My 11th great grandfather earned this moniker of “Madman” in Cubbington, England in the 1630s.
Cubbington is a small village south of Birmingham on Welsh Road, an old sheep drovers’ route connecting London and Wales.
Edward was the son of Thomas Greswold and Elizabeth Shuckburgh. He was christened 5 Aug 1594 in Tanworth-In-Arden, Warwickshire, England. Edward died 20 Aug 1633 in Cubbington, Warwickshire. He married Margaret Blencoe 20 May 1618 in Drayton, Oxfordshire, England. She was born about 1590 in Merston, Northants, England, the daughter of John Blencoe and Mary Wallison. Margaret died 16 Jun 1633 in Cubbington.
Dugdale’s “Antiquities” wrote, “About 1635 (sic) Edward Greswold was deeply possessed with these two fancies: 1) That we must not communicate with sinners. 2) Nor use any human inventions in God’s service.” (The date of 1635 is obviously an approximation because Edward and his wife both died in 1633, evidenced by the break-in by the Justice of the Peace.)
To avoid the first, he shut himself and children in his house, having no meat but what was put in at a hole or window, suffering no man to come in to minister unto them, nor even, when they lay sick and in great misery; insomuch that the Justice of the Peace in consideration of his case gave order to break open his house where they found him very sick on his bed and two of his children dead. And to avoid the other, he cut out the contents and the titles of everything in his Bible, leaving nothing but the text itself.
Edward’s surviving son Michael immigrated to America around 1640. He was a mason that later served as a constable, assessor and appraiser of land in Wethersfield, Hartford County Connecticut.
His 4th child, Jacob lived and died in Wethersfield, and was the first settler of “Two Stone”, Griswoldville, Connecticut.
Jacob was given sixteen acres at Two Stone Brook (Griswoldville), which had been given to his father in 1674 by the town, and he purchased the other land. Jacob married Mary Wright in 1685. They built their house on High Street (now Highland Street) about one-half mile up the road. Jacob and Mary had twelve children between 1636 and 1707.
The milling industry in Griswoldville was quite prevalent. These were built on Two Stone Brook, utilizing waterpower and sometimes wind power. The course of this brook has changed over the years due to removal of most of the trees, and also lessened the force. Jacob Griswold built what is reported to be the oldest Fulling Mill in 1681. The mill was built where the brook crosses Highland Street. This mill was used to prepare fleece for spinning, to dye yarn and surface hand-woven cloth and also to press hand-woven materials flat.
Jacob’s son Josiah and his wife Mabel Belding, carried on the business until military duties called him away. Their son, Daniel, took over operations in Josiah’s absence, and then Daniel’s son, Josiah, became proprietor. Josiah married Abigail Harris and their son continued the community mill service. The mill closed around 1840, after 159 years of service by one family at the original location.
Jacob’s eldest son, John, is my 8x great grandfather, born in 1688. John moved to New Milford Connecticut with his brother Jacob and opened the first grist mill there in 1717. He married Mable Boardman whose brother was Yale graduate Reverend Daniel Boardman of New Milford.
Rev Bordman (as the name was spelled in that day) would have been amongst the first to attend the fledgling college, which was established as the Collegiate School in 1701 by clergy of the Connecticut Colony. At that time it instructed ministers in theology and sacred languages only. (My 7x great grandfather Abijah Moore – whose daughter Ruth married Thankful Griswold’s son David Starr- was in the first class to graduate from Yale Medical School in 1726).
This summer we drove to New Milford on our family vacation. My daughter and I are big fans of the show Gilmore Girls and their town square is said to be the inspiration for the “Star’s Hollow” square on the show. I had no idea at the time that my 7x great grandmother had lived there and my 8x grandparents were buried there.
Their third born child was named Thankful and she is my 7x great grandmother. Thankful was orphaned at the age of 10. Her father died when she was just 4 and her mother when she was 10. It’s unclear who took her in after her mother’s death. She married Thomas Starr in Middletown, Connecticut in 1737 at the age of 22.
Her son, David, was born in Salisbury, CT the following year. I detailed his life in a previous blog post. Her husband Thomas died 8 years later in 1746 and she returned to Middletown where she married John Ward Jr. on Valentines Day 1750 and they had three more children, Thankful, Margaret and John Ward III.
John Ward’s will provided for their grandchildren in such a way it implies he and Thankful raised their four grandchildren after their oldest daughter, also called Thankful, and her husband, Joseph, both died in 1776. Thankful Barnes died about a week after delivering her 4th child in 6 years, at the age of just 24. Joseph Barnes was buried on the 30th of December “coming from captivity from New York (Long Island)”. By the end of 1776 disease and starvation had killed at least half of those take on Long Island after the battle in what is present day Brooklyn. The British defeated the Continental Army and they held the Port of New York for the rest of the war. It was the first major battle to take place after the United States declared its independence on July 4, 1776. It was the largest battle of the Revolutionary War in terms of both troop deployment and combat.
So Thankful Starr Ward at the age of 60 took over the rearing of a newborn, 2 yr old, 4 yr old and 6 yr old as her youngest son turned 19, her oldest 38. It’s also recorded her and her husband took financial responsibility for her son David’s family of 10 while he was away for 7 years during the Revolutionary War. Thankful lived a long life, dying in 1797 in Middletown at the age of 81. She lived to see a great grandson born to her granddaughter Mehitabel Barnes. She is buried in the Old Farm Hill Cemetery there.
