Transcript:Savage, James. Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England/v3p566

wh. tells how his gr.mo. bec. w. of famous Richard Rogers, author of the
seven treatises, and father of our Ezekiel, tho. he is very copious in acco.
of both Richard and Dedham John, yet being wholly silent a. the witness
of Smithfield fire, my friend, Charles Deane, the scrupulous antiquary at
Cambridge, is strongly inclined to disbelieve, that either of these prominent
Essex divines could be gr.s. much less own s. of the martyr. His
valua. argument on the assum. point of genealogy may be seen in the
Cambridge Chronicle of 3 Jan. 1850. Resort is had by the diligent
writer in Geneal, Reg. V. 101, to the "identical bible wh. belong. to the
protomartyr, print. in 1649," "own. by a descend. at Lunenburg" That
volume had been oft. and once or twice with severest, not unaid. scutiny,
examin. by me. It may be premised, that no English bible, print. in
1549, by Carwood and Jugge, printers of our Lunenburg exemplar, after
diligent search for one hundred yrs. had been discovered; and all competent
judges are now agreed, that the opinion formerly thrown out, as to
such an edit. is without support But the Lunenburg copy is very
clearly ascertain. to be of the yr. 1651, the earliest Eng. bible, indeed, of
Elizabeth's reign, yet six yrs. after Rogers was burned at Smithfield.
Infallible proof of this was furnish. by Mr. Stevens of London, and another
mod. disting. biblic. bibliograph. George Offer of London, on a part
of the volume sent from this country; and by collation, in many hours by
myself, with a sheet of the bible of 1651, sent hither from London, by Mr.
O. to his friend George Livermore, Esq. of Cambridge, the perfect. identity
is exhibit. in the printer's monogram, the pictures, and the minutest
parts of single words, and letters, in the text, correct as well as erroneous.
So that this relic, however valua. in itself, affords no prop to the claim
of descent from him, any more than it does to the wild tradit. that the
noble martyr held this same precious copy in his hand, when suffering at
the stake. In proof of the fable, Geneal, Reg. III. 373, truly says the
vol. "is much burnt,?" and it might have add. that it better would have
pleased the partakers of the triumph to have burned the book instead of
the man. But of the burnt part, wh. very slightly affect. the print.
Queen Elizabeth in her service book of 1661, suffers most, as I testify.
Many of us know of volumes, burnt in part, that never were in the
hands of martyrs in Smithfield. From every long protract, inquiry, in
order to sustain or reverse my first express of better. belief in the
descent of our N. E. posterity of Nataniel Rogers, the closest approach
to any exact relation with the martyr amounts only to this: the f. of
Rev. William Jenkin of London, wh. was min. of Sudbury, when William
was b. 1612, and of course the predecess. of our John Wilson was
gr.s. of a d. of the sufferer of 1555, and he had stud. under the old puritan,
Richard Rogers of Wethersfield. See Palmer's Non-Conform. Mem.