PETER PALFREY
ORIGIN: Unknown
MIGRATION: 1626
FIRST RESIDENCE: Salem
REMOVES: Reading by about 1655
OCCUPATION: Trader.
CHURCH MEMBERSHIP: In the list of Salem church members compiled in late 1636 (with annotation "removed") [SChR 5].
FREEMAN: Requested 19 October 1630 and admitted 18 May 1631 [MBCR 1:79, 366].
EDUCATION: Palfrey was to teach his stepson, Benjamin Fairfield, how to read and write [EQC 2:264].
OFFICES: Deputy for Salem to Massachusetts Bay General Court, 4 March 1634/5 [MBCR 1:135]. Coroner's jury, on the body of Austin Bratcher, 28 September 1630 [MBCR 1:77]. Committee to set out Mr. Humphrey's land, 7 November 1632 [MBCR 1:102]. Committee to confer about the raising of a public stock, 9 March 1632/3 [MBCR 1:95].
Essex jury, 27 December 1636, 28 March 1637, 28 June 1637, 3 October 1637, 26 December 1637, 27 January 1637/8, 26 June 1638, 25 October 1638, 30 June 1640, 29 September 1640, 29 December 1640, 30 March 1641 [EQC 1:4-9, 19, 21, 24, 26]. Petit jury, 25 January 1641, 9 July 1644, 31 December 1644, 8 July 1645, 30 December 1645, 30 June 1646, 26 December 1648, 26 June 1649, 25 June 1650 [EQC 1:33, 64, 74, 78, 89, 95, 153, 169, 191]. Grand jury, 27 December 1642, 28 December 1647 [EQC 1:44, 129]. Surveyor of canoes, 27 June 1636 [EQC 1:3].
Salem selectman, 1637, 1638, 1642-6 [STR 1:50, 68, 113, 121, 128, 137, 143]. Rater, 1637, 1638 [STR 1:57, 95]. Fenceviewer, 1640/1, 1644 [STR 1:110, 129]. Frequently surveyed lots.
ESTATE: On 25 February 1635/6 Peter Palfrey was granted a two hundred acre farm at the head of Bass River, as part of the freeman's land [STR 1:12, 19]. He was granted one acre of marsh on 25 December 1637, based on a household of six [STR 1:103].
He was granted five acres of meadow in Wenham meadow, 3 December 1649 [STR 1:162].
He sold apple trees to Samuel Bennett of Rumney Marsh, and Bennett failed to pay. Palfrey's attorney, Nathaniel Pickman, sued for payment and a writ was issued 15 July 1660 attaching Bennett's orchard [EQC 2:224].
In his will, dated 21 October 1662 and proved 15 December 1663, "Peter Palfrey ... being far stricken in years" bequeathed to "my dear & loving wife Ales Palfrey £5"; to "my son-in-law Matthew Johnson 5s."; to "my youngest daughter Mary Palfrey two pewter platters ... marked M.P. on the bottom and likewise an iron pot ... and £6 ... to be taken out of my son-in-law Aspinwall's his portion"; "Samuel Pickman, Peter Aspinwall & Benjamin Smith, my three sons-in-law, and my aforesaid daughter Mary Palfrey" to receive the residue in equal portions "but ... that my daughter Aspinwall took up in goods upon my account more by £6 than I did allow unto her, or any of my other children at their marriage, my will therefore is that £6 of my son Aspinwall's portion is to be given to my daughter Mary Palfrey as abovesaid"; "my son Samuel Pickman and George Davis" executors. In a 19 May 1663 codicil he adjusted his will so that daughter Mary received her £6 before the estate was divided, and that each child received an equal portion of the residue. In a 19 May 1663 codicil, "whereas my son Aspinwall hath a mare of mine ... I give the first colt the mare brings to my daughter Mary, & my son Aspinwall to have the use of my mare, and also the next colt she brings" and he to bring up "my daughter Mary's colt" [MPR Case #16382; SJC Case #587].
The inventory of Peter Palfrey was taken 14 September 1663 and totalled £84 10s., including £15 10s. in real estate: "in land and meadow beyond the river," £10; and "three acres of meadow more," £5 10s. [MPR Case #16382].
Two of the heirs of John Fairfield sued at November Term 1664 to recover the house and property that Peter Palfrey, as husband of Fairfield's widow, had leased out to Richard Coy. They deposed that "John Fayerfield, their father, about the year 1646, died seized of certain estate, the housing and land being left to them by will, their mother to have only a certain right to the use and occupation of the housing, but not to dispose of it or to have the profits of it for any set term of years. As his wife was `the most trusty friend that he left in the world,' she was given the care of the estate, but the plaintiffs' `father's fatherly care of his fatherless children was such that if his wife were about to dispose of herself in marriage that then before it should be solemnized our father did require his wife' to give security, etc. If Paulfry had a seeming right to the inheritance while their mother lived, it could not continue after she died, and he had broken the will to the plaintiff's great damage, so that Paulfry had no right to lease the estate to the defendant. When the will was made the life of his wife and also of Benjamin was uncertain" [EQC 3:208].
