The Progressive Lady Deborah Moody

Lady Deborah (Dunch) Moody was a dame not to tangle with. Founded a colony and in 1655 she won the right to vote in her own town meeting Gravesend, Long Island. See A History of the Town of Gravesend, N.Y. By Austin Parsons Stockwell, Wm. H. Stillwell
She was the widow of Sir Henry Moody, of Garesden, Wiltshire, who was one of the baronets created by James in 1622. Her parents were Walter Dirndl, a member of Parliament in Elizabeth's time. Family politics were liberal and she obviously was influenced by this. Her mother was Deborah Mervyn (Pilkington) daughter of James Pilkington, Bishop of Durham and Alice Pilkington.
Thus, "in close sympathy with those who battled for constitutional and natural rights." Her desire to flee England was for religious freedom and her ideas were like Ann Hutchinson-Anabaptist. 
See Barbara Wells Sarudy The Dangerous Lady Deborah Moody - Only Women to Found a Colony When she arrived she settled in Lynn and in 1640 the General Court of Massachusetts granted her 400 acres of land, to be selected by her, for a plantation. In 1641 she purchased the large farm of John Humphries, at a place then and now known as Swampscott, near Lynn.  She was admitted of Salem church, April 5,1640. In 1043, she fell under censure for denying infant baptism, and removed to Long Island, where she resided for many years, enjoying in large measure the favor of Governor Stuyvesant. See Winthrop's History of New England, II. 123, 124; Felt's Annals of Salem, II. 67T; Savage's Genealogical Dictionary.
John Winthrop on Lady Deborah Moody: "The Lady Moody, a wise and anciently religious woman, being taken with error of denying baptism to infants, was dealt withal by many of the elders and others, and admonished by the Church of Salem (where she was a member), but persisting still, and to avoid further trouble, etc., she removed to the Dutch against the advice of her friends. Many others, infected with Anabaptism, removed thither also. She was after excommunicated. With the exception of her troubling the church with her religious opinions, she appears to have been a lady of great worth."
Letter from The Winthrop Papers

LADY DEBORAH MOODY  TO JOHN WINTHROP, JR.
To y worshipfidl  my much honored frend Mr John Wintrop at his howse at Pequid giue this. [1649] Worthi Sur, — My respectiue loue to you remem[bered,] acknowliging my selfe for youre many kindness[es] & respecte to me much obliged to you. I haue writen diuers times to you, but I dout you haue not receued it; at present, being in hast, I can not inlarg my selfe, only my request is y* you will be pleased, either by this bote, if in your wisdom you see not a conuenienter opertunitie, to send to me those things y' Mf Throgmortone brought for me, & I vnderstand are with you, for I am in great need of ym, together with Marke Lucars chest & other things. So with my respectiue loue to you & youre wife, with M? Lacke, remembred, hoping you & they, with youre children, are in helth, I rest, comitting you to ye protection of y° Allmighti. Pray remember my nesesiti in this thing. Deborah Moody. Indorsed, "Lady Moody."

Depiction of New Amsterdam, the colonial settlement founded by Lady Deborah Moody that eventually become New York.

From Long Island Genealogy LONG ISLAND HISTORICAL BULLETIN," April 1913 Charles Andrew Ditmas, Publisher, 350 Fulton St., Brooklyn, N.Y. Copyright 1913
On December 10, 1645, Lady Moody, Sir Henry Moody, Ensign George Baxter and Sergeant James Hubbard, with their associates were granted a patent by Director Kieft. The settlers entered into an agreement at Amersfoort with Lady Moody and her associates by which the town was to be divided into 28 parts, each to receive a plantation lot, also a village lot. In 1646 a new division was made, laying out the town into 40 lots and:

1. Lady Deborah Moody
2. Sir Henry Moody
3. James Hubbard
4. George Baxter
5. John Morrell
6. Richard Ussell
7. John Tilton
8. James Ellis
9. Cornelius Swellinant
10. Edward Browse
11. Richard Stout
12. Thomas Cornish
13. George Holmes 14. Thomas Greedy
15. Thomas Spicer
16. Walter Wall
17. John Cooke
18. James Grover
19. Ambrose London
20. John Rinkman
21. Francis Weeks
22. Ralph Cardell
23. Robert Pennoyer
24. William Wilkins
25. Thomas Applegate
26. William Goulding 27. Charles Morgan
28. Thomas Morrell
29. John Thomas
30. Rodger Scott
31. Randall Huett
32. William Compton
33. Enium Bennum
34. Samuel Chandler
35. Pete Simpson
36. Thomas Cornwall
37. William Musgrove
38. Thomas Whitlock
39. Richard Gibbons, received a town plot and a section of land under the second division.

