HUBERT M. SEDGWICK A SEDGWICK GENEALOGY DESCENDANTS OF DEACON BENJAMIN SEDGWICK Compiled by Hubert M. Sedgwick New Haven Colony Historical Society 114 Whitney Avenue New Haven, Connecticut 1961 This book was composed and manufactured for the New Haven Colony Historical Society by The Shoe String Press, Inc. , Hamden, Connecticut, United States of America. CONTENTS The Sedgwick Family - a Chart vii Introduction ix The Numbering Code - an Explanation xi Deacon Benjamin Sedgwick - (B) 3 The Descendants of Benjamin Sedgwick Bl Sarah Sedgwick Gold 9 B2 John Sedgwick .53 B3 Benjamin Sedgwick Jr. 147 B4 Theodore Sedgwick 167 B5 Mary Ann Sedgwick Swift 264 B6 Lorain (Laura) Sedgwick Parsons 310 Index 315 THE-SEDGWICK FAMILY 1st ROBERT SEDGWICK, of London, England, son of William Gen. Sedgwicke, of Woburn, Bedfordshire, England; baptised at Woburn, May 6, 1613; married Joanna Blake, of Andover, England, emigrated to Charlestown, Massachusetts, 1635-6; became merchant at Charlestown and Boston; member of General Court; built first fort at Boston; first Major General of Massachusetts Bay Colony; died Jamaica, West Indies, May 24, 1656. 2nd WILLIAM SEDGWICK, 2nd son of Major General Robert, Gen. born 1643; married Elizabeth Stone, daughter of Reverend Samuel Stone, of Hartford, Connecticut; died 1674. 3rd CAPTAIN SAMUEL SEDGWICK, only son of William, born Gen. 1667; married Mary Hopkins, of Hartford; lived at West Hartford, Connecticut; died 173 5. They had eleven children, of whom we trace the descendants of the eleventh, BENJAMIN. 4th 1. Samuel, Jr. '7. Mary 1705-1759 Gen. 1690-1725 - 2. Jonathan 8. Elizabeth 1693-1771 1708-1738 3. Ebenezer 9. Thankful 1695-1759 1710-1720 4. Joseph 10. Mercy 1697-1765 1713-1745 5. Stephen 11. BENJAMIN 1701-1768 1716-1757 6. Abigail 1703- INTRODUCTION by Hubert M. Sedgwick England boasts that the records it kept were paths which led to its civilization. Through four centuries which began with the Renaissance they grew; records of the earth, the soil, rocks, fruits, the inhabitants themselves, mankind, the sciences, the professions. The break that followed World War One and World War Two halted the continuity, the systematic spread of the know­ ledge that came from the records. The world is back at its recording and a new chain is about to be forged in catching up our war records and starting anew. Amer­ ican f~ilies whose records were begun, perhaps with the Pilgrims, but had been discontinued, have been sought out and links made to connect them with the present. Pioneers whose records were religiously set down in the family album have been checked, the gaps filled to the present time and a new start- made. It is sought to bring down to date the Sedgwick geneal<?gy, its chapters of the family before it came to the United States, biog­ raphies of its founders, Major General Robert, who settled in Boston about 1629, and his son William, who in the next genera­ tion came to Hartford,. married Elizabeth Stone, followed by the records of their descendants. From the Boston and Plymouth pioneers the early generations spread over the sleeping continent westward, filling other New England states, into New York and Pennsylvania, through the Midwest to the western coast. General Robert Sedgwick and his son William had been halted by military campaigns into Maine and Acadia and by carrying out Cromwell's mission to capture Jamaica. In this era Robert died and William did not return to his wife in Hartford. In the third generation eleven children were born to Captain Samuel, the only child of William and Elizabeth. Six of the eleven children scattered across the continent and the Sedgwick hegira had begun. A generation of the Sedgwick emigrants rested in New York State and from them the surplus surged on. Homes were built in Ohio and Illinois and successive generations trod the paths that led to the Golden Gate, largely in the rush of just a century ago. The life story of every one of the six children of Captain Samuel who "went West" is a separate chapter of American history, not an epic but a record of daily life, rising to heights with the wars, the X growth of cities which the Sedgwick descendants helped to found and the records of their births, marriages and deaths. The story is too large for one volume. The records of BENJAMIN, the eleventh and youngest child, head of the Stockbridge, Syracuse and Boston branches have ' been taken for this first volume. The Sedgwick genealogy, begun in Puritan homes in family albums, was made into written manuscript form in Chicago by two pioneers, George and Frederick J. Sedgwick, a lawyer and rail­ road executive respectively. They cooperated with Henry Dwight Sedgwick of Stockbridge, who had gathered many of the early sta­ tistics. The experiences, and the 'facts and the dates of the links of the New England settlements