Tag Archives: Edward Hall

A Brief History of Raynham, Bristol County, Massachusetts and its First Congregational Church

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Raynham, Massachusetts was incorporated April 2, 1731, having been taken from the eastern precinct of Taunton, Massachusetts in Bristol County.  Taunton was first settled by English emigrants in about 1637-39.  Settlements in the area that was to become Raynham were made about 1652 by James and Henry Leonard and Ralph Russell, who had come from Wales, and established in Raynham the first iron forge on the continent.  By a free town vote they were given the liberty to “build and set up this work, and that they shall have the woods on the other side of the Two-Mile river, wheresoever it is common on that side of the river, to cut for their cord-wood to make coals; and also to dig and take mine or ore at Two-Mile Meadows, or in any of the commons appertaining to the town where it is not proprietary.”  The iron forge was held by the Leonard family and their descendants for a century, during which time the iron works were enlarged by adding more furnaces and eventually being converted into an anchor forge, and providing a livelihood for the inhabitants of the area for about 200 years.

Abraham Jones, who was born about 1659 in Hull, Massachusetts and died March 18, 1734/35 in Raynham, appears to have been the major voice in petitioning for separation from Taunton; his name appears first on each of the petition’s. The separation does not seem to have been from any political difference but rather from a convenience of the people as most of the inhabitants were too far from Taunton to attend public worship.  Three petitions to separate were presented to the Massachusetts General Court before the Court declared that it was “competently filled with inhabitants” to be set off into a distinct township.  The first petition, dated December 8, 1726, sought exemption from charges for the new meeting house in Taunton, and to be set off as a separate town from Taunton; the second petition dated October 17, 1728 asked that Taunton be erected into three separate and distinct districts; the third petition dated April 16, 1729 made the request to be set into a separate precinct from Taunton. The General Court, on the third petition, set off Raynham as a distinct township.  There were 30 families living in Raynham at the time that it was incorporated on April 2, 1731.

The inhabitants of Raynham, in anticipation of separation from Taunton had already erected and partially finished a meeting house two years before incorporation.  This first meeting house, according to “The History of Raynham, Mass.” stood a fourth of a mile east of the forge, on the north side of the road leading to Squawbetty.  On the website for the First Congregational Church of Raynham UCC, it is more clearly defined that the first meeting house was located along Richmond Street, not far from the Iron Forge.

The first town meeting for selecting officers was held April 22, 1731.  Samuel Leonard, Jr., was chosen town clerk, and John Staples, Samuel Leonard and Ebenezer Robinson, selectman.  In 1732 John White was chosen as clerk of the market and Elijah Dean and Thomas Baker were elected tithing-men. At a meeting on May 10, 1731, Mr. John Wales, who had already been preaching in Raynham for a year and a half, was chosen minister. The church was officially established on October 19, 1731 and the Rev. Mr. Wales was ordained as the pastor the following day. Mr. Wales continued as the minster of the Raynham church for another 34 years. He died February 23, 1765.  About two years after the death of Mr. Wales, Perez Fobes, of Bridgewater. was chosen pastor of the church, and served for 45 years.

On October 7, 1731 at a church meeting at the public meeting house in Taunton, 15 men and 17 women, all living in Raynham, and all brethren and sisters in full communion with the Taunton church, requested to be dismissed from the church in order to enter into a church state by themselves, and have the ordinances of the gospel administered among them. The church voted that they be dismissed accordingly.

It is every family historian’s desire to obtain primary source documents.  The following is the list of original members of the Church in Raynham, taken from page 129 of the Raynham Church Records, Vol. 1 (Old Colony Historical Society, Taunton, Massachusetts).