Those who took part in the first division, which was given up owing to the Indian wars, of Director Kiefts administration, were:

l. Lady Moody 2. Sir Henry Moody 3. James Hubbard 4. George Baxter 5. John Morrell 6. Richard Ussell 7. Nicholas Stillwell 8. George Holmes 9. Thomas Hall 10. John Tilton

11. James Ellis 12. Cornelius Swellinant 13. Edward Browse 14. Richard Stout 15. Thomas Cornish 16. Thomas Greedy 17. Thomas Spicer 18. Walter Wall 19. John Cooke 20. James Grover

21. John Rinkman,  22. William Musgrm 23. Thomas Whitlock 24. Richard Gibbons 25. Randall Huet 26. Ralph Cardell 27. Robert Pennoyer 28. William Wilkins

From  To Save A House Of History. The Mansion of Lady Deborah Moody to Be Restored
Friday, May 19, 1911 Times-Picayune (New Orleans, LA) (NOTE: This is not accurate, but several believed ths at one time was her home)  This house dates to either 1665 or 1770, depending on which account you believe. Brooklyn historical records have Sir Henry Moody selling the property on which the house stands in 1659 to Jan Jansen ver Ryn, who built the house sometime between 1659 and 1663, when ver Ryn sold the property. It passed through various hands before winding up with the Van Sicklen brothers, John and Abraham, who may also have built the house in 1770. In either case, the house never belonged to Lady Moody. “Lady Moody House” is a fiction dreamed up by a real estate office in the 1890s. It’s a very old building no matter how you slice it.

 More Family relations and information:

After the death of his first wife, Sir James married Debora, daughter of James Pilkington Bishop of Durham, and widow of Walter Dunche, of Little Wytnam, in the county of Berks.
Lady Deborah Moody: A Discourse Delivered Before the New York Historical Society, May 1880
National Genealogical Society Quarterly, Volumes 45-47
Saretta G. Hicks papers on Lady Deborah Moody ARC.276 
The New England Historical and Genealogical Register,: Volume 48 1894

History on house:  Swampscott
In 1640 she had purchased a lot at Sangus, near Salem, and was granted, at a General Court, 400 acres of land. She was not banished from her native country, but came over suo moiu to the New World, having sold her ancestral estate before leaving. In her New England abode she had "a beautiful farm, situated between the ocean cliffs and a river, stocked with cattle, and put under cultivation." She also built for herself a house there, which was well furnished, and had within it one of the best libiaries in the then infant colony.
Thomas Clinton, third Earl of Lincoln, d. 15 January, 1619 ; m. Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Knyvett, of Charlton, Wilts, and had: Lady Susan Clinton, who m. “ John Humfrey, Esq.,” 1595—1661, a lawyer, of Dorchester, in Dorsetshire. Mr. Humfrey was one of the six gentlemen to whom the council of Plymouth, England,in March, 1627-8, sold that part Of New England “between three miles north of the Merrimac and three miles south of the Charles,” for the Massachusetts Bay Company, of London; John Winthrop, Governor, and John Humfrey, Deputy-Governor. Mr. Humphrey came to New England, with Lady Susan, in July, 1634, and made his home on his farm of five hundred acres at Swampscott (Lynn), Massachusetts, and entered upon his duties as assistant, and was one of the founders of Lynn. In 1640 he was a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company ; in 1641 was appointed to the command of the militia with the rank of Sergeant Major-General. He and his wife, Lady Susan, returned to Sandwich, Kent, England, 26 October, 1641, having sold his farm to Lady Deborah Moody.
In the year of our Lord 1643, the authorities of New Amsterdam, under Governor Stuyvesant, granted a residence, at " S' fJravensande," now Gravesend, L. I., to " Ye honored Lady Deborah Moody, Sir Henry Moody, and others, with power there to erect a town and fortifications, and enjoye the free libertie of conscience, after the costome and manner of Holland." The place is opposite the Narrows and our noted Coney Island, originally "Couyen," and the Moody settlement was intended for a large city. Lady Moody, the widow of Sir Henry Moody, of Wiltshire, England, was a nonconformist who emigrated thence to Salem, in New England, in 1836, accompanied by her son, then a young man. The cause d'etre of her coming to New Amsterdam is intimated in the following extract from one of the old New England histories: "Lady Moody, a wise and anciently religions woman, who, being taken with the error of denying baptism .to infants, was dealt with by the Church of Salem, whereof she was a member; but persisting still, to avoid trouble, removed to the Dutch, against the advice of her friends."

