Person:Peter Tilton (3)

m. 30 Jan 1610/11
  1. John Tilton1612/13 - Bef 1688
  2. Peter Tilton1620 - 1696
m. 10 May 1641
  1. Mary Tilton1643 -
  • HPeter Tilton1620 - 1696
  • WMary _____ - 1689
m. Bef 1689
  • HPeter Tilton1620 - 1696
  • WSarah HealdEst 1620 - 1711
m. 3 Nov 1690
Facts and Events
Name[1] Peter Tilton
Gender Male
Christening[3] 2 Apr 1620 Wolston, Warwickshire, England
Marriage 10 May 1641 Windsor, Hartford, Connecticut, United Statesto Elizabeth _____
Marriage Bef 1689 to Mary _____
Marriage 3 Nov 1690 Springfield, Hampden, Massachusetts, United Statesto Sarah Heald
Death[2] 11 Jul 1696 Hadley, Hampshire, Massachusetts, United States
References
  1. Best, Frank E. (Frank Eugene); William John Keep; and Helen Elizabeth Keep. John Keep of Longmeadow, Massachusetts, 1600-1676, and His Descendants: in which is Incorporated an Unpublished Keep Genealogy Prepared by W.J. Keep; a Record of Ancestry by Helen E. Keep; and the Extended Ancestry of Sallie Keep Best. (Chicago, Illinois: Frank E. Best, 1899)
    p.10.
  2. Savage, James. A Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England: Showing Three Generations of Those Who Came Before May, 1692, on the Basis of Farmer's Register. (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co, 1860-1862).

    PETER, Windsor, perhaps s. of William of Lynn, may never have been of Dorchester, yet early at W. and possib. came with Rev. Ephraim, Huit, there m. 10 May 1641, Elizabeth whose surname is lost, had Elizabeth bapt. 19 June 1642, wh. d. at 13 yrs.; Mary, 18 Feb. 1644; and Peter, 5 Dec. 1647, rem. a. 1659 up the riv. and was one of the first sett. at Hadley, took the freeman's o. 26 Mar. 1661, and o. of alleg. 8 Feb. 1679; was deac. rep. for H. 1665, and most yrs. foll. exc. 1667, when he was ret. mem. for Chelmsford, chos. Assist. in 1680, and so contin. exc. dur. the usurp. of Andros, and on the last elect, under the old chart. ten days bef. coming of the new, among the whole eighteen only Phips, Sewall, Russell, and Cooke had more votes than him. See 3 Mass. Hist. Coll. X. 120. He d. 11 July 1696. His sec. w. Mary, d. 16 Apr. 1689; and he m. 3 Nov. 1690, Sarah, wid. of deac. Benjamin Parsons, wh. had been wid. of John Leonard, both of Springfield; and she outliv. him and d. at S. 23 Nov. 1711.

    Of the two surv. ch. Peter was infirm in body and mind, kept under guardians, and did not perpet. the name. Mary m. Joseph Eastman of Suffield, and next James Guernsey, 17 Feb. 1693. Aft. the d. of Peter jr. in 1707, all the Tilton est. vested in Joseph Eastman gr.s. of the first peter.

  3. Johnson, Robert Leland. The ancestry of Anthony Morris Johnson. (Denver, Colorado: Robela Pub., c1989-1994, [1997?], [2000?], [2001])
    Vol. 12, p 6107.

    Baptized 2 APR 1620 in St. Margaret's Church, Wolston, Warwickshire, England. published in England as Tilton family genealogical notes by Debrett Ancestry Research (Winchester, England) 1986/7 [1] A copy of these documents were published in Vol 12 p 6104+ in The ancestry of Anthony Morris Johnson

  4.   Jacobus, Donald Lines, and Edgar Francis Waterman. Hale, House and Related Families, Mainly of the Connecticut River Valley. (Hartford: The Connecticut Historical Society, 1952)
    678+ .

    link Peter Tilton Married 3rd Sarah Heald widow of John Leonard

  5.   Davis, Walter Goodwin. The ancestry of Phoebe Tilton, 1775-1847, wife of Capt. Abel Lunt of Newburyport, Massachusetts. (Portland, Maine: The Anthoensen Press, 1947)
    8+.