The Original Members of the Church in Raynham
Men (15) Women (17)
Abraham Jones Hannah White
John Staple Mary Hacket
John Leonard Kathrine Leonard
Samuel Hacket Hannah Campbell
Joseph Jones Susannah White
Samuel Leonard Hannah Staple
Seth Leonard Mehetable White
Samuel White Ruth Crane
Ebenezer Campbell Elizabeth Shaw
John White Mary Jones
Gabriel Crossman Joanna Leonard
Jonathan Hall Abigail Hall
Thomas Baker Lydia Brettun
Samuel Hacket 2d Patience Hacket
Henry Crane Sarah Hall
Rebecca Leonard
Abigail Baker

Three Halls appear on the list of original members of the church: Jonathan, Abigail and Sarah Hall. Abigail Hall was the widow of Samuel Hall, he being the first of this family to settle in this area; Jonathan was the son of Abigail [and Samuel], and Sarah was Jonathan’s second wife, Sarah Smith.

The second meeting house was built sometime during the 1760’s to early 1770’s by Israel Washburn, on the present lot of the church today, in Raynham Center. The land upon which it was erected belonged to Amariah Hall (nephew of Jonathan Hall).    A steeple was added later as a tower attached to the side of the house. When the church decided to replace this building, the town expressed an interest in it as they had been using it for town meetings and had no place else to meet.  Some of the church people were not fond of this idea and one night the tower was severed from the building.  In the morning the tower lay upon the ground, extending across the street with the spire projecting into the orchard of Amos Hall (son of Jonathan Hall).   Subsequently, no serious objection was made by the town to remove the dismembered building.

The third meeting house was built on the corner in Raynham Center.  It stood until July 22, 1913 when a fire in a shed belonging to a nearby blacksmith spread and the church was completely destroyed.  When the church members rebuilt their house of worship, they decided to use a stone exterior for better fire protection.  The Stone Church, as it is commonly known, was dedicated on April 1, 1915 and remains active today.

Sources
1. Raynham Church Records, Vol. 1, Old Colony Historical Society, Taunton, Massachusetts.
2. History of Raynham, Mass. From its First Settlement to the Present time, by Rev. Enoch Sanford, A.M., Providence, 1870.
3. First Congregational Church of Raynham UCC, (web site).
4. A Brief History of Raynham, Massachusetts, Town of Raynham (web site).
5. Descendants of Thomas Jones of Hingham, Hull, and Manchester, Mass., compiled by Claude W. Barlow, NEHGR, vol. 113, 47-48, 1959.

Esther Hall, wife of Edward Hall

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Esther Hall will most likely forever remain a mystery.  We have not been able to discover any documentation that gives her maiden name, birth or death dates, where she was born or where she died and is buried; nor the names of her parents.  No marriage records exists in those early records that are available.

I recently read a small book on early Duxbury.  The author made the comment that the search for love did not seem to travel far as most men in the Plymouth Colony married the daughters of their neighbors.  Is it possible that Esther’s family was of Plymouth Colony and a near neighbor of Edward Hall?  But then we have the fact that Edward, for no apparent reason that can be found, leaves Plymouth Colony for Braintree and remains there for about 5 years, where his first two children are born and recorded in the Braintree Vital Records.  I suspect that Esther was considerably younger than Edward and base this only on the fact that their last child, Benjamin, was born in 1668 when Edward was about 57 years of age.  Could it be possible that Esther’s family was of Braintree and that Edward and Esther lived with them the first few years of their marriage so that a very young wife might have the assistance of her mother as she bore her first two children?  We’ll probably never know the answers to these questions.

The only documentation on Esther Hall or the Widow Hall in Rehoboth follows.  There is no way to know for sure if the first entry from PCR pertains to Esther.

  • October 7, 1651, Grand Enquest presented Samuel Eaton and Goodwife Halle, of the towne of Duxborrow, for mixed dansing. Released with admonition (PCR 2:174).
  • Widow Hall appears on the earliest extant tax list in the town of Rehoboth, 1671 (Early Rehoboth, Vol. 1, by Bowen, p. 39).
  • Ester Hall is shown with one share of the Rehoboth North Purchase on 28 May 1672, Rehoboth town records (Early Rehoboth, p. 41).
  • Widow Hall appears on the Rehoboth 1674 tax list (Early Rehoboth, p. 16).

There are no further entries in the Rehoboth town records for either the Widow Hall or Esther Hall.

