Person:Jacob Sheafe (1)

"Jacob Sheafe (Edmund, Thomas, Richard, Thomas) was baptized 4 August 1616 at Cranbrook, Kent, England. In 1639 he emigrated to New England with Rev. Henry Whitfield, Robert Kitchel, William Chittenden, several relations by marriage, and other Kent men. He settled first in Guilford, Connecticut, thence to Boston where, by special license of 7 September 1643, he married Margaret Webb, the only child of Henry Webb of Boston, formerly of Salisbury, Wiltshire.

He was constable of Boston in 1651, selectman 1658-9, and clerk of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. He appears to have had a third interest in a mill in Roxbury, also much other property. He left 361 ounces of silver ware. His estate was appraised at £8,528.03, a really large fortune for that time. In 1655 his Boston residence must have been near the Court House, for in 1662 his widow petitioned the Court to give her title to a house and lot at the corner of Tremont and Beacon Streets. This property eventually was deeded by her to Harvard College.

Jacob Sheafe died 22 March 1658/9 and was buried in King's Chapel Burial Ground under a table tomb. The inscription is as follows, placed there by his son-in-law Robert Gibbs:

HERE LYETH INTERD THE

BODY OF JACOB SHEAFE OF

BOSTON WHO FOR SVME

TIME LIVED AT CRANBROOK

IN KENT IN OVLD INGLAND

HEE DECEASED THE 22 OF

MARCH 1658 AGED 42 YEARS

On the same stone is also the following inscription:

Here Lyeth jnterred ye body of

Mrs Margaret Thacher formerly wife

of Mr Jacob Sheafe & lately wife

of the Reverend Mr Thomas Thacker

aetat 68 obit 29 February 1693"^[2]

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2} Holman, Mary Lovering. The Sheafe Line. American Genealogist (D.L. Jacobus). (Oct 1945)
   (at 22:90).
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6} Threlfall, John B. (Brooks). Twenty-Six Great Migration Colonists to New England & their Origins. (Madison, Wisconsin: J.B. Threlfall, 1993)
   256-257.