When Lady Moody had died in 1659, when Sir Henry sold his Long Island property and removed to Virginia. In 1660 he was an Ambassador from that colony to New Amsterdam.

In the " New York Corporation Manual," edited by that admirable farmer, antiquarian, and City Clerk, David T. Valentine, in 1863, we find, in a chapter entitled " Law and Lawyers in New Amsterdam," the final record of Sir Henry Moody. It is given in the words of "Solomon La Chair, Notary Pablicus" of the city, in 1661, in which he speaks of going to the house of Daniel Litschoe, inn-keeper, at his request, to examine an obligation, written in English, and signed by trie baronet Sir Henry Moody, then deceased, who had died at the residence of Colonel Mowvitson, in Virginia, and had left "over fifty written and printed books of divers tongues," that were deposited in pledge with him, for the debt of Sir Henry. 

A list of most of them, given in La Chair's report, is in the article by Mr. Valentine. One of them was a Latin Bible, in folio, and sixteen were Latin and Italian books of " divers matters." Another, a book in quarto, called " Bartar's Six Days' Work of the Lord," translated into English by Jos. Sylvester. From a "discourse" entitled "Lady Deborah Moody," delivered by J. W. Gerard, Esq., before the New York Historical Society, in 1880, to which we have been greatly indebted in preparing this sketch, a printed copy of which having been kindly handed to us by Mr. William Kelby, at the New York Historical Library, we learn that these books were sold, aud that the one last mentioned by us is now in the aforesaid library. It is possible that others of that Moody collection are scattered around among the old families of this city. Lady Moody seems to have been the only titled woman, at least of an English family, mentioned in the annals of New Amsterdam; and her name is, doubtless, to be held in honor as one of those eminent women of rank and wealth in the old country who, in the early part of the seventeenth century, were content to leave their comfortable ancestral homes, cross the seas, and endure so much hardship and danger "in the wilderness " for conscience' sake and liberty of worship. And it is certainly greatly to the honor of the ancient Dutch Republic that it so early declared itself in favor of such liberty, and thus took the lead in all Christendom, in adopting the Master's noble rule of giving " unto Cresar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's." William Hall.

Photo by BK Genie Gravesend CemeteryBrooklyn Kings County (Brooklyn) New York, USA Grave Memorial# 26165329

Anne Houlton Walker first "Pub Crawler" & A look into Colonial Misconduct and "Bawdy" behavior among Woman

   

On April 30 1638 John Winthrop reported that "Anne, wife of Richard Walker, being cast out of the church of Boston for intemperate drinking from one inn to another and for light and wanton behavior," was sentenced to be whipped, "but because she was with child her punishment was respited" She was excommunicated for a variety of infractions, including "cruelty toward her children." and She was tied, with shoulders naked, to the Whipping-post; but being with child she was not whipped." Many call her the first "pub crawler." From the Great Migration Immigrants to New England, 1634-1635, Volume VII, T-Y

According to "Christianity and Sexuality in the Early Modern World: Regulating Desire, Reforming Practice," excommunication was decided only by the patriarchs of the church and was the harshest penalty set on an individual and could be administered for secular acts, or for any crimes committed outside the church.  

Well looking over a two month span Anne Hutchinson and Judith Smith were also bared from service. These three women, according to Darren Staloff in "The Making of an American Thinking Class: Intellectuals and Intelligentsia in Puritan Massachusetts," were the first in seven years to get the boot with the exception of one fellow, who was readmitted with seven months of his excommunication. 

