Visiting the Relatives

Drawing Uncertainty

Platts-Bradstreet House, 1677, Rowley, Massachusetts

I’m not sure I should have drawn this old house in Rowley, Massachusetts. I researched it like all the other places in my series of drawings, but the problem is the link to my ancestry in this case is just a hunch—maybe more like an educated guess. I’m still missing a crucial fact. Perhaps this can act as an illustration of the challenges of historical, or ancestral research—a never-ending series of questions. Allow me to explain.

My grandmother was Edna Colburn, a direct descendent of Richard Colburn of River Philip, Nova Scotia, Canada. Richard shows up in historical records not at his birth, but rather, as a young soldier at Fort Cumberland, on the border of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, fighting for the British against a gang of rebels who hoped to link their lives in Canada to the American Revolutionary War. But where was he from? Maybe he was an immigrant from England? Or, was he from the American Colonies? I think he was Canadian, from New Brunswick. It’s a weakly-supported theory, but I’m sticking with it for now.

I say Richard was related to the Colburns who moved from Dracut, Massachusetts, to Sudbury, New Brunswick in 1867. People like the Colburns who moved north are called “New England Planters.” Another New England family up there was the Burpees from Rowley, Massachusetts. Moses Colburn and Hannah Burpee are my placeholders for Richard’s parents, even though I can’t prove it. It’s a long shot, but it’s my best shot. I’ve found that Moses Colburn’s descendants are related to me (a little) by DNA. I have other good reasons for my hunch, but they’re just too complicated to explain here.

Meanwhile, let’s enjoy this beautifully-restored house which Jonathan Burpee (father of the aforementioned Hannah) owned for a while before moving to Canada. Known as The Platts-Broadstreet House, it was built in 1677 and is now the home of the Rowley Historical Society.

Parmenter’s Ordinary

Jonathan Parmenter House, 1775, Wayland, Massachusetts

My immigrant ancestors are what this series of drawings is all about. I track them down by book and by foot—traveling back in time and over to towns and neighborhoods that I’ve never visited before. I walk the streets with my sketchbook. For me, sketching is a form of research. With my drawings, I try to illustrate the discoveries I’ve made and the stories I’ve found.

John Parmenter was another ancestor among the group of original founders of Sudbury, Massachusetts. (My past has a lot of them.) Where this handsome old house stands, in what is now the town of Wayland, John lived in 1640 with his wife, Bridget Daveye. The Parmenters were both 51 years old when they came to America from Essex, England. Their two grown children came as well, settling nearby. John was a 10th great-grandfather of mine and his daughter Mary was a 9th great-grandmother.

John Parmenter was active in town affairs and served as the second deacon of Sudbury. In 1645, he opened a tavern which lasted for generations as Parmenter’s Ordinary or Parmenter’s Tavern. This was once a busy corner, but now the once-prominent house is hard to see or even find. My view was from a bit of swamp that I slithered into. On the facade of the house is a small historic marker stating that this is the Jonathan Parmenter House of 1775—surely a grandson of John’s who updated the property. That wasn’t the last upgrade, however—the house is now assessed at 1.2 million dollars.

Map of the First Roads & House Lots of Sudbury, J. S. Draper

Sudbury Settler

Hopestill Bent Tavern, 1701, Wayland, Massachusetts

John Bent (a 10x great-grandfather of mine) was from a successful farming family in Hampshire, northeast of London. Nonetheless, in 1638, he left to start a new life in America on the ship Confidence, along with his influential neighbor William Noyes—probably due to their displeasure with King Charles 1st. Bent emigrated with his wife Martha and five young children (including his son, Peter, my 9x great-grandfather) and 103 others, many of whom were indentured servants. John’s sister and elderly mother both set out on a later ship to join him in Massachusetts, but died during their passage. His mother made it all the way to Boston Harbor before passing away.

John Bent was one of the founders of the town of Sudbury, west of Boston, which was considered wilderness then (to the Whites) and populated by Native Americans. Where they settled is now part of the town of Wayland, and the layout of the original lots looks similar to old maps, with a long row of preserved old houses overlooking community-owned open fields. It is still a neighborhood of prosperity.

Along with his son Peter, John went on to help found the neighboring town of Marlborough, where Peter built a grist mill. Like everyone else of that time and place, the Bents were part of the tensions and violence with the native population. One of Peter’s sons was scalped in an attack on the mill in 1676. Another son, Hopestill Bent, was the owner of the tavern and home in my drawing. It was built in 1701 and added on to throughout the years. The house sits next to Wayland High School on Route 126 (which is still called The Old Connecticut Path)

Hopestill Bent Gravestone, Wayland, Massachusetts

Past Discovered

Peter Rice House, 1688, Marlborough, Massachusetts

My grandmother Edna Alberta Colburn was the daughter of Canadian immigrants. It was when digging into my grandmother’s family in Nova Scotia that I fell into a deep, hidden well of early New England history. It turns out a significant number of her ancestors were settlers of white America—living there for generations—before moving or escaping to Canada due to the American Revolution. Was that fact lost? Hidden? My grandmother always described herself as ancestrally Scottish, which turns out to be only partly true. Her roots were primarily English—settlers of Cumberland, Northern Nova Scotia—and split between those from Yorkshire and those from New England. Perhaps being English would not have been a positive attribute for her, once she married a Lynch and moved into an overwhelmingly Irish Catholic world.

