John Thomas (ca 1621 to 1692) and His Wife Sarah Pitney of Marshfield, Plymouth County, Massachusetts

John Thomas was born about 1621 in England. His parentage has not been determined. I believe it was this John Thomas who was a child of 14, unaccompanied by parents, when he came to New England in the fall of 1635 on the Hopewell’s second trip of the year. Robert Charles Anderson believes more proof is need to identify John Thomas of Marshfield as the young man on the Hopewell, primarily because there is an eight-year gap between the ship’s arrival and his appearance in Marshfield records.

I personally believe it is quite likely the John Thomas of Marshfield and the young man on on the Hopewell are one and the same. Perhaps there was a lack of records because he was an indentured servant and a minor for a portion of that time. Governor Edward Winslow did have an indentured servant named John Thomas. Another passenger on the same voyage, Robert Chambers, was known to be a servant of Winslow. The names of John Thomas and Robert Chambers appear adjacent to one another, immediately after that of Edward Winslow, in the Marshfield section of the 1643 Plymouth Colony list of men able to bear arms. John of the Hopewell is the right age to be John of Marshfield. There is no record found of his parents in New England, again supporting that he came here unaccompanied. 

On 27 February 1643-4 Gov. Winslow petitioned the town of Marshfield to grant land to John Thomas and Robert Chambers, effective upon the end of their servitude in November 1645. The land was next to Luke Lilly’s and it was too small for two men, so Winslow advised that the town grant them an enlargement in any convenient place. Winslow guaranteed the taxes until the end of their servitude. [Marshfield Town Records I:10] A grant of 30 acres to each of the men was made on 8 April 1644, so it appears John’s servitude ended by this date as there is no stipulation. The land was on the north side of the South River near the land of Capt. Miles Standish and Mr. John Alden. [Marshfield Town Records I:11]

I have read that after his indenture John was a lifelong overseer of Gov. Winslow’s Green Harbor estate, Careswell, but with no source given. I have not found any mention of this in Marshfield Town Records although my research is not all-encompassing.

Twenty years later, on 24 Oct 1664, the town made a further grant of 30 acres to John Thomas. [Marshfield Town Records, I-93]

John Thomas married Sarah Pitney on 21 December 1648 at Marshfield. [Marshfield Vital Records, p 5] Sarah was baptized 11 February 1627 at St. Olave, Southwark, Surrey, England, the daughter of James Pitney, felt maker. [St. Olave Parish Register 1583-1627, p 291] Her mother was Sarah Smith.  Sarah was age 7 on  the 11 April 1635  embarkation certificate for the ship Planter. [Hotten 56]  She migrated from England with her mother and brother to join her father James Pitney at Ipswich, Massachusetts. I wrote about James Pitney here.

John and Sarah had eight children born Marshfield [births of 1 through 7 recorded Marshfield Vital Records p 18]:

1. John born 16 Nov 1649; m Sarah —-; d 24 May 1699 (drowned) [History of Marshfield]

2. Elizabeth born 12 Sept 1652; some say she married a West and others that she died unmarried; Lysander Richards wrote she attended Gov. Winslow’s wife

3. Samuel 6 Nov 1655; m 27 May 1680 Mercy Ford in Marshfield [MVR p 16]; died 1720 [History of Marshfield]

4. Daniel born 20 Nov 1659; m 26 April 1698 Experience Tilden in Marshfield [MVR p 23]

5. Sarah born September 1662; m 12 Jan 1681/2 Benjamin Phillips of Marshfield [MVR p 16]

6. James born 30 Nov 1663; m 3 Jan 1692/3 Mary Tilden [Duxbury VR p 319]

7.  Ephraim born October 1667, removed to Little Compton RI [History of Marshfield]

8. Israel born about 1671; m 23 Feb 1698/9 Bethia Sherman in Marshfield [MVR p 23]; d 29 Jan 1755 in Marshfield in his 85th year [Descendants in the State of RI Providence Plantations p 108]

I descend from their daughter Sarah.I wrote about Sarah and her husband Benjamin here.

