Col. Read is supposed to have been a son of Sir Thomas and Mary Cornwall, of Brocket Hall in Hertfordshire, England. His paternal grandfather had been Clerk of the Green Cloth, and his maternal grandfather was Lord of Strophshire. His elder brother Compton was a baronet. He came to America in the great fleet in 1630, with Winthrop and others, and settled in Salem, Mass. He was made freeman the same year. He had a town-grant of three hundred acres of land in 1637, lying contiguous to that of Gov. Endicutt, and being what now constitutes the celebrated farms of Kendall Osburne, Esq., and the Hon. Ricard S. Rogers, in South Danvers, known many years as the Derby Farms, together with some smaller lots. The first settlers had grants of land in proportion to their amount of funds in the common stock, and their means of cultivating the same. There were but four persons in Salem who had as large grants of land as Col. Read. The name of his wife was Alsea. Their children were Thomas, Jacob, and Abraham; and they were probably born in England. He was a very prominent man in the Colony, and held the rank of colonel as early as 1613, and was probably an officer of that rank before he came to America. He was a colonel in the British Army, at the restoration of Charles II, in1660. He died in England in 1663, and his son Abraham settled his estate.