The Rehoboth Vital records contain the marriage of an Esther Hall to Thomas Jordan in Rehoboth on 24 December 1674.  There has been much speculation in published genealogies and histories that it was the Widow Esther Hall who married Thomas Jordan.  Other published genealogies and histories claim that it was Edward and Esther’s daughter, Esther, who married Thomas Jordan.  The only thing that is for certain is that there is absolutely no proof for either speculation.

The last document that mentions Esther Hall is a 1715 Quit Claim deed in which the siblings, Samuel, Thomas, Andrew, and Benjamin convey land in favor of their brothers, John and Preserved, described as:

…the lands which our father Edward Hall and our mother Esther Hall had in said Rehoboth in the Town of Attleborough in said county of Bristol….

The deed was recorded May 21, 1715 (Bristol Co. Deeds, 9:279-280).

Edward Hall, 1611-1670: Family and Later Years

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We know that Edward was named a Supervisor of the Highways in Duxbury, Plymouth Colony, in June 1647.  There are no further records to be found until the birth of his son, John, in 1650, as written in the Braintree vital records.

Edward met and married Esther or Hester (herein after referred to as Esther) probably by 1649, but where?  Who was Esther Hall?  Braintree was part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and from what little written information there is on old Braintree, once settled it was a closed settlement. Because of this I assume that Edward had to have been invited into the town.  There are no records of him owning land there so he likely lived with a family already established in the settlement.  Was this Esther’s family?  Edward and Esther’s first two children were born in Braintree, Massachusetts Bay Colony; the remaining known 6 children were born in Rehoboth, Plymouth Colony, as recorded in the Rehoboth vital records.  Edward would have been 39 years old when his first child was born in 1650/51.

  • John, born January 23, 1650/51, Braintree (July 5, 2018, please note: the birth date of John Hall has been changed to reflect the correct birth information that has now been obtained from the original records of Braintree. The Julian calendar was in use in 1650 and the 11th month would be January, not November. Therefore, his “genealogically correct” birth date would be 23 Jan 1650/51. That record can be viewed here; married Mary Newell, died September 1721 in Rehoboth.
  • Hester (Esther), born October 23, 1654, Braintree, *may have* married John Kenrick about 1672 or she *may have*  married Thomas Jordan in Rehoboth in 1674. We just haven’t been able to find any documented proof and there is some speculation that it was the Widow Hall who married Thomas Jordan (Jordaine) instead.  Her marriage, therefore, is a work in progress.
  • Samuel, born October 24, 1656, Rehoboth; married Abigail Pratt, died August 30, 1716 in  Taunton.
  • Jeremiah, born July 28, 1658, Rehoboth; died before May 1715.
  • Thomas, born March 31, 1661, Rehoboth; married Abigail Martin, died April 29, 1717 in Dedham.
  • Preserved, born March 20, 1663, Rehoboth; married widows Lydia (Jackson) Leavitt and Hannah (Damon) May; died August 5, 1740, in Hingham.
  • Andrew, born May 10, 1665, Rehoboth; married first, Susanna Capen; second, Mary Bennett, died December 1756 in Newton.
  • Benjamin, born August 7, 1668, Rehoboth; married Sarah Fisher, died August 25, 1726, in Wrentham.

We need to wrap up some unfinished business for Edward Hall as noted in the Plymouth Colony Records before moving on to records for Braintree and Rehoboth:

  • March 2, 1651, at the General Court at New Plymouth, Steven and Abigail Bryant complained against John Haward, Edward Hall, and Susanna Haward of Duxborrow in an action of slander and defamation to the damage of 500 pounds. The jury found for the plaintiffs damage of 5 pounds equally and jointly (PCR 7:57).
  • Circa 1651 there is a subsequent entry to the description of the land of Mr. John Alden describing the boundary:  The bounds of a parcel of marsh meadow, bought of Edward Hall in the year 1651, which meadow was primarily Mr. William Collyiars (sic), and by him given to Mr. Constant Southworth, and by him sold to Edward Hall, aforsaid, and bought by me, John Alden and is as followeth: viz: layed out at the first for five acres, and bounded with a creek, commonly called and known by the name Indian Creek; and from thence to run to the meadow land of Philip Delano, deceased; and so it runs on the northerly side as the river runs to the Mill Creek (PCR 1:71).
  • October 7, 1651, Edward Hall(e) was presented by the General Enquest for felling of timber and selling of it out of the colony, which timber is on the town commons; Released and aquite (PCR 2:174.