Finding myself as part of these early American families is bewildering. My identity is scrappy Irish, a people very cognizant of their very humble origins. However, the early white Americans are well documented and their descendants are exceedingly proud. I look on, and draw, in wonder.

Among the families from the Colburns’s past were the Rices. Deacon Edmund Rice came from Berkhamsted, England, in 1638 and soon after was a founder of Sudbury, Massachusetts. He was one of my 10x great-grandparents. There is a beautiful plaque by the side of the road in Wayland (formally part of Sudbury) where he first lived. Online, one can find an Edmund Rice Association dedicated to his genealogy, and in 1858 a handsome book of the family was published. This drawing is of the home of Peter Rice, Edmund’s grandson in Marlborough, Massachusetts, which hosts the town’s historical society. Yes, the Rices were founders of Marlborough, too.

Deacon Edmund Rice Marker, 1913, Wayland, Massachusetts

A Genealogical History of the Rice Family, 1858, by Andrew H. Ward

Original White Settlers of Sudbury, Massachusetts

Shaped by War

The tale of William Eager, an 8x great-grandfather of mine, is almost too exotic to be true. He was brought to America on the “Unity”— a ship full of Scottish prisoners of war. These men were captured in the Battle of Dunbar in 1650 and sent abroad by Oliver Cromwell, sold off as indentured servants. Freed after the typical seven years of unpaid obligated labor in Malden, Massachusetts, Eager married local girl Ruth Hill, a taverner’s daughter, and they moved to Cambridge. Eager fought in the Mount Hope campaign of King Philip’s War in 1675 — a fight between the new White settlers and the Native Americans. A few years later, Ruth died and he married Lydia Cheever (also widowed) and together the produced a family of six children, adding to the eight he already had.

In 1684, the Eagers went west to Marlborough, MA, a frontier town that had been sacked in King Philip’s War. The settlement had held a large native population of “Praying Indians” (those that converted to Christianity) who largely scattered after the war. William Eager was one of a number of colonists who were part of the purchase of Ockoocangansett Plantation that was left behind. Many would say that the purchase was a swindle — an unfair taking of the natives’s land.Where the Eagers lived for generations, still stands a very old house, situated at an odd angle on a cul-de-sac of contemporary houses. There is no marker on the house of its historic significance. The only clue of its legacy is the name of the street: Eager Court.

List of Scottish Prisoners brought to Boston

1652 William Eager in Will of William Goddon of Malden, MA

Eager House, Marlborough, MA – Massachusetts Historical Commission

Hill Tavern

A new building is coming to the growing city of Malden, Massachusetts. This is a busy corner and perhaps the oldest in the city. The previous structure, built in 1900 was taken down because it was determined to be unsafe. In 1657, 364 years ago, a tavern stood within a stone’s throw of here, owned and operated by Abraham Hill, a 9x great grandfather of mine. Before that, this was the land of the Pennacook Tribe of Native Americans. Hill’s Ordinary (later called Hill’s Tavern) was the Malden’s very first tavern, and it remained a family business for generations, serving as an important gathering place for the community. One such visitor was John Adams, who described the Tavern’s sign—featuring a “rising eagle”—in his diaries.

Abraham Hill, the Tavern’s founder, came from St. Albans, Herefordshire, England, in 1636, settling in nearby Charlestown. Four years later, he married Sarah Long, the daughter of a prominent “taverner.” In 1646, Hill moved out of town to the more remote Malden to run a grain mill, and by 1657 his tavern was operating. The last year of the Hill Tavern was 1855. Two years later, the building was bought by the city and moved around the corner to make way for a new city hall. On Friday, November 27, 1914, the old Hill Tavern building was demolished. It was the oldest building in the city at that time. What’s coming next to this spot I do not know, but I wonder how long it will last.

1674 List of Freemen in Malden, Massachusetts

Lynch at Its Worst

Old Slave Mart Museum, Charleston, South Carolina

Lynch is a common name in Ireland—in the top twenty—and because so many Irish came to the US, there are plenty of Lynches here too, particularly in the northeast part of the country, where I’ve always lived. The Irish name from which it derives is O’Loingsigh, and it actually means “mariner.” It’s a name so ordinary, I never gave it much thought.

