Pheinhas Forbush, s/o Jonathan, b. 4 Mar 1721, m. Westborough 5 Jan 1743 Sarah Bellows.
[On p. 31, Pierce says "From a private diary ... it is learned that Phinehas Forbush, of Westborough, Mass., died at Fort Massachusetts July 16, 1746". However, the accompanying narrative is very confusing. Pierce mentions a will dated 24 Oct 1747, which is obviously impossible. The will "mentions his wife Sarah as administrator", the term administrator indicating there was no will. So one suspects this might have been some sort of division or settlement of the estate, or more remotely a nuncupative (verbal) will relayed by a survivor. Pierce further confuses things by giving the birth date of second daughter Lucy in 1748, which turns out to be a typo, her birth being recorded in 1743 in the Westborough VRs. He also mentions the year 1756 in his narrative, which is also probably a typo for 1746, but all these errors leave the chronology of events completely unclear to the reader. To top it all off, it appears Pierce got the year of the diary entry wrong (individual entries do not give the year, it must be measured from the first entry). Referring to the Calder transcription cited below, the diary starts on p. 3, dated 19 Dec 1745. On p. 11 is an entry for Wed 16 Jul 1746, p. 12 is Thu 17 Jul 1746. On p. 27, the writer (who was not himself at Fort Massachusetts) arrives in Quebec on Thu 25 Sep 1746. Here the entries become nearly daily and longer. So, on p. 79, where Phineas is mentioned, the entry should be 1747. A check of the named days of the weeks seems to agree with this assessment, as 17 Jul 1747 was a Friday, whereas 17 Jul 1746 would have been a Thursday. Since Pierce's date, 16 Jul 1746, is actually before the wikipedia:Siege of Fort Massachusetts, it would imply Phineas died of disease at the fort, instead of in captivity, which is qualitatively wrong.]