The only record found in Braintree mentioning Edward Hall is published in the Massachusetts Colony Records, vol. 3, pages 309-310 and vol. 4, part 1, page 145.  These entries have to do with the law case of Wilson v. Faxon in which the widow Wilson brought suit against Thomas Faxon concerning her son, Joseph Wilson.  In these records, No. 188, 8th paper, states that Edward Hall was deposed in this case, dated March 10, 1652 (NEHGR 62:93-94).

Edward and Esther spent a brief time in Braintree, Massachusetts Bay Colony, approximately 5 years, 1650-1655.  By October 1656, when their son, Samuel, was born, Edward and Esther are back in the Plymouth Colony at Rehoboth, where Edward remained for the rest of his life.

  • 1658, Edward Hall appears on the list of those who took the Oath of Fidelity at Rehoboth (PCR 8:178)
  • June 22, 1658, Edward Hall was No. 41 out of 49 persons who drew in order of the settlers estates for meadow lands which lie on the north side of the town, at town meeting of Rehoboth (Rehoboth Vital Records).
  • August 3, 1665, Edward Hall conveys 10 acres of land lying at Namassakeesit, given to him by the town, to Robert Barker who hath now peaceably enjoyed the same space for 17 years, with all the appurtenances (Old Records, town of Duxbury, p. 19).
  • May 26, 1668, Lots drawn for meadow lands in the North Purchase, now Attleboro, Cumberland, R.I., and parts of Norton and Mansfield (Rehoboth Vital Records).

It’s likely that the above lot drawn in 1668 was for 50 acres, as Edward gave to his son, John, by will, 40 acres in the North Purchase, with the remainder to his wife, Esther.  A Sketch of the History of Attleborough, p. 99, called it 50 acres at “the Falls” Attleborough, as given to his son, John, by will.

Edward Hall’s will was written November 23, 1670.

Will of Edward Hall of Rehoboth

Be it knowne to all men of these presents that I Edward Hall of Rehoboth in the colonie of Plymouth in New England: being in my fresh memory, do ordaine and make this my last Will and Testament.

Item. I give to my son John forty acres as upon my share of land on the North Purchase; which is to be his full Share of land:

Item. I give my house orchyard Garden Barne homlott and all my other lands and meddowes in the Town of Rehoboth or on the North Purchase or elsewhere as alsoe my household Goods Cattle or Chattles whatsoever I have or did enjoy or posess; unto my beloved wife Ester; whom I ordaine and make my sole exequitrix: That is to pay all my debts; To Improve for to bring up my Children; and to dispose of it unto them according to her wisdome; but if my wife should Marry then she shall have the third of my land; and the other two thirds shall be divided as above said. This is my last will and Testament; With my hand

Edward Hall (his mark)

In the presence of John Meller Senior, John Peck

John Meller Senior hath attested the truth of this will upon oath before me Henery Smith July 4th 1671.

(Plymouth Colony Records, Wills, Volume 3, Part 1, Page 36)

Edward Hall died on November 27, 1670 (Rehoboth Vital Records).  He would have been 59 years of age.  The inventory of his estate was made March 6, 1671 and presented to the Court held at Plymouth on October 29, 1671, valued at £ 84.   It is said that he is buried in an unmarked grave in the Newman Cemetery, Rumford, Providence, Rhode Island (once a part of Rehoboth).

At the time of Edward’s death, his first born child, John, would have been 20 years old.  The remaining 7 children would have ranged in ages from 16 years down to 2 years old.  Quite a responsibility for a presumably young widow and for her oldest son, John, who had not yet himself reached legal age.