However, on a recent road trip to the American South, I found myself reflecting more and more about my name’s terrible connotation with the term “lynching.” Between 1882 and 1968, 4,743 lynchings were recorded, with an overwhelming majority of the horrors happening in the former Confederate states. How, I wondered, did my surname become associated with such a horrible crime of terror. There are a few theories, but one dominates.

Charles Lynch Jr. of Virginia (1736-96) (no relation) is the lead suspect for the term’s namesake. The son of an Irish immigrant from Galway, a plantation owner and judge, Lynch was active in the American Revolution. In 1780, he organized the punishment of British sympathizers in southern Virginia (near Lynchburg, named for his brother John) who were suspected of plotting an insurrection. No formal trial was held, however, and swift justice was dished out including whipping under a chestnut tree. Between that time and the 1850s, this sort of unlawful vengeance was referred to as “Lynches Law.” From there, the term “lynching” evolved—becoming more specifically related to the racial terrorizing of African Americans by White mobs, particularly by hanging. Clearly, my name, as a verb, is the worst of all

Long Ago

On June 17, 1775, the Three Cranes Tavern of Charlestown, Massachusetts, burned to the ground during the Battle of Bunker Hill. Gone for centuries, it was unearthed in the 1980s in preparation for Boston’s “Big Dig”— the most expensive highway project in American history. This archeological dig found a wealth of pottery, glass, coins, smoking pipes, utensils, and even musket balls — all dating back to the time of the Tavern. For generations, the Three Cranes had been run by the Long family, and it was Robert Long, my 10th great-grandfather who founded it.

In July of 1635, Robert Long, along with his wife Elizabeth and ten children, set sail from London to New England on the ship “Defence.” They were part of a wave of immigrants to the area that became known as “The Great Migration” (1620-1640). Five years earlier, a fleet of 11 ships brought John Winthrop and his followers to Charlestown where they started the first permanent white settlement of the area. Winthrop relocated his group across the harbor five years later to what is now downtown Boston, and he became the first governor of Massachusetts. It was John Winthrop’s house, left behind in Charlestown, that became the Tavern. The business lasted for 140 years. After the British bombardment, it was not rebuilt.

Now, this place is a pretty park called City Square with benches and a lovely fountain topped with a crane weather vane. On the lawn, are the foundation stones of the historic tavern exposed and explained where they were rediscovered. The site is a sort of open-air museum which lies on Boston’s popular Freedom Trail of historic places. As I drew this picture, a steady stream of tourists stopped for a minute on their way to to the Bunker Hill Monument.

Suburbia

My life is a suburban one, a place filled with people like me, whose immigrant ancestors are long gone. This is the house I’ve lived in for almost thirty years; my wife and I bought it soon after marrying. It was built in 1880 and its style is called “gambrel roof colonial,” which I describe as barn-shaped. In a fluke of zoning, our house is tucked behind a bigger house and not on the main street. So, it’s not easy to get an unobstructed view of our place. I’d consider it a peaceful spot if it weren’t for the squads of lawn mowers, trimmers, and blowers attacking our neighborhood every day.

Our town—Winchester, Massachusetts—was founded in 1850. Before then, this land belonged to the Massachusetts tribe, and was later a part of neighboring towns. It is now an affluent place, the home of many professionals who work in and around Boston. I wouldn’t consider my own family affluent, however—unless compared to our immigrant ancestors. According to the Pew Research Center, we’re in the middle of the middle class for our area of the country.

Winchester, like a lot of Boston’s suburbs, is 82% white (numbers from 2018), but has a steady-growing population of Asian families (13%). Surprising to me, is that this prosperous town’s foreign-born population is 17.5%, leading me to believe that Winchester hosts a different kind of immigrant, one that didn’t start life in America at the bottom of the social ladder, like mine did generations ago.

Roots

The story of my family is one of immigration, as it is for all white Americans. In my current drawing project, I draw at the places of my ancestors and am quite surprised to see how fruitful my research can be, and how lucky I’ve been to find that so many of my ancestors lived within driving distance of my home — inviting me to keep driving and drawing.

Envisioning the research, I picture it as a digging up of roots rather than the growing out of a family tree. So much is hidden, unexpected, and interconnected. I’ve written often of the surprise that a good part of my 1/4 ancestry — Nova Scotian — was found to be transplanted Colonial Americans. That group is so well documented, that the information about them dwarfs what I know about my dominant cultural heritage: Irish. I can trace my English and Scottish roots back 13 generations or more. They came to North America as pioneers and Puritans, with land grants. By comparison, my Irish ancestors came across the ocean as paupers, mostly tenant farmers from the western and southern coasts of what was then a colony of the British Empire. Research on my Irish ancestors comes to halt after four or five generations.

Regardless of their status — whether they arrived from prosperity or poverty — it’s striking how interesting and consequential the stories of immigrants are. They are the shakers and the movers. Whether they came in the 17th, 18th, 19th or 20th centuries, it is clear not only that America changed them, but they changed America.