However, in "New World, New Roles: A Documentary History of Women in Pre-industrial America," authors Sylvia R and Frey, Marian J. Morton assert that Winthrop clearly put the energy into his nightly recapping of the day to day events  on woman's misconduct and "bawdy" behavior. Two examples of event in 1634 are both excommunicated for murdering their children and "should be sufficient to impress the pathos or the downright tragedy of the situation;"

"A cooper's wife of Hingham, having been long in a sad melancholic distemper near to phrensy, and having formerly attempted to drown her child, but prevented by God's gracious providence, did now again take an opportunity. . . . And threw it into the water and mud . . . She carried the child again, and threw it in so far as it could not get out; but then it pleased God, that a young man, coming that way, saved it. She would give no other reason for it, but that she did it to save it from misery, and with that she was assured, she had sinned against the Holy Ghost, and that she could not repent of any sin. Thus doth Satan work by the advantage of our infirmities, which would stir us up to cleave the more fast to Christ Jesus, and to walk the more humbly and watchfully in all our conversation."

"Dorothy Talbye was hanged at Boston for murdering her own daughter a child of three years old. She had been a member of the church of Salem, and of good esteem for godliness, but, falling at difference with her husband, through melancholy or spiritual delusions, she sometimes attempted to kill him, and her children, and herself, by refusing meat. . . . After much patience, and divers admonitions not prevailing, the church cast her out. Whereupon she grew worse; so as the magistrate caused her to be whipped. Whereupon she was reformed for a time, and carried herself more dutifully to her husband, but soon after she was so possessed with Satan, that he persuaded her (by his delusions, which she listened to asrevelations from God) to break the neck of her own child, that she might free it from future misery. 

This she confessed upon her apprehension; yet, at her arraignment, she stood mute a good space, till the governor told her she should be pressed to death, and then she confessed the indictment. When she was to receive judgment, she would not uncover her face, nor stand up, but as she was forced, nor give any testimony of her repentance, either then or at her execution. The cloth which should have covered her face, she plucked off, and put between the rope and her neck. She desired to have been beheaded, giving this reason, that it was less painful and less shameful, Mr. Peter, her late pastor, and Mr. Wilson, went with her to the place of execution, but could do no good with her."   Winthrop: History of New England, Vol. II, pp. 79, 335. And from Church records is looks as though Anne Walker was not the only one partaking in spirits that were not of the good pastors words:

CHURCH DISCIPLINE IN THE EARLY HISTORY OF THE FIRST CHURCH IN BOSTON Case #4, Page 22 Anne Walker April 29, 1638 [Church Records show the children James in 1634 & Jabez in 1637 being baptized.] 

Stormy Weather in Mass Bay Colony

“You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.” Bob Dylan 

John Winthrop recorded in his journal 1643: There arose a sudden gust at N. W. so violent for half an hour as it blew down multitudes of trees. It lifted up their meeting house at Newbury, the people being in it. It darkened the air with dust, yet through God's great mercy it did no hurt, but only killed one Indian with the fall of a tree. It was straight between Linne {Lynn} and Hampton. From The history of New England from 1630 to 1649 (With notes by J. Savage)  By John Winthrop. He begun keeping a daily diary of atmospheric conditions while aboard the Arabella en route to the New World in 1630. If he was around today he could have made a prosperous career as a meteorologist. There was another recording of a storm in 1635 "The Great Storm of 1635." Essex Antiquarian" Vol. I, p. 63 Covered from Nova Scotia to at least Manhattan NY. Storm surge waves were 20 feet. Wind damaged crops and blew down trees in immense numbers. In The Old Families of Sailsbury and Amesbury by David W Hoyt we find John Bailey in the storm frenzy:

Here is an article from  Corner in Ancestors Coat-of-Arms of the Porters of America - Thomas Bayley, Founder of His Line Sunday, February 14, 1915   Duluth News-Tribune (Duluth, MN) I had to break up the article into sections so it could be visible, thus the vary in sizes. Also note updates to family history may have recorded after article was written
 

 

John Tillotson was another: Emigrated from England to America in 1635 on the ship "James", leaving Southampton on Apr 5, 1635, under the supervision of Matthew Mitchell, brother of his mother, Mary. The ship carried "one hundred other honest people of Yorkshire", according to one Tillotson history. His father died when John was ten years old. The "James" left Bristol, England, for America on June 4, 1635, albeit the passengers had been aboard since May 24, and did not lose sight of the English coast until June 22, landing at Boston August 17 1635. The ship carried one hundred passengers, twenty-three crew, twenty-three cows and heifers, three suckling calves, and eight mares. All survived and indeed apparently well after such a lengthy voyage on such a small vessel, in spite of weathering a great storm, losing both anchor and tackle.  From Brobst Family Historical Registry.

