52 ANCESTORS IN 52 WEEKS 2016 WEEK 5: RICHARD HILDRETH OF CHELMSFORD, MA. PT2

I didn't have much luck finding a record that would prove Richard Hildreth was the father of my
9x great grandmother Jane (Hildreth) Proctor. She may ave been born in England; I couldn't find her birth record in Cambridge, Ma. where Richard first settled in the colony. There is no mention of her in Richard's will, either.

But then I found some stories about Richard's involvement in church politics. There are several versions of this story which I found in Wilson Waters' History of Chelmsford, Massachusetts:

Says Arthur Hildreth: When Richard Hildreth removed to Chelmsford in 1656 he was received into Mr. Fiske's church. He had a poor opinion of Mr. Fiske as a minister. He was used to better preaching in Cambridge. He expressed his opinion to Deacon Esdras Reade, who accused Hildreth, and the latter was summoned to appear before a committee, which he declined to do. In 1670, Hildreth and John Barrett obtained the signatures of those who desired the dismissal of Mr. Fiske. On a lecture day Hildreth brought the paper to Thomas Henchman, who "did manifest his utter dislike against it." At Town meeting, so the account goes, Hildreth spoke against the minister, and was cited to appear before the County Court at Cambridge on April 4th, to answer "for reproachful speech of the minister of Chelmsford." Thomas Henchman and Abraham Parker were witnesses. Mention was made of the "very large speech" which Hildreth had made, and it appeared that his grievance was that the minister had prosecuted Josiah Fletcher, (or was it Joshua?) for a grave misdemeanor. The case seems to have come to nought. But such affairs must have stirred the community and furnished a subject for conversation, if not of controversy, among those who had not much to busy their minds.-p412

History of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, Printed for the town by the Courier-Citizen Company, Lowell, Ma. 1917

On a hunch I Google searched for Proctor, Hildreth, Chelmsford, church and found this:   

In 1673 he had a stubborn quarrel with his father-in-law, Richard Hildreth, concerning a boundary line between their meadows. He made some unfounded charges against Hildreth, and Hildreth retaliated by preventing Proctor from receiving the church Sacrament, or as Parson Fiske on the church records couches it: " He, Bro. Hildreth, was instrumental of hindering his son Proctor from ye Sact."

This particular entry on the church records, expressly calling Proctor son of Richard Hildreth, proves that Jane Hildreth (Robert Proctor's wife) was a daughter and not a sister of Richard Hildreth. -pp48-9

SECOND PUBLICATION OF THE HILDRETH FAMILY ASSOCIATION GENEALOGICAL AND HISTORICAL DATA RELATING TO RICHARD HILDRETH (1605-1693), FREEMAN, 1643, Cambridge and Chelmsford, Mass...
COLLATED AND EDITED BY JOHN LYMAN PORTER
PUBLISHED BY THE HILDRETH FAMILY ASSOCIATION 1922 

Richard Hildreth had a falling out with his son-in law Robert Proctor ten years before Richard's death. Ironically it is that dispute that provides evidence of Jane (Hildreth) Proctor's relationship to Richard.

52 ANCESTORS IN 52 WEEKS 2016 WEEK 5: RICHARD HILDRETH OF CHELMSFORD, MA. PT1

9x great grandfather Robert Proctor married Jane Hildreth, the daughter of  immigrant
Richard Hildreth, or at least that is what the Proctor family genealogies say. But in the
various descriptions I've found online for Richard, there is no mention of a daughter named
Jane. For example, here's William Richard cutter's brief sketch:

 
Richard Hildreth, immigrant ancestor, settled first in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he was admitted a freeman May 10, 1643; was town officer 1645. He removed to Woburn and signed the petition dated May 10, 1653, with twenty-eight others, for the town subsequently named Chelmsford. He was before that a petitioner for Woburn and Concord. The Chelmsford town records show that Sergeant Hildreth received, prior to March 3, 1663, from the general court, grants of eight separate lots of land amounting to one hundred and five acres. In 1664 the general court allowed him one hundred and fifty acres additional on account of his having lost his right hand. It is believed that Richard Hildreth and his son James were the ancestors from which all the Hildreths of this country are descended. Richard Hildreth died in 1688, aged eighty-three years. His wife Elizabeth died at Malden, August 3, 1693, aged sixty eight. In his will made February 9, 1686, he mentions wife and children. Children: I. James, born 1631; mentioned below. 2. Elizabeth, born September 21, 1646. 3. Sarah, August 8, 1648. 4. Joseph, born April 16, 1658; married December 12, 1683, Abigail Wilson; died January 28, 1706. 5. Persis, born February 8, 1659-60. 6. Thomas, born February i, 1661-2. 7. Isaac, born July, 1663. 8. Abigail, married Moses Parker, of Chelmsford. 9. (Probably one of the eldest-mentioned as "Natural" in the will), Ephraim, of Stowe, to whom the Chelmsford homestead was bequeathed.-p1874

Historic Homes and Places and Genealogical and Personal Memoirs Relating to the Families of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, Volume 4 Lewis historical publishing Company,  NY, NY 1908

And here's an entry for Richard from the Wisconsin Society of Colonial Wars:

RICHARD HILDRETH1 of old Charlestown Village, Cambridge and Chelmsford, Mass. Was of Cambridge, Mass., May 10, 1643. A grantee of Chelmsford in 1653, where he and his descendants lived from 1653, and in which vicinity his lineal descendants still live. Prior to March 3, 1663, was Sergeant in the Military Company at Chelmsford and served until 1664. In 1664 Sergeant Richard Hildreth, "being greatly disadvantaged of the use of his right hand, whereby wholly disabled," received, for the ninth time, an additional grant of land. He was noted in Chelmsford church records about 1670, kept by the Rev. John Fiske, as denying the right of the minister or church committee to compel his attendance at the Meeting House on Sundays and refusing to pay the fines sought to be imposed upon him by the Minister, or Deacon, Esdras Reade, or any other minister or deacon. The record shows that "Sergeant Richard Hildreth used reproachful speech and seditious language concerning the Church." He said that he, and others, had quit England to escape the assumption and interference of the clergy in matters not connected with religion. Their grave-stones are still in the old Chelmsford burying-ground.

Chelmsford Town Records, Book A, p. 22.
Gen. Court of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay in New England, Vol. IV, part 2, pp. 100, 1669.
Allen's History of Chelmsford, 1820.
New England Hist, and Gen. Reg.. Vol. XI, 1857, as corrected, 1892, by Capt. Philip Reade, U. S. A.,
pp. 4-5-39-40.
Register Society Colonial Wars, 1896, p. 334.
-p55
Society of Colonial Wars in the State of Wisconsin: list of officers and members, including pedigrees and a record of the services performed by ancestors in the wars of the colonies
Society of Colonial Wars in the State of Wisconsin,  Swain & Tate, Milwaukee, WI, 1906


Notice in the biography from William Richard Cutter, there is a fifteen year gap between the births of
his first two children in the list of children. The reason is that his eldest son James was a child from
his first marriage. But there is no mention of a daughter named Jane. I think I may have the reason for
that, which I'll discuss in my next post.

To be continued.