"William (Curtis), bp. Nazeing 21 June 1618, d. Roxbury late 1634 ('He was a hopeful scholar, but God took him in the end of the year 1634' [RChR 75]). … The child William has presented a problem to those who have treated the Curtis family in the past. He clearly existed, for Eliot tells us about his arrival a year before his father, and his death not long after. But the date of marriage of the immigrant to Sarah Eliot, the baptism of son Thomas nineteen months later, and the regular arrival of children after that leave no place for William. The discovery of a marriage in London in 1615 for a William Curtis of 'Nassinge' provides him with a wife early enough to be the mother of the William baptized at Nazeing in 1618. Unfortunately, the Nazeing parish registers for these years do not name either of the parents of the child, so there remains a possibility that this William belongs in another family. There is, however, no baptism for another William anywhere near the right time, and there is no evidence for a second adult William Curtis of Nazeing who could have made the London marriage, and so the solution above is adopted."
