Transcript:Corrections to the Spalding Memorial

Introduction

As noted in two articles in The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, transcripts of which are provided below, the 1897 Spaldng Memorial combines the children of Joseph² and his son Joseph³, omitting the father's elder children and not mentioning the son, Joseph, and his wife, Mary, at all.

Transcripts

New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 63:379-81, October 1909

SPAULDING—In the early part of the eighteenth century there were two men named Joseph Spaulding in Chelmsford, Mass. One was Joseph³ (John², Edward¹), born 22 Oct. 1673. He was a husbandman, and married Elizabeth Colburn. He was called Junior, to distinguish him from the other Joseph, though the difference in their ages was only about two years.

The second Joseph was a wheelwright, with wife Mary. He was sometimes called Senior, though he often appears without such a suffix. In 1715, and after, he purchased land in Groton, but retained his Chelmsford estate, and from that date divided his time between the two towns, though mainly living in Groton, In 1717 his daughter Susanna had the use of his Chelmsford farm. It was claimed that he owed taxes in Chelmsford, and Joseph Spaulding the husbandman, being town constable, entered the house and seized certain domestic utensils to meet the claim. This led to a suit in the Inferior Court of Common Pleas. The bill of complaint alleges that Joseph Spaulding, Jr., (the husbandman) entered the "hired house of Susanna Spaulding, spinster," and seized articles as aforesaid, but that they were hers, not those of Joseph Spaulding the wheelwright. Various depositions appear, among them that of Thomas Read, Jr., who states that he saw "Joseph Spaulding of Chelmsford who desired me if I met his brother [sic] Joseph Spaulding to inform him that he had that day been to his house and made distress upon" the articles mentioned. Judgment was for the plaintiff, the articles to be returned and costs paid. "Joseph Spaulding of Groton" receipts for the money due, and the official record calls him father of Susanna.

Joseph the wheelwright appears in the Court of Sessions for 1748 in a petition from the selectmen of Dunstable, dated 8 Mar. 1747. They state that he is living in that town, "upwards of seventy-six years old," infirm and poor, and they ask that the Court compel such of his children as are well-to-do to support him, naming them thus: Joseph Spaulding and John Spaulding of Dunstable, Ebenezer Spaulding of Westford, Susanna, wife of Mousel Wright of Woburn, Mary, wife of John Nutting of Groton, and Lydia, wife of Ephraim Nutting of Groton, The selectmen add that the father once had a "good estate," but that he passed it over to his children. Deeds confirm this. In the order of the Court his son Joseph is called "eldest son," The father elected to make his home with Ephraim Nutting. This paper has a strong secondary importance in that it gives the identity of the wives of the Nuttings. The latter were brothers, sons of an older John Nutting and wife Mary Woods, and grandsons of John and Mary (Lakin) Nutting. Joseph Spaulding the wheelwright does not appear in the Spaulding Genealogy. Who was he? In the genealogy we have the history of an older man of the same name.

JOSEPH² SPAULDING (Edward1) was born 25 Oct. 1646; removed in middle life to Plainfield, Conn., and died there 3 Apr. 1740, He married, 9 Dec. 1670, MERCY (or MARY) JEWELL, and is said to have had these children:

i. EUNICE,³ b. 14 Feb. 1685; not traced.

ii. NATHANIEL, b. 24 Feb. 1687; m. JOHANNA _____.

iii. THOMAS, b. 2 Apr. 1690; m. MERCY WELCH.

iv. MERCY, b. 21 Feb. 1692; not traced.

v. SUSANNA, b. 12 Sept. 1695; not traced.

vi. JOSEPH, b. 16 Apr. 1697.

vii. JOSEPH, b. 17 Apr. 1699; d. at Dunstable 9 Mar. 1772; m. at Dunstable MARY _____.

viii. EBENEZER, b. __ July 1701; m. HANNAH CRAFT, and lived in Westford.

ix. MERCY, b. __ Oct. 1703; not traced.

x. MARY, b. 29 Jan. 1706; not traced.

xi. LYDIA, b. 1 July 1708; not traced.

xii. RACHEL, b. 9 Sept. 1710; not traced.

If the above is correct, it is remarkable in that, first, there is no sign of children until the parents were married nearly fifteen years, after which twelve were born, and, secondly, that the last child was born forty years after the marriage, at which time the father was sixty-four years old, and the mother, according to her age at death, fifty-eight.

Compare the last half of the foregoing with that of Joseph the wheelwright. His wife was Mary, and his children were:

i. SUSANNA, m. MOUSEL WRIGHT.

ii. JOSEPH, eldest son; was living in Dunstable in 1747, and deeds show that his wife was MARY.

iii. EBENEZER, was residing in Westford in 1747.

iv. MERCY, probably, m. SIMON RUMRILL about 1722, Simon receiving land from Joseph the wheelwright in 1727. Also, in 1743 Simon's "usual place of abode" was at the house of John Spaulding. (See Inferior Court, Nutting v. Rumrill.)

v. MARY, m. JOHN NUTTING.

vi. LYDIA, m. EPHRAIM: NUTTING.

vii. JOHN, was living in Dunstable in 1747.

The father of these children, Joseph the wheelwright, was seventy-six years old in 1747, which places his birth about 1671, This is significant in view of the fact that the older Joseph Spaulding and Mercy Jewell were married in 1670. Middlesex Deeds, vol. 17, p. 182, 26 Sept. 1712, adds emphasis to the point. Joseph Spaulding and wife Mercy, of Plainfield, to my son Joseph Spaulding, wheelwright, of Chelmsford, various lots of land in the last-named town, "on condition that my said son Joseph shall have no right to my land in Plainfield."

It is the contention of this article that, a year after his marriage to Mercy Jewell, Joseph² Spaulding (Edward¹) had a son Joseph born; that said son was the wheelwright, and that the genealogy has omitted a generation and joined the children of the son to those of the father. As a final point, attention is called to the fact that, in the suit of Spaulding v. Spaulding, above quoted, Joseph the wheelwright is called "brother" of the contemporaneous Joseph the husbandman, though, as before shown, they were not children of the same father. The husbandman married Elizabeth Colburn. The writer knows but little of the latter family, but supposes she was born 8 Apr. 1679, daughter of John and Elizabeth (_____) Colburn, and supposes, further, that John previously has a wife Susanna Read. If so, he had a daughter Mary born 23 Oct. 1671. Observe that Joseph the wheelwright had wife Mary and children Susanna and John. Were the wheelwright and the husbandman "brothers" because they had married sisters? WILLIAM H. MANNING. Somerville, Mass.

New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 64:79, January 1910

SPAULDING, SHEPARD.—The Spaulding Genealogy does omit children of Joseph Spaulding, Sr., and join the remaining list with that of the son's children (Register, vol. 63, p. 380), For further data consult records at Plainfield and Willimantic. Hannah, daughter of Joseph and Mercy (Jewell) Spaulding, married Issac Shepard, Sr., of Plainfield, Conn., son of Isaac Shepard of Concord, Mass., by his wife Mary Smedley. Isaac Shepard, Jr., of Plainfield, married Mary Gerould. This corrects the Spaulding work, and supplies the missing wives for the two generations of Shepards. Yale Station, New Haven, Conn. E. N. SHEPPARD.