    link 3. Peter2 Tilton (William1 ) was born in England, possibly about 1617. While he may have come to New England with his father, there is no record of him in Lynn and there is a traditional account which states that he preceded his family and migrated with Rev. Ephraim Huet in 1639. Mr. Huet, who had been a Puritan parson in Wroxall, CO. Warwick, vv;is settled as a colleague to Rev. John Warham in Windsor in the Connecticut country wlien he arrived in New England, and at Windsor we get our first trace of Peter Tilton. On May 10, 1641, Peter Tilton married Elizabeth at Windsor, and in that year he bought from Anthony Hawkins a small lot in the village on which he built a house. There he lived until 1650 when he bought the Buckland lot just north of the Sandy Hill road and built another house, presumably bigger and better. Aside from these few facts, and the births of his three children, nothing is known of Peter Tilton's life in Windsor. In the spring of 1659, after several years of religious differences, a strongly conservative minority of the church at Hartford and a like-minded majority of the church at Wethersfield, under the leadership of Rev. John Russell, decided to seek a new home above Springfield, in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Peter Tilton and John Hawks of Windsor joined this group in the foundation of the town of Hadley. All of the "withdrawers," as they were called, signed an agreement on April 18, 1659, at Goodman Ward's house at Hartford. In Hadley Peter Tilton speedily became one of the leading citizens. Strongly religious, he was one of the two original deacons of the new church, and, with apparent educational qualifications, he held the most important town offices. To lay out the land which the "withdrawers" had bought, two "town measurers" were appointed, one being Tilton, in 1660. He took the freeman's oath on March 26, 1661, and in that year he was elected the town's auditor and also town clerk which office he filled for thirty-two years or until 1693. He served the town as selectman in 1670, 1674, 1677, 1679 and 1687, and was elected "recorder of lands" in 1663. In 1664, from the trustees under the will of Edward Hopkins, Esq., who had lived in Hartford but who had returned to England, Hadley received £308 toward the foundation of a Grammar School, which at that period was the name given to a school basing its instruction on Latin and possibly Greek. When the board of five trustees of the school was formed in 1669, Peter Tilton was one of the two Hadley men elected. Tilton eventually resigned from this board, probably feeling that the small community did not justify a classical school but did need more practical elementary education. By 1686 the fortunes of the school had seriously declined and a local movement to devote the endowment to an English school was laid before the County Court of Springfield. Samuel Partridge of Hadley was the chief proponent of the change, and Peter Tilton, who was a justice of the court, was heartily in agreement with him. The Grammar School was upheld, however, and, it would seem, properly so. John Pyncheon, Esq., the chief-justice, said "Mr. Tilton, fully falling in with him, is as full and strong in all his notions as Mr. Partrigg himself . . . Mr. Tilton said it (the decision) would kindle such a flame as would not be quenched. But if to do right & secure the public welfare kindle a flame, the will of the Lord be done." Peter Tilton's contributions to the judicial and legislative system of his town, county and colony were distinguished. In Hadley he was a commissioner to end small causes, or local justice. For Hampshire county he acted as treasurer for ten years, was a member of the Council of War during the struggle with the Indians in the years from 1675 to 1677 known as King Philip's war and by 1680 he was a justice of the Hampshire county court. He represented his town in the General Court of Massachusetts Bay in Boston in 1665, 1666, 1668 and 1670- 1679. He was also a legislator in 1667 but representing the town of Chelmsford. Mr. Peter Golding of Hadley accused Tilton of packing a court in 1693 and was fined £5 for the slander. Tilton's judicial career culminated in his election in 1681 as an "assistant" of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which position he held until the beginning of the administration of Sir Edmund Andros in 1686. The assistants to the Governor had originally executive, legislative and judicial powers and duties, but long before Peter Tilton's time their functions had become solely judicial and they acted as the final court of appeal in the colony. Having gone through the successive stages of "Mr." and "Esq." in the colonial social scale he now became "The Worshipful" Peter Tilton, which fulsome title was still a degree below "Honorable" which was sometimes granted him. The Court of Assistants met twice a year during Tilton's incumbency, and he must have been very much at home in the provincial capital of Boston and a familiar figure in its society. The most interesting feature of Peter Tilton's history is by its very nature the most obscure. In 1660 General Whalley and General Goffe, two of the Puritan judges of the Commonwealth who had sentenced King Charles I to death, sought refuge in New England on the eve of the restoration of King Charles II. Hunted throughout the colonies by British agents, they eventually found asylum in Hadley under the protection of Rev. John Russell, the parson, and Peter Tilton, the chief layman of the town. There they remained in concealment for the remainder of their lives, possibly fourteen to sixteen years. Mr. Russell never left Hadley during those years, and Peter Tilton, frequently in Boston, acted as the agent of the family and friends of the regicides in sending and receiving information and in obtaining the necessary funds for their support. The secret was perfectly kept although it must have been known to the Russell and Tilton families and even to some others in the village. So well was it kept, in fact, that when Governor Hutchinson visited Hadley to gather facts for his History of Massachusetts, published in 1764, the people had little of memory or tradition to give him. In later da}T s they made up for this lack, and spectacular and dramatic stories of the two generals were told, particularly of the appearance of one of them, armed and ready to lead in the defense of the town when an alarm was sounded during King Philip's war. They are all apocryphal, however.[History of Hadley, Silvester Judd, 2nd edition, 1905] Peter Tilton's first wife, Elizabeth, may have died before he left Windsor. His second wife, Mary , died in Hadley April 16, 1689. She must have been a woman of intelligence, for one of his letters to her from Boston contains comments on colonial and international politics which are a compliment to her understanding. As his third wife he married on November 3, 1690, Abigail Parsons [sic see Hale-House above her name was Sarah not Abigail], widow of Deacon Benjamin Parsons of Springfield and previously widow of John Leonard. Tilton died at Hadley July 11, 1696, and his widow survived until November 23, 1711. Tilton made his will on April 24, 1694, and it was proved September 16, 1696. To his wife he left one third of his lands and housing in Hadley or elsewhere for life, and, if she chose to live in Hadley, she was to have the use of the west end of his house, both lower and upper rooms, also £10 and the things that she brought to their marriage. To his daughter Mary Eastman, to whom he had already given a full portion, 20s., and to her two sons Peter Eastman and Joseph Eastman 10s. apiece. To his son Peter Tilton, his house and barn, lands and movables in Hadley or elsewhere, except what was given to his wife, and he shall not have power to sell the house and lands without the consent in writing of the executors. "Also my fatherly advice and charge is that he does not remove his habitation or dispose of himself in marriage without the advice of my executors." Also to his son Peter "the bed I now lye on with all the furniture thereto belonging." Executors : loving friends Capt. Aaron Cooke Esqr. and Samuel Partrigg. The estate was surprisingly small, considering the man's prominence, and this is possibly to his credit. The reputation of more than one of his prominent contemporaries is marred by the use made of governmental position to obtain great land grants for no acknowledged return. The entire estate was valued at £300, the homestead being entered at £60. Except for a silver cup, it contained no articles of luxury. Of books, however, there were many. "Book," and "books," without titles, are listed nine times. In addition there are bibles, psalm books, annotations, concordances, law books, Fox's Booh of Martyrs, Zealand's Index, The Resolves and Prophesy of Daniel, and works by Cotton, Clark, Dalton, Tocker and others. This "Inventory of ye Estate of ye Worship11 Petr Tilton Esqr who dyed 11 July 1696" was taken by Lieut. Joseph Kellogg and Lieut. Timothy Nash on July 16, 1696.[Hampshire Probate, Box 148, No. 18.]

