Portsmouth Compact, March 7, 1638 Signed by our 8th Great Grandfather.
Hello Williamsons,
It's been awhile since we gathered around the digital fire here in the Great Hall for another of our historical expeditions into our shared past. Today we are going to learn about our 8th Great Grandfather, Samuel Shadrach Wilbore and his grand daughter Abigail. Let's start with the Relationship Chart so you can see how we are related. I stop the chart with my Grandfather Charles and his brothers and sisters. It is from them most of us descend. You can easily see your relationship.
Relationship Chart
8th Great Grandparents. Samuel Shadrach Wilbore and Ann Smith
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Shadrach Wilbur (Wilbore) and Mary Deane
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Mary Rebecca Wilbore and Abraham Hathaway
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Benjamin Hathaway and Abigail Hathaway
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Rebecca M. Hathaway and Isaac Morris
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Isaac Morris and Sarah ?
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Nancy Morris and Whitty Victor
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Effie Victor and William Jonathan Williamson
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Vennie, Ima, Inez, Lille, Josie, Emmett, Walt, Charles and Maurice
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US
Samuel Wilbore (born 1595 - died 1656) originated in Sible Hedingham, Essex, England, where he was married to Ann Smith in January 1620, and where all five of their children were baptized from 1622 to 1631. His two sons Arthur and William died in infancy in England. Around 1633 he, his wife, and his three surviving sons, Samuel, Joseph, and Shadrach, sailed to New England.
The Wilbore family arrived in Boston in the where he was made a freeman in March 1633. He and his wife Ann were both admitted as members of the Boston church in December 1633, and the following November he was an assessor of taxes. In 1636 a major theological rift arose in the colony, often called the Antinomian controversy, and Wilbore became attracted to the preachings of the dissident ministers John Wheelwright and Anne Hutchinson. He signed a petition in support of Wheelwright. Following the banishment of these two individuals from the Massachusetts colony, Wilbore and many other followers were disarmed when on 20 November 1637 he and others were ordered to deliver up all guns, pistols, swords, powder and shot because the "opinions and revelations of Mr. Wheelwright and Mrs. Hutchinson have seduced and led into dangerous errors many of the people here in New England."
Portsmouth, Mass
Scores of the followers of Wheelwright and Hutchinson were ordered out of the Massachusetts colony, but before leaving, a group of them, including Wilbore, signed what is sometimes called the Portsmouth Compact, establishing a non-sectarian civil government upon the universal consent of the inhabitants, with a Christian focus. Planning initially to settle in New Netherlands, the group was persuaded by Roger Williams to purchase some land of the Indians on the Narragansett Bay. This they did, settling on the north east end of Aquidneck Island and establishing a settlement they called Pocasset, but in 1639 changing the name to Portsmouth. William Coddington was elected the first judge (governor) of the settlement.
Wilbore was in Portsmouth by May 1638 when he was present at a general meeting, and the following month he was given the military role as clerk of the Train Band. The following January he was selected as constable, and a month later he was allotted about two acres of land in the Great Cove. In 1641 he became a freeman of Portsmouth, and in 1644 was selected as Sergeant.
In May 1639 Wilbore repudiated his signature to the Wheelwright petition, and was thereafter allowed to return to the Massachusetts Bay Colony. About 1645 he returned to Boston, where his second wife, Elizabeth, was received into the Boston church in November. In May 1648 he was called of Taunton (in the Plymouth Colony), and continued to own land there, in Portsmouth, and in Boston. In 1655 he was again in Portsmouth, but when he wrote his will in April 1656 he was living in Taunton. His death, however, on 29 November 1656, was recorded in Boston.
Wilbore's son Samuel was named in Rhode Island's Royal Charter of 1663; he married Hannah Porter, the daughter of John Porter, another signer of the Portsmouth Compact. His son Samuel had a daughter Abigail, who married Caleb Arnold, the son of colonial governor Benedict Arnold.
General Benedict Arnold, Revolutionary War Traitor
Abigail was our 1st cousin, 8 times removed. She married Caleb Arnold. Caleb's father was Governor Benedict Arnold, the Great Grandfather of General Benedict Arnold, Revolutionary War Traitor. Abigail was therefore General Benedict Arnold's Great Great Aunt through marriage.