to those of the teeming expansions of population settling in the Midwest were recorded by George and Frederick. To their records were added those gathered by Fran­ cis Sedgwick of Columbus, Ohio, who completed the task of re­ writing the early records and brought the records up to his death in 1929. The entire written volume was turned over to Hubert M. Sedgwick of New Haven, Conn., who has completed every feature of gathering and compiling the work. EDITORS NOTE: Hubert Merrill Sedgwick died in 1950. His notes and manu­ script for this Sedgwick line were deposited by his family in the library of the New Haven Colony Historical Society shortly be­ fore his death and the Society, soon thereafter, had a typescript copy made of the compilation for reference use in the library. This follows Mr. Sedgwick's compilation without effort to com­ plete the line in the present generation. Many home addresses given for descendants living in the mid 1940's are as they then were and may have changed in the years since. In 1960 Mr. Sedgwick's daughter, Professor Ruth Sedgwick, of New Haven and Mount Holyoke College, provided funds to en­ able the Society to publish the Genealogy in this form. This she does as evidence of her admiration for the time, effort and tal­ ent he devoted, over ~any years, to gathering the data which is the basis of this publication. · xi THE NUMBERING CODE -AN EXPLANATION In the numbering code successive numbers represent succes­ sive generations. In this line it begins with Deacon Benjamin Sedgwick of West Hartford and Cornwall, of the fourth generation. Major General Robert Sedgwick was the first generation. His son, William of the second generation, went from Boston to Hartford, Conn. The eleven children of Captain Samuel, son of William, mark the first numbering. His first child, Samuel,Jr., was (No.) 1, the second, Jonathan, was 2, and the third son, Ebenezer, was 3. And so it went on to Thankful, the ninth child, who was, of course, 9. There were no more digits _in numbers and the letters of the alphabet were therefore borrowed. The tenth child, Mercy, was A and the eleventh child, BENJAMIN, was B. As the descendants of BENJAMIN, B, comprise the only line we are tracing in this volume the number assigned to each per­ son will start with B, indicating descent from this Deacon Ben­ jamin, the first generation of this line. In the next generation Sarah, the first child of BENJAMIN, (B) is Bl; the second, John, B2; and the third, Benjamin Jr., is B3; and so on for his six children. Passing to the next generation, Thomas Gold, the first child of Sarah (Sedgwick) Gold (Bl), is Bll. Illustrating the system by numbering Benjamin Cleveland Gold, B15, 218,3; his descent numbers indicate that hi;s ancestors were BENJAMIN (B) the eleventh child of Captain Samuel; then Sarah (Bl), first child of BENJAMIN. Following is Hezekiah Gold (B15) fifth child of Sarah (Sedgwick) Gold; then Samuel Wads­ worth Gold (B15,~) second child of Hezekiah. Progressing to Theodore Sedgwick Gold {Bl5,21) Samuels first child; thence to Charles Lockwood Gold (B15,218) eighth child of Theodore; and finally to Benjamin Cleveland Gold (B15,218,3) third child of Charles Lockwood Gold. In the text we enclose many of these numbers in parenthesis, to avoid possible confusion with numbers in dates or other numbers which may be adjacent. Thus every succeeding generation records the descent and there is only one correct number for any Sedgwick descendant under the system. The letter B and the first digit following it indicates that child of Benjamin whose line is herein treated as a separate chapter, as indicated in the "table of contents", thus making reference easier. A SEDGWICK GENEALOGY DEACON BENJAMIN SEDGWICK B. Benjamin Sedgwick, 11th and youngest child of Captain Samuel Sedgwick and Mary (Hopkins) Sedgwick, was born Novem­ ber 7, 1716, at West Hartford, Conn., and was baptized there November 12, 1716. He died February 7, 1757, at Cornwall, Conn., in his 41 st year. He married, Ann (·Anne, tombstone spelling) Thompson of Wallingford, Conn., daughter of John Thompson and Sarah (Culver) Thompson. After Deacon Benjamin's death, his widow married, 2d, Aug­ ust 8, 1764, Timothy Judd, Esq., of Westbury Society, Waterbury, now Watertown, Conn. This marriage proved unhappy, they sep­ arated and she returned to Cornwall and lived with her son John until her death, June 3, 1793, aged 74. She is buried in the new, or lower, burying ground at Cornwall Hollow. Her monument stands next to that of her son John. Benjamin received from his father's estate at West Hartford, which was inventoried at 2190 pounds sterling, the following legacy: ''I give unto my son Benjamin Sedgwick, my dwelling house, barn and all my outhousing, and all land at home, butting on his brother Jonathan's land east, and on Lt.