    Children, by first wife, born in Windsor:
    i. Elizabeth, bapt. June 19, 1642; d. in 1655.
    ii. Mary, bapt. Feb. 18, 1643/4; m. (1) Joseph Eastman of Suffield who d. in April, 1692; m. (2) Feb. 17, 1693, James Guernsey.
    iii. Peter, bapt. Dec. 5, 1647. He was, according to tradition, feebleminded and constantly guarded, and must have been a source of great sadness and anxiety to his father. He was still living in 1707 when he would have been sixty years old.

Founders of Windsor, CT
Windsor was the first permanent English settlement in Connecticut. Local indians granted Plymouth settlers land at the confluence of the Farmington River and the west side of the Connecticut River, and Plymouth settlers (including Jonathan Brewster, son of William) built a trading post in 1633. But the bulk of the settlement came in 1635, when 60 or more people led by Reverend Warham arrived, having trekked overland from Dorchester, Massachusetts. Most had arrived in the New World five years earlier on the ship "Mary and John" from Plymouth, England. The settlement was first called Dorchester, and was renamed Windsor in 1637.

See: Stiles History of Ancient Windsor - Thistlewaite's Dorset Pilgrims - Wikipedia entry

Loomis homestead, oldest in CT.
Settlers at Windsor by the end of 1640, per the Descendants of the Founders of Ancient Windsor: Abbot - Alford - S. Allen - M. Allyn - Barber - Bartlett - M. (Barrett) (Huntington) Stoughton - Bascomb - Bassett - Benett - Birge - Bissell - Branker - Brewster - Buckland - Buell - Carter - Chappel - D. Clarke - J. Clarke - Cooke - Cooper - Denslow - Dewey - Dibble - Dumbleton - Drake - Dyer - Eels - Eggleston - Filley - Ford - Foulkes - Fyler - Gaylord - Francis Gibbs - William Gilbert - Jere. Gillett - Jon. Gillett - N. Gillett - Grant - Gridley - E. Griswold - M. Griswold - Gunn - Hannum - Hawkes - Hawkins - Hayden - Haynes - Hill - Hillier - Holcombe - Holmes - Holt - Hosford - Hoskins - Hoyte - Hubbard - Huit - Hulbert - Hull - Hurd - Hydes - Loomis - Ludlow - Lush - Marshfield - A. Marshall - T. Marshall - Mason - M. (Merwin) (Tinker) Collins - M. Merwin - Mills - Moore - Newberry - Newell - Oldage - Orton - Osborn - Palmer - Parsons - Parkman - Pattison - Phelps - Phelps - Phillips - Pinney - Pomeroy - Pond - Porter - Preston - Rainend - Randall - Rawlins - Reeves - J. Rockwell - W. Rockwell - B. Rossiter - St. Nicholas - Saltonstall - Samos - M. Sension (St. John) – R. Sension - Sexton - Staires - Starke - F. StilesH. Stiles - J. StilesT. Stiles - Stoughton - Stuckey - Talcott - E. Taylor - J. Taylor - Terry - Thornton - Thrall - Tilley - Tilton - Try - F. (Clark) (Dewey) (Phelps) - Vore - Warham - Weller - Whitehead - A. Williams - J. Williams - R. Williams - Wilton - Winchell - Witchfield - Wolcott - Young
Current Location: Hartford County, Connecticut   Parent Towns: Dorchester, Massachusetts   Daughter Towns: Windsor Locks; South Windsor; East Windsor; Ellington; Bloomfield