Wednesday, November 22, 2017

Connections in American History



Genealogy is a time-consuming opportunity to view history from a perch not exploited in high-school and university courses. Over the years that I've been digging into the past of my own and other families, I've found story after story that would never have been important enough to be included in those dreary texts we all experienced in US History classes, and yet were fascinating in their own way.

My mother's family has long known their connection to the Salem Witchcraft Trials. Around 1637 when he was about 40, the patriarch of the Towne family in the New World came to these shores with a family consisting of three girls ranging in age from three to seventeen, and three boys, six to thirteen. Over the next fifty years or so, those children built their homes, lives and families in eastern Massachusetts. The middle son, Edmund Towne, was my 6th great-grandfather. In 1692, three of the sisters were charged with witchcraft in Salem. Two, Rebecca and Mary were charged, convicted and executed. A third, Sarah, who was born in Massachusetts after the family arrived on these shores, was charged, but never convicted, and after a time in jail, was released and given a bit of money for her troubles. A motion picture named Three Sovereigns for Sarah was made of her story, with my sixth great aunt, Sarah Towne Cloyce, played by Vanessa Redgrave.

My mother dug and dug through her family history, hoping to find someone who had participated in the American Revolution so that my sister would be eligible to join the DAR. She never came up with one, and I suspect my sister was relieved.

In researching my Dad's family history, I found an ancestor, one Josiah Rawson, in my paternal grandmother's lineage who fought in the Revolution, so I told my sister she would be eligible if she wanted. She wasn't interested, verifying my suspicions.

When you dig into family history, you sometimes get on a roll, and that happened to me. Mr Rawson's lineage is pretty well documented and within a few more days, I determined that not only was I eligible to become a Son of the Revolution,  I was eligible to apply for membership in the Mayflower Society because of two ancestors. Rawson's wife was the second great granddaughter of John Alden and Priscilla Mullens Alden.  Many of us had to read Longfellow's "The Courtship of Miles Standish" in high school in which John Alden was prompted to suggest Priscilla marry Miles and her response included, "Why don't you speak for yourself, John?"

Now I'll get to the point I started to make originally. John and Priscilla Alden's son John became a well-known sea captain and businessman. Because of a rather convoluted series of circumstances, he was charged with witchcraft in Salem, but later exonerated, primarily because nobody would speak against him.

So, in 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts, my 8th great uncle on my father's side had the opportunity to meet three of my 6th great aunts on my mother's side in one of the low points in American justice.  I'd like to think they did.  I also am glad that Priscilla was more interested in John Alden than Miles Standish.