Henry Squire was born in Charlton Mackrell, Somersetshire, about 1563, according to his own deposition in 1580, when he was termed a husbandman of Moorlinch, aged about sixteen years. Probably he was employed by some yeoman in Moorlinch, a parish about seven miles from his birthplace, but he sometime was apparently also a blacksmith’s apprentice. As a married man he lived in Charlton Mackrell, where he had children baptized from May 1587 to February 1599. By November 18, 1599, the family had apparently moved a short distance to the adjoining small parish of Charlton Adam. They likely continued in one or both of these parishes for another dozen years or so and then moved into the adjacent parish of Kingweston. This is assumed because daughter Ann was married in Kingweston on January 28, 1613/14, and Henry signed her marriage bond with a mark, being called “blacksmith of Kingweston.” In the 1630s three of Henry’s daughters—Edith, Ann, and Margaret—emigrated to New England with their husbands. Daughter Edith was the wife of Henry Adams, and eventually her great-great-grandson, John Adams, became President of the United States. December 25, 1649, Henry Squire was termed as “late of Kinweston neere Somerton in Somersetshire.” He therefore probably died in Kingweston, but the exact date is unknown. The early parish registers are lost, and neither will nor administration on his estate has been found.
