Person:Robert Taprill (1)

Robert TAPRILL, called Mr., mariner, proprietor of Portsmouth, married Abishag Walton (dau of George1 Walton) after 1659. He was a Wittness Champernowue to Walton, 1661. In 1672 they where living in Boston in Alexander Waldron’s house. She seems to have left her husband and returned to her father's house at Newcastle soon afterward, opening a shop to maintain her family. Robert Taprill was captain of the pinke Hopewell in 1676 when he was sued for wages by Francis Pallet, and of the ketch Providence when he died at sea in Nov. 1678. Lists 302b, 311a, 313a, 330ab, 331b. The widow died January 1678-9. See ‘Ancestry of Lydia Harmon’ (W. G. Davis, 1924). Children named in grandfather Walton’s will:
1) Alice, suspected of having had an illegit. ch. 1685.
2) Priscilla, married at Boston 18 Aug. 1699 Francis Caswell; d. bef. 1714 when his w. was Jane.
3) Grace, had illegit. ch. 1700 which she laid to John Tomson of Kittery; married first to Israel Hoyt and probably married second to Sampson Babb.

Robert Taprill was one of the proprietors of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in 1660. He was a mariner. The name, which is also spelled Taperell, is met with in the New England records
with extreme infrequency, and, inasmuch as the seventeenth century clerks, like their contemporary descendants, were liable to occasional error, it seems probable that the William Taprill, who testified in Hampton Quarterly Court in October, 1650, that he had served a summons on Humphrey Chadborne for his master, George Walton, was the Robert Taprell who subsequently married Walton’s daughter.

Abishag Walton was unmarried when she witnessed a deed for her father in 1659, J and the date of her wedding is uncertain. Taprill was at Great Island in the summer of 1661 and witnessed a bill binding Mr. Francis Champernowne to pay twenty-six pounds to her father.§ They were married before 1663, however, when she was presented at the Quarterly Court, as Abishag Taperill, for not attending meeting for several months, from which we judge that she also inclined to the Quaker belief. In 1672 they were living in Boston in a house which was owned by Mr William Waldron, and which his brother, Mr. Alexander Waldron of Piscataqua River, bought of him in that year, for eighty pounds. Mr. Alexander Waldron died in 1676 and left this house and land to Mrs. Taprill for the period of her life, and also two gold rings which were in a purse in his chest.... Children:

1) Alice. In 1685 she was suspected of having had an illegitimate child, and a jury of women was given a warrant to inquire into the case.

2) Priscilla. She was m. to Francis Caswell by Rev. Mr. Miles in Boston, Aug. 18, 1699. Caswell was the only son of William and Mary (Hudson) Caswell, and was b. Dec. 23, 1671, in Boston. His only sister, Elizabeth, was the wife of Henry Dickson. His mother, who was a daughter of Francis Hudson, m. second, Neville. Priscilla Caswell d. before 1714, and her husband m. Jane

3) Grace. By the will of her grandfather she inherited her mother’s house at Great Island. She was presented for having an illegitimate child in 1700. She was outside the jurisdiction of the court, however, and did not return until nearly a year later, when she “owned herself guilty,” stated that John Tomson of Kittery was the child’s father and paid a fine of £2: 10. J The reasons for believing that she subsequently married Israel Hoyt are given in the account of the Hoyt family.

The author examines the probate records in England and believes Robert was the son of Richard and Grace Taprile of Millbrook in the parish of Maker in Cornwall who left a will dated 4 Sep 1664 and probated on the same day leaving a bequest to son Robert. A bp record for Robert is dated 1 Sep 1637 in Maker, Cornwall, England is perhaps that of this immigrant.

Robert Taprill; Taperell Portsmouth, mariner, proprietor, 1660. Wife Abisha, d. leaving a nuncupative will dated Jan. 25, 1678-9, left children, not specified by names. Alexander Waldren, who d. at Great Island in 1676, bequeathed a house in Boston to Abisha for her life and 10 li. to her dau. Alice Taprell; the latter was also a legatee of George Walton, Sen. in 1686, to 8 acres of land jointly with her sister Priscilla, while he gave their sister Grace "the house her mother died in."