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| Notes for Alice | ||||||||||||||
| 110Alice died six days after the birth of the twins, Jonathan and Joseph. | ||||||||||||||
| Notes for George (Spouse 1) | ||||||||||||||
| Before 1666, George obtained a grant in the settlement Chelmsford, Massachusetts. In 1671, George applied to the Chelmsford Selectmen to lay out a "highway to mill and meeting house." He was married three times and had eleven children. In 1675, he was arrested for killing helpless Indians near Pawtucket Falls in Lowell, but was acquitted due to lack of evidence. From "Early Chelmsford" in Chelmsford local paper: "The meadows upon the great brook early attracted settlements in the southern part of town, in what is now Carlisle. In that neighborhood lived John Barrett, George Robbins, Thomas Cory and others. In 1671 the town laid out a highway for the inhabitants of Greeat Brook and others to travel to mill and meeting house." George Robbins was probably the first owner of Robbins farm in North Carlisle, which was originally a part of Chelmsford. It has been lived upon continuously by his descendants until this generation (nine generations) and is still owned by a descendant< Mr. Arthur G. Robbins of Winchester, Massachusetts. (Elizabeth Robbins Berry.) 168George Robbins is mentioned incidentally in an entry in the Notebook of the Reverend John Fiske of Chelmsford: Nathaniel Shiply, called before the church on 1 November 1657 ofr "notorious lying," acknowledged falsehoods about Goodwife Byam, saying that "he spoke there [sic] and their substance to George Robbins."169 In this context, it seems possible that both were quite young men at the time. 170171The George Robbins farm was located in the southern part of Chelmsford near Great Brook, where George owned a mill, near what is now Curve Street in North Carlisle. 172In 1671, a highway "to mill and meeting house" was laid near Great Brook for the accomodation of John Barrett, Thomas Cory, George Robbins, and Ambrose Swallow. During King Phillip's War, the Robbins house was one of the garrison houses in town. Late in 1675, a group of settlers from Chelmsford attacked an Indian village near Pawtucket Falls (now Lowell), wouding several women and killing one child. At a Court of Assistants held at Boston 19 November 1675, Jonathan Largin and George Robbins were accused of firing their loaded guns into a crowd of Indians at the Falls. Owing to a lack of evidence, however, the court found them not guilty.173 On 25 February 1677/1678, George purchased "Medow land" in Billerica from George Farley and his wife, Christian, of Billerica. One meadow was bounded by the COncord line, and the other, called "Brook medow," was nearer Chelmsford. The deed for these pieces of property was not recorded until 17 January 1710/1711.174 In 1686, George Robbins was named in a deed as one of the 50 proprietors of former (Wamesit) Indian lands near Chelmsford.175 George Robbins of Chelmsford, in his will dated 19 February 1688/1689, witnessed by Samuel Meriam, Juda Potter, and Joseph Estabrook, Jr. and proved 1 October 1689, bequeathed as follows: "... I give to my beloved wife Mary [£20] in corn or cattle at country price as it goes between man & man this to be payd unto hir foure years after my death. To my three sons Samuel Eliazer & Benjamin I give [£10] to each of them: also to my son Jonathan I give [£10]: also to Tho: my son I give [£5] these legacyes to be payd them in corn or cattle when they become to be of age: also to my daughter Sarah I give my feather-bed with its furniture & also [£10] ... and to my daughter Mary I give [£10] half of it in household goods & the other half in corn or cattle: also to my son Phillip I give half my medow which I bought of Georg Farly of Bilerica lying by Concord road & twelve acres of upland lying by Sam Barret: item to my two sons John & Georg I give all the rest of my lands equally to be divided among themselves as they shal agree: finally I constitute & make my sons John & Georg to be executors of this my last will & testament ...176 The inventory, dated 23 August 1689 and valued at £191 8s, was taken by John perham, Eleazer Brown, and Ephraim Hildreth. One of the items valued was George's "intrest in ye medow & upalnd in the wamaset & pactucat feeld." Some of the property remained in the family for several generations. One of the last owners was Arthur Graham Robbins (1862 - 1947) [descended from George H., Ephraim, Jonas, John, George].177 For additional notes on some of George's family, see E.R. Sprague, "Robbins Relatives: George Robbins of Chelmsford, Massachusetts in 1667 and Some of His Descendants at Stow, Massachusetts" p. 1-127. | ||||||||||||||
| Research | ||||||||||||||
| 178Some early historians presumed that George Robbins was the son of Robert Robbins, perhaps because the two men settled in the Neighboring towns of Chelmsford and Concord. Possibly they were kinsmen, but no evidence has been found to indicate that George was the son of Robert. On the contrary, it appears that George may have been the elder of the two. 179In 1835, Lemuel Shattuck wrote, "Robert Robbins was here (Concord) before 1670; married Mary (Maxwell, according to tradition)"; he listed their children erroneously, as "George, John, Robert, James, Eleazer and perhaps other[s]." James Savage, writing in the 1860s, mentioned Robert Robbins of "Concord, 1678," but named no wife or children,180 ignoring the first record found of Robert, which places him in Concord in 1671.181 | ||||||||||||||
| Last Modified 22 Apr 2001 | Created 6 Jan 2007 by EasyTree for Windows |