52 ANCESTORS IN 52 WEEKS 2015 WEEK 28: JOHN WAKEFIELD

For Week 28 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge, I come to the last post (for
now) on my paternal grandmother Cora Barker's ancestors on her mother's side of her
family tree. This concerns my 9x great grandfather John Wakefield, who married Elizabeth
Littlefield, sometime before 1663 when his daughter (and my 8x great grandmother)Mary
Wakefield was born.

Much of the records of Wells Maine were destroyed in several Indian attacks during the King Philip's War. There's not much online, either. I was able to find the following in Volume 1 of Genealogical and Family History of the State of New Hampshire:

(I) John Wakefield, the progenitor of the family which has been very numerously represented in Maine, was a native of England. The first record of him found in this country bears date January 1, I637, when at the town meeting held at Salem he was assessed fifteen shillings as an inhabitant of Marblehead in the Colony of Massachusetts Bay. It is presumable that he came as early at least as the previous summer. On the fourteenth of the same month, among the several portions of land laid out at Marblehead. he received four acres "on the Neck." Prior to 1648. he lived in Salem, which then included the present town of Marblehead. He first appears on record in Maine in 1641, when he and his brother-in-law, John Littlefield, received a grant of what is known as the Great Hill Farm. The hill at that time extended much farther into the sea than it now does, and with the projecting land at the eastern end was called the Great Neck. This was in the ligonia patent, and neither of the grantees took possession probably on account of the uncertainty as to their title. John Wakefield settled in the town of Wells, where he attained considerable prominence. He served as commissioner and selectman in 1648-54-57. In each instance his father-in-law, Edmund Littlefield, served in the same capacity. In 1652 John Wakefield purchased Wakefield's island and removed to it in that year and there resided for a time. He subsequently purchased land in Scarboro and resided upon it several years. Thence he removed to that part of Biddeford which is now Saco, where he remained until his death. That he was a man of considerable substance, is evidenced by the fact of his buying and selling lands, and he was frequently called upon to witness deeds for others. In 1670, when he was probably incapacitated by illness or the infirmities of age, his wife acted as his attorney in selling parcels of land. He died February 15, 1674, and was buried at Biddeford. The destruction of the records of Wells, Maine, leaves us no accurate data as to the time of his marriage or his birth or the births of his children. His wife Elizabeth was a daughter of Edmund and Annis Littlefield, of Wells. Her death is not recorded. Their children included: John, James, Henry, William, Mary and Katherine.
p30
Ezra S. Stearns, William Frederick Whitcher, Edward Everett Parker. editors, Genealogical and Family History of the State of New Hampshire: A Record of the Achievements of Her People in the Making of a Commonwealth and the Founding of a Nation, Volume 1, Lewis Publishing Company, 1908


Now I'll be moving on to the Coburn family side of Grandmother Barker's family tree.