John Sargent Makes His Son Samuel a Weaver

The 1716 will of John Sargeant of Malden, Massachusetts, contains bequests for all his children, including this one to his son Samuel:

Will of John Sargeant[part], Middlesex County, Massachusetts, 
file 19883; digital image from AmericanAncestors.org, obtained 13 October 2014

John gives his son Samuel a "weavers trade with a loom to work in" and indicates that he also has provided Samuel with land by "a deed of gift under my hand."

Fortunately the deeds for Middlesex County, Massachusetts, are available online at FamilySearch. The grantee index for the 17th and early 18th century contains numerous entries for members of the Sargent family, including the apparent deed referenced in John's will. The index wasn't very difficult to navigate on FamilySearch. Later work on the family should include a look at these other documents besides the one referred to in John's will.

The deed which is underlined in the above image was easy to locate as well. There are two deed book pages on one image which is why deed page 324 is part of image 185 and not image 324. The original deed books are apparently over 500 pages each. 

John refers to his son Samuel as a weaver in this deed and clearly states their relationship as father and son in addition to listing their residences. The weaver reference is consistent with the occupation clue for Samuel given in John's will. It serves as a way of specifically identifying Samuel Sargent as the weaver who is the son of John. There may have easily been other Samuel Sargents in the area who were not weavers or sons of John.

We'll discuss the details of the deed in a future post. It always pays to use wills and probates as clues to other records. John's reference in this case was pretty blatant. Sometimes the clues are a little more subtle.

Not Getting the Revolutionary Cart Ahead of the Horse

Haste makes waste.

A search on GoogleBooks for Samuel and Sarah (Gibson) Sargent brought up the a reference in a genealogy of the descendants of John Gibson of Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Sarah Gibson who married Samuel in 1798 is my ancestor.

And it's tempting to immediatly conclude that my Sarah is the daughter of this John Gibson referenced below:

I don't have too many ancestors with Revolutionary War service as this John does--his father actually does as well.

But it's important to read the entire writeup carefully. The author uses the word "likely" to define the relationship between Sarah (Gibson) Sargent and this John Gibson. Just how "likely" is "likely?" It is enough to put the relationship in my database and go from there?

Just because other online trees have included the relationship does not mean it is true. They could very well have used the reference above (or a reference derived from it). It may or may not be worth my time to look at other online compiltations to determine if someone has attempted to take the relationship from "likely" to something even stronger.

At the very least, it would be good to know why the author used the word likely? There's no indication of what prompted the author to clarify the parent-child relationship as likely. Was it beause of the proximity of the indivduals involved? Were there no other Gibson families in the area? Was it based upon the probable age of the Sarah who married compared with the known Sarah, daughter of John?

I don't know.

It appears that the author was unable to locate John after he sold property in 1799. The book follows other male Gibson lines of descent (it also includes information on children of Gibson daughters) and the lack of information on any of John's other children causes me to believe that the author simply lost the family after 1799.

What to do?

I know where Samuel and Sarah (Gibson) Sargent were after 1799. They left the immediate area. It's possible that they moved along with other Gibson family members. At this point, I will:

• Look for Gibsons living near (in the same and adjacent counties) to Samuel and Sarah (Gibson) Sargent in post 1800 census and other records. 
• Look for Gibsons living near Samuel and Sarah (Gibson) Sargent's children in New York State, Michigan, Illinois, Vermont, and New Hampshire. While the father John probably didn't move into Illinois, it is possible that he did go to any of the other areas and the Sargents could always have lived near Gibson cousins.The Sargents who settled in Illinois and Michigan did not settle near other Sargent relatives. 

That's probably enough for now. 

The motivation is to find something on John Gibson that may more concretely tie him to the family of Samuel and Sarah (Gibson) Sargent. 

His Estate Inventory Indicates He Is A Baptist

Estate inventories can tell researchers quite a bit about their families. Lists of your deceased ancestor's personal goods provide a glimpse into the mundane details of their lives, particularly during that era when every pot, pan, and book are inventoried. The genealogical clues usually concentrate on economic status and occupation.

Every once in a while something different will appear on a list of items, like this one from the estate of Samuel Sargent in Marlborough, Cheshire County, New Hampshire in 1819.

Samuel had one pew on the floor in the "Baptiste Meetinghouse," one pew in the gallery and half another pew on the floor. The values of the pews were also shown--the first pew shown here was value at $14.

Other papers in the file refer to Samuel as being of Dublin, New Hampshire. I'll have to do a little bit of work to determine which Baptist church this was, whether or not it is still in existence, and whether any records are extant.

Note: Samuel Sargent is my 5th great-grandfather.