Person:Thomas Hale (9)

"His (Thomas Hale) name first appears in Coffin, under date of August 10, 1638. 'Thomas Hale and John Baker are appointed haywards till the town shall appoint new.' (pg 28.) 'February 23d (1642) a generall towne meeting (of Newbury). By the gererll consent of all ther freemen the stinting of the commons was referred to Henry Short, Mr. (Edward) Woodman, Edward Rawson, Thomas Hale, and Mr. (John) Woodbridge, according to their best judgments and discretions.' (Coffin, pp. 35, 36)

He removed to Haverhill, probably in 1645. In that year he is named as a 'landholder' in Haverhill, and 'from Newbury.' His name heads the list of the first board of selectmen chosen in Haverhill in 1646. In that year his name first appears on the record of assessments in that town. In 1647 he was chosen by the town and approved by the General Court, with Henry Palmer and Thomas Davis, 'to try small causes.' The same year he was appointed by the General Court a commissioner to lay out a road from Andover to Haverhill. In 1648 he was appointed by the town 'to keep a ferry.' In 1649 he was elected constable, the first chosen in Haverhill. In 1650 he was appointed by the town 'to meet men from Salisbury to lay out bounds between that town and Haverhill.' In 1651 'Little River' in Haverhill was named as "Thomas Hale's River." (See Mirick's Haverhill, and Chase's Haverhill.)

In or about the year 1652 he returned to Newbury, and continued to reside there till 1657, when he removed to Salem. There he remained till about the year 1661, when he again returned to Newbury, where he continued to reside till his death.

His name appears in the list of proprietors of Newbury, declared by the ordinance of Dec. 7, 1642, as the only persons 'acknowledged to be freeholders by the town and to have proportionable right in all waste lands, commons and rivers undisposed,' &c. &c.

In Felt's 'Annals of Salem,' his name appears in the list of 'glovers' in 1659. It also appears in the town records of Salem in 1657 as 'Sarjent Thomas Hale,' and he is several times referred to in those records as 'clerk of the market.'

After his final return to Newbury, he is found among the active supporters of the Rev. Mr. Parker in his controversies with a portion of his church, while the name of his son Thomas appears uniformly among the antagonists of Mr. Parker, known as 'Mr. Woodman's party.'

Conveyances of real estate to and from him appear in the Essex records in 1640, 1652, 1655, 1656, 1666, and 1669, in which he is described as 'of Newbury.' In conveyances appearing in 1647 and 1648, he is described as 'of Haverhill'; in one of Jan. 15, 1652-3, as 'of Newbury, late of Haverhill'; and in sundry of 1658, 1659, 1660 and 1661, as 'of Salem.' In these conveyances he is usually described as 'glover,' sometimes as 'yeoman,' and once as 'leather-dresser.'

He seems to have been an active and public-spirited citizen, held in respect by his fellow citizens in the several towns in which he lived, and his long life was evidently one of active usefulness. By trade a glover, he united with that employment some practice as a surveyor, and his various public employments show him to have been a man of fair education and business qualifications.

He died in Newbury, Dec. 21, 1682. His widow Thomasine survived him just forty days (a 'widow's quarantine'), and died in Newbury, Jan. 30, 1682-3. No will appears on record, nor any administration of his estate."^[4]

Disputed Lineages

Thomas Hale {1633, Roxbury} seems to have been sometimes confused with this Thomas Hale {1638, Newbury}.

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 1.7 1.8 1.9} Threlfall, John B. Fifty Great Migration Colonists to New England & their Origins. (Madison, Wisconsin: J.B. Threlfall, 1990)
   171-174.
2.   Davis, Walter Goodwin, Compiler, and Introduction by Gary Boyd Roberts. Massachusetts and Maine Families in the Ancestry of Walter Goodwin Davis (1885-1966): A Reprinting, in Alphabetical Order by Surname, of the Sixteen Multi-Ancestor Compendia (plus Thomas Haley of Winter Harbor and His Descendants). (Baltimore, Maryland, United States: Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc., 1996)
   II:62-65.
3.   Hale, Robert Safford, and George Rogers, Editor Howell. Genealogy of Descendants of Thomas Hale of Watton, England, and of Newbury, Mass. (Albany, N. Y.: Weed, Parsons and Company, 1889)
   17-21.
4. ↑ Hale, Robert S. Thomas Hale, the Glover, of Newbury, Mass., 1635, and His Descendants (1877). New England Historical and Genealogical Register. (New England Historic Genealogical Society, Jan 1877)
   31:83-84.
5.   Reynolds, Cuyler. Hudson-Mohawk genealogical and family memoirs: a record of achievements of the people of the Hudson and Mohawk valleys in New York state included within the present counties of Albany, Rensselaer, Washington, Saratoga, Montgomery, Fulton, Schenectady, Columbia and Greene. (New York, New York: Lewis Historical Pub., c1911)
   New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1911. 2:568.

   by Reynolds, Cuyler. (Family History Library, 974.74 D3r)

6. ↑ Col. Banks and John Brooks Threlfall say that he came on the Hector. Others do not, and he is not on any published passenger list for that ship.