these questions, but they are worth considering.  I sure wish he had lived to leave some records here!

The line if descent is:

Richard Lamb-Anna White
Anna Lamb-Richard Falley
Richard Falley-Margaret Hitchcock
Samuel Falley-Ruth Root
Clarissa Falley-John Havens Starr
Harriet Starr-John Wilson Knott
Edith Knott-Edward Allen
Richard Allen-Gladys Holbrook
Their descendants