John Thomas took the oath of fidelity in 1657. [Nathaniel Shurtleff editor, Records of the Colony of New Plymouth, p 178] He served on a jury of inquest into the deaths of two men in Marshfield in 1655. [General Court of Plymouth Colony 31 January 1654/5 and 14 Feb 1654/5] He was surveyor at Marshfield in 1656 and 1679 [Marshfield Town Records I:56, 113] and constable there in 1664. [Marshfield Town Records I:92]

The town of Marshfield owned cattle, called the poor stock, that was loaned to the poor in town, often for a four-year period. On 24 May 1652 poor stock was given to Goodman Bump, Goodman Perry and John Thomas. [Marshfield Town Records, transcription of I:36, 1643-1878]

On 21 October 1679 Anthony Snow and John Bourne divided the poor stock to benefit the poor of the town. They found that John Thomas had a five increase of one cow valued at 6/9/0 and there was 4/6/0 due to John Thomas. Two of John Thomas’ cows were of the poor stock. [Marshfield Town Records, transcription of I:170, 1643-1878]

It is puzzling to me that John would have been considered a poor man. At times he served as a surveyor and constable, was literate as his inventory lists books which were expensive to buy in colonial America, he was a land-owner, and his inventory contained a considerable number of livestock. 

On the 16th of August 1683, John Thomas Senior delivered unto John Reed a cow of the Poor’s Stock by order from the overseers of the said Poor Stock for the said Reed to keep at the rate of the letting out the said stock for four years. [Marshfield Town Records, transcription, I:170, 1643-1878]

John Thomas was listed with other inhabitants as not attending town meeting, something that was subject to a fine, in August 1652, November 1652, July 1653, and August 1657. 

Lysander Richards wrote that the site of John and Sarah’s homestead is marked by a statue presented to Adelaide Phillips, the famous opera singer who lived on the land they once owned. Something I need to investigate further. 

In his 14 March 1663 will, James Pitney made a bequest to “my son John Thomas Sr” and appointed “my loved daughter Sarah Thomas” executrix. 

Sarah (Pitney) Thomas was buried 2 January 1682/83 at Marshfield. She was about 55 years old. 

John Sr.’s died at Marshfield, likely not many days before his inventory was taken on 12 January 1691/2. [Plymouth Probate Records, 1:116] The value of the estate, which did not include real estate, was not totaled but it was over 63 pounds. It included household items, books, corn, woolen cloth, a portion of a canoe, horse goods, tobacco, cider, two oxen, fifteen cows, six sheep, nine pigs, and farming tools, John Thomas of Duxborough, eldest son, made oath to this inventory on 16 March 1691/2; he gave bond on 26 March. [Plymouth file 20367]

There is conflicting information among historians and genealogists about when John died although his inventory convinces me of an approximate death of February or March 1691/2. Marcia Thomas wrote that John Thomas was buried 26 June 1673, but I cannot find this in Marshfield records. Lysander Richards gives John a 1676 death year. 

I believe both those dates are incorrect for various reasons with the main one being that when Sarah (Pitney) Thomas was buried in 1682, she was recorded as “wife of John Thomas sen.,” not as his widow or relict, indicating John was still living.

Another reason is that John Thomas and his son John appear in a 1684 list of Marshfield townsmen. [Digital image, ancestry.com “Massachusetts, U.S., Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988”] One is written as John Thomas and the other John Thomas has a notation next to his name which I decipher as “ye second.”

There is also conflating of the deaths of John and his son John Jr, who also married a woman named Sarah. The latter was drowned “going out of Greens harbour in a Cunnoe” on 20 May 1699 and administration on his estate was granted to his wife Sarah on 7 August 1699 (Plym I:307). This administration is incorrectly stated as that of John 1 Thomas in Pope’s Pioneers of Massachusetts.

There is a memorial monument to early settlers of Marshfield at the Old Winslow Burying Ground with these names inscribed:

Edward Winslow and wife Susanna

Kenelm Winslow and wife Ellen

Josiah Winslow and wife Margaret

Josiah Winslow and wife Penelope

William Thomas

Nathaniel Thomas and wife Mary

John Thomas and wife Sarah

Marshfield Monument to First Settlers [source: findagrave.com]

Sources Not Mentioned Above:

Milton Halsey Thomas, NEHGS Register, “Notes Historical Intelligence: The Death of John 1 Thomas of Marshfield,” 101:72

Marcia Thomas, Memorials of Marshfield, 1854

Lysander Richards, History of Marshfield, vol II, 1905

Barbara Lambert Merrick, The Mayflower Descendant, “Plymouth County Probate Records and Files,” 42:137 (July 1992)

Robert Charles Anderson, The Great Migration Begins, VII:22 (John Thomas) and II:37 (Robert Chambers), 1995