John George: A Quaker Descendant of Richard Townsend, The Welcome Passenger

John George A Quaker Descendant Of Richard Townsend The Welcome Passenger MARY BURTON DERRICKSON MCCURDY A S ESTABLISHED BY George E. McCracken, Richard TownAl send was a passenger on Penn's ship Welcome in 1682, along with his daughter Hannah and wife Ann Hutchins who gave birth to son James on board the ship a few days after its arrival in the Delaware River.' Townsend in the memoir of his life, which includes an account of the voyage and the reception of the new settlers by the Indians and Swedes, states that at the time of writing he was in the eighty-fourth year of his age and the forty-sixth of his residence in this country,' from which it can be calculated that he was born about 1645. It is known, further, that he was married to Ann Hutchins in Bucklebury, Berkshire, England, the 25th of the third month 1677.5 Finally, there is the supposition that his father was also named Richard Townsend. Recently, in searching for the Richard Townsend name in the parish records of Berkshire, England, compiled by the Genealogical Society of the Latter-day Saints. I found a baptismal entry in perfect agreement with the above information: Richard Townsend, son of Richard Townsend, was baptized at Bucklebury on the 30th of November, 1645.5 The first of the children born to Richard and Ann Townsend after their settlement in Pennsylvania was Mary, their fourth child. She was born at Brattleboro Mills, near Philadelphia, the 22nd or 23rd of the third month, 1685.5 She married John Bartlett, a black1George E. McCracken, The Welcome Claiments Proved, Disproved and Doubtful, Publications of the Welcome Society of Pennsylvania, No. 2 Baltimore, 1970, 496-503. 2lbid., 497-499. sibid., 499. 4 /bid., 500. 4 Microfiche records for Berkshire, England at the Genealogical Branch Library, Church of Latter-day Saints, Raleigh, N.C. (Should be available in all LDS Branch Libraries. °McCracken, op. cit., 500, 501. 72 73 The Pennsylvania Genealogical Magazine smith of Talbot County, Maryland, on the 25th of the first month, 1706, at the Abington Monthly Meeting, as McCracken tells us; he adds other facts about them, including the names of their eight children and the spouses of the one son and two daughters who survived to marriageable age?. One of the daughters, Sarah married Joseph George of Kent County, Maryland, a member of the Cecil Monthly Meeting, on the 20th day of the ninth month, 1729.9 At the time of Joseph George's will of 20 July 1756, probated 14 August 1756, he mentioned no wife, but named four sons, Joseph, Bartlett, Richard and James, and two daughters Sarah and Rachel, leaving one of his two tracts of land to Joseph and the other to Bartlett, to be passed on to the other two sons in case Joseph and Bartlett should die without heirs.9 A fifth son, John George, whose parentage remained unknown for years to Delaware descendants, was omitted from the will of his father, probably because he had been well provided for in the will of his grandfather, John Bartlett, made the 20th of the third month, 1748, and probated 2 December 1748. This will left John Bartlett's grandson John George one-half of a tract of about 770 acres called "Swanbrook" in newly formed Queen Anne County, originally a part of Talbot County, and his daughter Hannah the other half. Presumably, since John George's mother is not mentioned, he inherited what would have been hers if she had still been alive. Bartlett's will does mention his wife Mary, nee Townsend, as we know, and a son Joseph, co-executor with grandson John George.n The will furnishes a necessary clue to the identity and ancestry of John George. It was discovered by tracking him to Queen Anne County, Maryland, through the deed by which he acquired land in Kent County, Delaware, to be referred to below. That deed designates Queen Anne County as his place of residence. Further details about this descendant of Richard and Ann Townsend can be extracted from the legal and Quaker records. "Swanbrook" was partitioned by Indenture 5 December 1759 between John George and his wife Rachel Wilson and Isaac Turner and his wife Hannah Bartlett." Earlier that year, on the 25th of the sixth 7 /bid., 502. sThird Haven Records, VI, 52-3, Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore. Evidently the date of 29th/9th mo./1729 as given by McCracken is a typographical error. °Kent County, Maryland Wills, Liber 3, 346; Liber 20, 123, Hall of Records, Annapolis, Maryland. Will of Joseph George. 1sTalbot County, Maryland Wills, Liber 25, 506-07, Hall of Records, Annapolis, Maryland. Will of John Bartlett. "Queen Anne Deeds, Liber RT #F, 44-6. Queen Anne County Court•House, Centreville, Maryland. Partition of "Swanbrook". John George 74 month, John George had been appointed by the Third Haven Meeting "to have the oversight of Queen Anne Meeting, and likewise the oversight of the ministry with Henry Coventry."'" In 1772 he moved to Kent County, Delaware, where in the previous year on 29 May he had bought 1681/2 acres located "on the N.W. side of ye Kings road lead-from Town of Dover to the drawbridge," i.e., between Magnolia and Frederica." He and his family joined the Duck Creek Meeting, by certificate of transfer from the Third Haven Meeting which names him and his wife Rachel and seven children, Joseph, Rachel, James, John, Sarah, Thomas and Mary. This certificate was dated the 30th day of the fourth month 1772.14 The Queen Anne Meeting which was under the auspices of the Third Haven Meeting, began to decline soon after the removal of the John George family and the death of his uncle, by marriage, Isaac Turner, leaving a membership of only three women and some young people?' John George made his will the year he moved to Delaware, the 13th day of the eleventh month, nearly five years before his death, bequeathing his Maryland land with its boundary on Hannah Turners; i.e. his portion of "Swanbrook", to his eldest son Joseph, probably named after his father, and to a younger son John." At the time of the making of the will his wife was pregnant, and about a month later she gave birth to Daniel. Their last child, Hannah was born about three years later. The last glimpse we have of John George alive is as a witness, the 13th day of the first month 1776, to the marriage of his widowed aunt Hannah Turner of Caroline County, Maryland" to Samuel Rowland of Sussex County, Delaware, her second husband." John George died the fifth month 1777, aged 45." Thus he was born in 1732 within three years of the marriage of his parents. He was probably their first son, and was very likely named for his grandfather John Bartlett. His birth occurred in the same year that his great-grandfather Richard Townsend died. 11Third Haven Records, III, 311, Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore. 13 Kent County Deeds, Liber T. Vol. I, 139, Kent County Court House, Dover, Delaware. Deed of John Thompson to John George. 11Duck Creek Meeting Records, Kent County, Delaware, 235. Quaker Records, Swarthmore College Library. ',Kenneth L. Carroll, "Quakerism in Caroline County, Md., Its Rise and Decline," Bulletin of Friends Historical Association, Vol. 48, 85. 19 Kent County Wills, Liber L, 218, Kent County Court House, Dover, Delaware. Will of John George. 1/"Swanbrook" was in that part of Queen Anne County which now formed Caroline. 18 Talbot County Marriages, III, 3, Hall of Records, Annapolis, Maryland. 19 Murderkill Meeting Records, XXI, Hall of Records, Dover, Delaware.