William Witter

Abt 1584 - Abt 1659  (75 years)

• Name	William Witter  [1]
  Birth	Abt 1584	England   [1]
  Gender	Male
  Memo	At the time of the controversy between the Massachusetts Bay Colony authorities and the leaders of the Baptist movement, William Witter was one of those whose adherence to the Baptist tenets brought him into disagreement with the former. He was haled to Court more than once because of his opposition to infant baptism. He also gave offense because of his entertainment of the Baptist leaders, Obadiah Holmes, John Crandall and .John Clarke, the first-named being an ancestor of Abraham Lincoln. In the narrative of their journey to Rhode Island, because of the persecution of the Massachusetts government, John Clarke wrote: "It came to pass that we three ... came into the Mathatusetts Bay about the 16 day of the 5th Moneth 51; and upon the-19th of the same, ... we' came into a Town ... called Lin, where we lodged at a Blind-man's house, neer two miles out of the Town, by name William Witter .... " From this we see that William Witter, in his old age, had become blind.
  Memo	William Witter's homestead at Swampscott was on "the spot where Joseph Blaney's house now stands,"--or where it was standing in 1844, about two miles from Lynn. The land on which it stood was purchased by William Witter from an Indian, according to the following deposition made by him, and recorded in the files of the Salem Court, under the dates April 15 and 27, 1657: "Blacke will, or duke william, so called; came to my house (which was two or three miles from Nahant), when Thomas Dexter had bought Nahant for a suit of clothes; the said Blacke will Asked me what I would give him for the ' Land my house stood vppon, it being his land, and his ffather's wigwam stood their abouts .... " and he adds that he "bought Nahant and Sagomer Hill and Swamscoate of Black William for two pestle stones."
  Reference Number	2713
  Will	06 Aug 1657  [2]
  	William Witter's will was dated August, 1657. In it he bequeathed to his wife, Annis, half of his estate, and to his son, Josiah, the other half. Of his daughter, he says: "Hannah shall have a yew and lamb this time twelf mounth." He died two years after making his will, in 1659.
  Death	Abt 1659	Swampscott, Essex County, MA   [1]
  Person ID	I2713	ESVA Connections
  Last Modified	2 Nov 2014

  
  

  Family	Hannah "Annis" Churchman,   b. Abt 1616, England d. Abt 1659, Stonington, New London County, CT (Age 43 years)
  Marriage	Abt 1630	New England   [4]
  Children	1. Josiah Witter,   b. 15 Mar 1638, Swampscott, Essex County, MA d. 24 Nov 1685, Stonington, New London County, CT (Age 47 years)   2. Hannah Witter,   b. 1640, Swampscott, Essex County, MA d. 1696, Woodstock, Windham County, CT (Age 56 years)
  Last Modified	11 May 2022
  Family ID	F894	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

• Sources

  [S209] Ancestry.com, Ancestry.com. International, Find A Grave Index for Select Locations, 1300s-Current [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012. [S210] Compiler: Georgia Cooper Washburn, Witter Genealogy, (The National Historical Company, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, 1929), Pages 15. [S210] Compiler: Georgia Cooper Washburn, Witter Genealogy, (The National Historical Company, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, 1929), Pages 14 - 15. [S209] Ancestry.com, Ancestry.com. U.S., New England Marriages Prior to 1700 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2012. Original data: Torry, Clarence A. New England Marriages Prior to 1700. Baltimore, MD, USA: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2004.