BIRTH: By about 1605, assuming that he was adult when he migrated to New England.
DEATH: Reading 15 September 1663.
MARRIAGE: (1) By 1636 Edith _____. Among the Salem church members before 1636 was "Eedith Palfery" (annotated "dead") [SChR 6].
(2) Between 1646 (death of her first husband) and November 1660 [EQC 2:263; EPR 1:325] Elizabeth (_____) Fairfield, widow of John Fairfield of Wenham.
(3) say 1662 Alice _____, named in his will. "Alse Palfrey" died at Reading on 20 March 1677[/8?].
CHILDREN:
i LYDIA, b. say 1632; m. by 1659 Samuel Pickman (eldest child b. Salem 4 December 1659).
ii HANNAH, b. say 1634; m. Woburn 12 November 1656 Matthew Johnson.
iii JONATHAN, bp. Salem 25 December 1636 [SChR 16]; no further record.
iv JEHOIDAN, bp. Salem 25 December 1636 [SChR 16]; m. Reading 27 March 1661 Benjamin Smith.
v REMEMBER, bp. Salem 16 October 1638 [SChR 17]; m. Boston 12 February 1661[/2] "Peter Aspinwall of Muddy River" [BVR 82 (also recorded at Reading)].
vi MARY, bp. Salem 15 December 1639 [SChR 17]; living in 1663, unmarried (codicil to father's will).
ASSOCIATIONS: Peter Palfrey was in partnership with ROGER CONANT, ANTHONY DIKE and FRANCIS JOHNSON in the beaver pelt trade and with Conant, and Nathaniel Pickman, Dike's successor, Palfrey sued Francis Johnson for failure to share the profit on a parcel of beaver received from Mr. [RICHARD] FOXWELL about 1635 [EQC 1:409]. This much-belated court case brought forward many interesting depositions regarding trade in the early years of the colony. Palfrey does not seem to have had the social standing of either Conant or Johnson, and was not called "Mr."
Peter Palfrey was frequently in association with John Balch, which may simply reflect the fact that these were two of the earliest inhabitants of Salem.
COMMENTS: In his deposition of 20 January 1680/1, RICHARD BRACKENBURY included "Peter Palfray" among those who were already resident at Salem prior to the arrival of JOHN ENDICOTT in 1628 [EIHC 13:138-39].
Peter Palfrey had a household of six in 1637. This would include Peter, his wife Edith, and daughters Lydia, Hannah and Jehoidan. The sixth member may have been son Jonathan, or, if he was already dead, Palfrey's servant Jane Wheat, who was at June Term 1637 whipped for killing his neighbor's poultry, for lying and loitering, and running away from her master [EQC 1:5].
At December Term 1649 Matthew Edwards, servant to Peter Palfrey, asked "liberty to bind himself to some other master to learn a trade, saying he was not Palfrey's servant, his master and dame to whom he was first bound being dead." The court instructed him to serve out his indenture to Palfrey [EQC 1:181]. At November Term 1662 "[w]hereas Benjamin Fairfeild, by consent of Salem county court, 29:9:660, made choice of Peeter Palfery for his guardian, until said Benjamin were twenty years of age, or at said Palfrie's death, the latter having lately deceased, he chose Mathew Edwards as his guardian, and the court confirmed it" [EQC 3:109; EPR 1:325].
Peter Palfrey was deputized as one of six men to view Mr. John Humphrey's land "least it should hinder the building of a college, which would be many men's loss," 18 April 1636 [STR 1:16]. He replaced John Woodbury, deceased, and served with Jeffrey Massey in fixing charges for a five acre lot bought by Mr. Matthew Williams of Marblehead, July Term, 1642 [EQC 1:42]. "Peter Palphry" was one of the men chosen to lay out the highway between Salem and Reading 25 March 1659 [EQC 2:333]. On 2 June 1662 Peter Palfrey deposed that nineteen or twenty years ago he was "called by John Johnson and the Marshall to appraise the Cog ponds farm" [SJC #444].
He took the inventory of widow Margery Worthen 20 July 1644, John Talbey, January 1644[/5], Edward Candall, November 1646 [EQC 1:71, 75, 105]. He proved the will of John Balch of Salem, 28 June 1648 and took his inventory [EQC 1:143-4].
In a civil case about an unknown cause, John Woodbury, Peter Palfrey and John Balch sued Elizabeth Babson at September Term 1639 [EQC 1:12].
The Great Migration Begins
