Person:Grace Ravens (5)

Grace Porter died in Watertown, leaving an undated will proved June 17, 1662, an abstract of which follows:

After devises to her “son John Sherman and to her daughter Elizabeth Smith” (who was her daughter by Thomas Rogers, and widow of Daniel Smith who died 1660), and after legacies to “her grandchildren,” each of whom she names, viz.: to Daniel Smith, who was the son of her daughter Elizabeth Rogers, and to John, Martha, Mary, Sarah and Joseph Sherman, all the children then living of Capt. John Sherman, she directs the residue to be divided equally between “her said son John Sherman, and her said daughter Elizabeth Smith.” “My brother John Coolidge and Lieutenant Richard Beers to be executors.”

My cousin John Sherman to be overseer, to whom “I give as followeth: to my said cousin Sherman the sum of forty shillings, and twenty shillings apiece to each of my said executors, brother John Coolidg and Lieutenant Beers.”

“Witnesses John Sherman and Mary Sherman.”

On one page of the inventory of this residue, a note about the division of Grace Porter’s estate says:

“In case their brother in England shall legally obtain against the estate that they jointly and equally do tender estate for satisfying the same that so neither side may be unequally represented by this award. The 8th of July, 1662, Simon Willard, Richard Russell, Thomas Danforth.”

“Their brother in England” is without doubt the Richard Sherman described in the bequest in Anne Auger’s will, as one of the two children of the wife of Thomas Rogers.

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2} Wood, Michael J., "The English Origin of Grace (Ravens) (Sherman) (Rogers) Porter and Mary (Ravens) Coolidge of Watertown, Mass.: New England Descendants of Ravens of Dedham, co. Essex," 62 [Apr-Jul 1987] : 65-77; 161-170., in The American Genealogist (TAG). (Donald Lines Jacobus, et.al.)
   (at 62:76-77).

   GRACE(1) RAVENS (Rev. Richard(A), William(B)) was probably born at East Bergholt, co. Suffolk, ca. 1591 and died at Watertown, Mass., on 3 June 1662. She married first at Wattisfield, co. Suffolk, on 26 Sept. 1611 JOHN SHERMAN, who was baptized at Dedham, co. Essex, on 17 Aug. 1585, son of Henry and Susan (Lawrence) Sherman and nephew of the Edmund Sherman whose tenant Grace's father had been. He was buried at Great Horkesley, co. Essex, on 24 Jan. 1615[/6]. Grace married secondly THOMAS ROGERS of Dedham, co. Essex, with whom she emigrated to New England ca. 1634. He was a proprietor of Watertown, Mass., 1636-37, admitted freeman 17 May 1637, and died there on 12 Nov. 1638, aged 50 (Bond p. 412). Grace married thirdly, as his second wife, ROGER PORTER of Watertown, who as a husbandman from Long Sutton, Hampshire, had emigrated in September 1638, aged 55, with four daughters. He was admitted freeman of Watertown 22 May 1639 and was made a selectman of Watertown in 1648, where he died on 3 April 1654 (Bond pp. 406-7, 910). (Bond [p. 865] is the source of the erroneous statement that Grace also married William(1) Palmer of Newbury; Grace's son John Sherman was a son-in-law of Palmer, not because Palmer was his stepfather but because John Sherman had married William Palmer's daughter Martha.) The undated will of Grace Porter was proved 17 June 1662 (Middlesex Co. PR File 12652), and has been printed in full in NEHGR 51 (1897) : 314. She named her son John Sherman, her daughter Elizabeth Smith, several grandchildren, and "my brother John Cooledge."