Person:Godfrey Armitage (1)

Godfrey Armitage from Savage

Godfrey Armitage, Lynn, 1630; a tailor; removed to Boston; freeman, 14 March 1639; by wife, Sarah, perhaps daughter of William Webb, had Samuel, born 7, baptized 12 October 1645, probably died young; Rebecca; and Samuel, again, born 14 April 1651. This last has mother, in the record, named Mary [Mary Cogswell, daughter of the first John]^[1]. By the will of Rebecca Webb, widow of William, all her estate was given to her grandchild, Rebecca Armitage.^[2]

Godfrey Armitage from The Ancestry of John Davis

Godfrey Armitage, of Lynn, 1630. Immigrant; a tailor. His brother Joseph, in 1661, made affidavit that he and Godfrey had eighty acres assigned to them in the division of Lynn lands.

Freeman, 14 March 1638/39.

In 1643, September, he signed petition of Jane, wife of brother Joseph, for a continuance to her of the license to "keep an ordinary;" the petition with his fac-simile may be found in the N. E. H. G. Reg., 1879.^[3] Godfrey removed to Boston, and, about 1644, married Sarah, daughter of William and Rebekah Webb; two children.

About 1650 he married second wife, Mary, daughter of John Cogswell, Senior, of Ipswich; she was born 1619. Her brother, John Cogswell, wrote from London, 30 March 1653, praying his father to help his "brother William and his brother Armitage," in the payment of £100., which he had "written to Armitage to pay for him because he lived in Boston." John Cogswell, Junior, died abroad; will of 13 December 1652, proved 27 September, 1653, made brother William and brother Armitage executors.

Armitage appeared in the settlement of several estates; as appraiser 1652, estate John Roberts; 1654, John Avery; 1655, Nathaniel Souther; 1662, William Brown; as debtor, 1652, to estate of Captain Bozone Allen; as creditor, 1659, of estate of John Maynard; 1664, of Andrew Cloade; and in 1664 estate of John Stone owed "Armitage the Taylor."

About December, 1654, Rebekah Webb died, leaving all her property to her grand-child, Rebekah Armitage, Godfrey's daughter; will mentions Godfrey, and he appears on the records as overseer.

In 1669, he was overseer of will of Elizabeth Bitfield, who left him 50s. as a token "of love;" also, 20s. to Sam. Armitage. The same year he made his own will, leaving a legacy to his "daughter, Rebekah Tarbox." I have no record of his death.^[4]

1. ↑ ^1.0 1.1 Anderson, Robert Charles; George F. Sanborn; and Melinde Lutz Sanborn. The Great Migration: Immigrants to New England, 1634-1635. (Boston, Massachusetts: NEHGS, 1999-2011)
   II:138.
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2} Savage, James. A Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England: Showing Three Generations of Those Who Came Before May, 1692, on the Basis of Farmer's Register. (Boston: Little, Brown, and Co, 1860-1862)
   1:63.
3. ↑ The New England Historical and Genealogical Register. (Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society)
   33 [1879] : 33.
4. ↑ ^4.0 4.1 Davis, Horace. Ancestry of John Davis, governor and U.S. Senator, and Eliza Bancroft, his wife, both of Worcester, Massachusetts. (San Francisco [California]: H. Davis, 1897)
   42f.
5. ↑ Early Lynn records are notoriously meager so it is difficult to know whether he was actually there that early.