RICHARD SACKET was the son of Captain Joseph Sacket, of Newtown, Queens County, Long Island, probably by his first marriage, with Elizabeth, daughter of Captain Richard Betts, of Newtown.
He studied theology, and married (before November, 1711) Elizabeth, daughter of Lieutenant John Kirtland, of Saybrook, Connecticut, who survived him.
In 1711 he was preaching to the Presbyterian congregations in Maidenhead and Hopewell, New Jersey. In 1712 his residence was in Saybrook. Early in 1714 he succeeded Mr. John Jones (Harv. Coll. 1690) in preaching to the First Church in Greenwich (old parish), Connecticut, but by 1716 changed to the supply of the pulpit in the parish at what was then called Horse Neck in the Western part of the same town. His ministrations here were so acceptable that the General Assembly granted in October, 1716, an application from the Society to organize a church, and accordingly a church was quickly formed (perhaps in the following month), and Mr. Sacket ordained pastor.
He remained in this office until his sudden death, in Greenwich, May 8, 1727. A notice of his death in the New England Weekly Journal says that “he was so well the day before that he preached both parts of the day."
He is reported to have been of a mild temper and pleasing manners, and much beloved by his people. His children remained in Greenwich. The inventory of his estate (dated August 15, 1729) amounted to about two thousand pounds, fifty pounds being in books.
AUTHORITIES.
Greenwich 2d Church 150th Anniversary, 23–26.
Mead, Hist. of Greenwich, 108.
Records of Presbyterian Church in U. S., 1706–88, 22.
Riker, Annals of Newtown, 345.
R. D. Smyth, College Courant, August 15, 1868, 99.
