Ancestor Birthday - June 1st - Rebecca Law 1655-1729

Inscription on her gravemarker at Rowley Burial Ground

HERE LIES Ye BODY
OF MRs REBEKAH JEWET
ye WIFE OF MR
JOSEPH JEWET WHO
DIED DECEMBER Ye 26th
1729 IN Ye 74th
YEAR OF HER AGE

Yesterday (31 May 2017) I wrote about my 8th great-grandfather Joseph Jewett. I did state that he had married Rebecca Law on 2 Mar 1676/77. Since Rebecca was born 1 Jun 1655 she would have been 21 years old when she married him. Rebecca was born in Rowley, Massachusetts, so lived in the same town as Joseph.

Her parents were William and Mary (Cheney) Law. She was their 4th child. They had named their oldest child, born in 1646, Rebecca. That Rebecca and the 2nd child John both died in 1652. The 3rd child, Mary, born in 1650, died in 1653. When their 5th child was born in 1657, they named her Mary. They named their 6th child John (they kept on trying) but he died at a year old. When the 7th child was born in 1662, she was named Priscilla. Apparently some time before 2 May 1666 Rebecca's mother died, because William remarried then to Faith, the widow of John Smith. So the 3 surviving daughters, ages almost 11, 8 and 3, now had a step-mother. In the will of Rebecca's grandfather, John Cheney, written 5 Jun 1666 he gave a bequest to William Lawes 3 daughters: Rebecca, Mary and Priscilla. Each were to receive 40 shillings.

Rebecca had 1 half-brother, Aquila, born in July 1667, but he died before his 2nd birthday. Both Rebecca and Mary lived to be married. I have not found information for Priscilla.

Rebecca and Joseph had 4 children, 2 boys and 2 girls, and all lived to be married, before Rebecca died 26 Dec 1729. The church record wrote about her death: "who lay long in a sad disconsolate condition, but was (we hope) lifted into joy."

Ancestor Unbirthday - About 1655 - Joseph Jewett

I have decided to occasionally write about ancestors where I don't have an exact birthdate. Today I want to feature one of my 8th great-grandfathers, Joseph Jewett. Tomorrow (1 Jun 2017) is his wife's birthday so I plan to write about her then.

Much of the information I have about Joseph Jewett comes from the book, Early Settlers of Rowley Massachusetts, by George Brainard Blodgette and Amos Everett Jewett which was published by Picton Press in Camden, Maine in 1997, a third printing of the book originally published in 1933. It is a book I enjoy looking through as I had ancestors living there for almost a hundred years, and relatives for many years after that. Of course there is also a section about Joseph in the Jewett Genealogy, Volume 1, pages 24-27, copyright 1908. Now that I have downloaded to my computer a copy of that book, which would now be in the public domain, I can easily check its contents also.

So I did that. To my surprise I find that Frederick Clarke Jewett, who wrote the genealogy has assigned a birthdate to Joseph. He states that Joseph was born 1 Feb 1654. However in checking the published birth records for Rowley, I find a Joseph born 1 Feb 1656, the son of Joseph and Ann. The month and day are the same, but the year is different and my Joseph was not the son of Joseph and Ann, but he was the son of Maximilian and Ann. Maximilian and the older Joseph were the immigrants, sons of Edward and Mary (Taylor) Jewett of Bradford, West Riding of Yorkshire, England. The published Rowley records do not include a birth record for Joseph, the son of Maximilian, so I will leave his birthdate as about 1655.

Both publications call my Joseph, Ensign Joseph Jewett. It is recorded that he was a soldier in King Philip's War 1675-6 and received a small pension and a land grant. This War is not well known as it was a hundred years before the American Revolution. History Bits calls it "the most devastating war in American history as measured by deaths in proportion to the population of the combatants." The English settlers and allies from the Mohegan Indians battled against the Wampanoag, Narragansett, Nipmuc and other native people. After many deaths and devastation, the English had control of New England.

Apparently after the War, on 2 Mar 1676/77 Joseph married Rebecca Law. Joseph and Rebecca had 4 children who all lived to adulthood and were married and had children. Joseph became a widower when his wife died in Dec 1729. Joseph remarried in Bradford, a neighboring town, 20 Jan 1731/32 to Mary who was the widow of Nathaniel Gage and before that the widow of Thomas Green. They were married over 3 years before Joseph died 29 Oct 1735. His grandson, the Rev. Jedidiah Jewett noted that he died "in the 81 year of his age."

Some of My Immigrant Ancestors

(with probable immigration information)

Name	Gen #	Ship	From	To	Date
Thomas Blossom	13	Mayflower (not 1620)	England	Plymouth	1629
Richard Kimball	13	Elizabeth	England	Boston MA	1634
Henry Kimball	12	Elizabeth	England	Boston MA	1634
William Law	12	Planter	England	MA	1635
Maximilian Jewett	12	John of London	England	Boston MA	1638
Henry Reynolds	10	Kent	England	Burlington NJ	1676
William Clayton	11	Kent	England	Pennsylvania	1677
William Woolman	12	Shield	England	Burlington NJ	1678
John Borton	12	Griffin	England	NJ	1679
Benjamin Acton	10	Lion/Lyon	England	Salem, NJ	1683
Ludwig Falk	4	Wieland	Posen/Bremen	Baltimore	1858

Are any of you related to these men? Maybe we can compare and share information.

Ancestor Birthday - Jonathan Jewett - 11 March 1678/79-1745

One of my Jewett ancestors was my 7th great-grandfather, Jonathan Jewett, who was born in Rowley, Massachusetts 11 Mar 1678/79. He was the oldest of four children to parents Joseph and Rebecca (Law) Jewett.

Jonathan probably knew his grandfather, Maximilian Jewett, who had emigrated from Bradford, England, in 1638. Maximilian died in October 1684 and Jonathan would have been about 5½ years old when his grandfather died. Maximilian's will left the homestead to Joseph, Jonathan's father. I wonder if the family including Jonathan ever lived there.

It was 24 Jan 1699/1700 when Jonathan married Mary Wicom. They had 9 children, who all lived to adulthood and married. Jonathan became a widower 21 Jan 1741/42 when Mary died while visiting in Exeter, New Hampshire. They lacked 3 days of being married 42 years.

It was a little less than a year later, 27 Dec 1742, when Jonathan, at age 63, remarried to a widow, Rebecca (Hale) Poore, from the neighboring town of Newbury. He lived about 2½ years more before he died 26 Jul 1745.

Ancestors' Wedding Days 150 years apart

Two sets of ancestors were married on March 2nd, 150 years apart. My 3rd great-grandparents, William England and Mary Walker were married in 1827 in Gibson County, Tennessee. My 8th great-grandparents, Joseph Jewett and Rebecca Law were married in 1677 in Rowley, Essex County, Massachusetts.