On another note you have to wonder if the storm tempers permeated Master Tilloston as records Essex County Courtly Court Records show he had a fiery, strong temper, a "tempestuous nature kept him in trouble" (see Comfortably Fixed by Judith M Darby) so we can conclude he had a definite inner rage: 1648 fathered a child four months before his marriage to Dorcas Coleman. 1650: "John Tillotson, it is well knowne what he is, the town gave him 30s but this winter to make a bane." September 1650: Sued and found guilty of killing the mare of James Noyes, for which he was ordered to pay 27 pounds. John did not much like the decision; he was later presented in a public church meeting "for scandalous and reproachful speech cast upon the elders and authorities." April 1656: John Tillotson admonished for chaining his wife to the bedpost with a plow chain to keep her within doors. See also Tillotson of East Montpelier, Vermont: being an account of the ancestors and descendants of Olin Locke Tillotson (1854-1956) and Susie Dellah Davis (1861-1932) and their allied families. November 1657: "John Tilison sentenced to the house of correction. But he was released and bound to "good behaviour and to live with his wife and prvyde for her acording to his place as a husband ought to doe." 1659: John Tilison, upon complaint of Mr. Dummer, fined for false oath, and to pay fees of the Constable of Newbury. 
The Angel Gabriel and the Great Storm of 1635
Janice Brown New Hampshire: Visions of Dorothy and Toto–It’s Tornado Season
John Horrigan's historical lectures Audio on JohnWithrop 
Early American tornadoes, 1586-1870 by David McWilliams Ludlum

Photo from Descendants of Edward W Woodman Nancy Griffin Cunningham Contact cunningb@flash.net

Margaret Jones: First Person Executed for Witchcraft in Massachusetts

A Share from Rebecca Beatrice Brooks and her blog 
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Margaret Jones was a midwife from Charlestown and the first person to be executed for witchcraft in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

                                                                John Winthrop

The only information that exists of Jones’ case comes from two sources, Governor John Winthrop’s journal and Reverend John Hale‘s book “A Modest Enquiry in to the Nature of Witchcraft.”

According to Winthrop’s journal, Jones was accused in 1648 by some of her patients who stated that she told them they would never heal if they refused to take her medicine. When her patient’s illness and injuries didn’t heal, many began to suspect Jones of witchcraft, leading to her accusation in the spring of 1648.
 Yet, according to John Hale’s book “A Modest Enquiry into the Nature of Witchcraft,” Jones was accused after quarreling with some neighbors:

Illustration from Matthew Hopkins “The Discovery of Witches” circa 1647. The manual was used to convict Margaret Jones of witchcraft in 1648

“Several persons have been charged with and suffered for the crime of witchcraft, in the governments of the Massachusetts, New-Haven, or Stratford and Connecticut, from the year 1646, to the year 1692. The first was a woman of Charlestown, Anno 1647 or 8. She was suspected partly because that after some angry words passing between her and her neighbors, some mischief befell such neighbours in their creatures, or the like; partly because some things supposed to be bewitched, or have a charm upon them, being burned, she came to the fire and seemed concerned. The day of her execution. I went in company of some neighbours, who took great pains to bring her to confession and repentance. But she constantly professed herself innocent of that crime: Then one prayed her to consider if God did not bring this punishment upon her for some other crime, if she had not been guilty of stealing many years ago? She answered, she had stolen something, but it was long since, and she had repented of it, and there was grace enough in Christ to pardon her that long ago; but as for witchcraft she was wholly free from it, and so she said unto her death.”

Jones’ case was heard by the General Court, which consisted of Winthrop, Deputy Governor Thomas Dudley and assistant governors John Endicott, Richard Bellingham, William Hibbins, Richard Saltonstall, Increase Nowell, Simon Bradstreet, John Wintrhop, Jr., and William Pynchon.

The evidence used against Jones was gathered using Matthew Hopkin’s witch-hunting manual, “The Discovery of Witches,” published just a year earlier, which advises “watching” a witch for a period of 24 hours to see if the witch’s imp, or familiar, comes to feed. Jones was watched on May 18, 1648 and Winthrop stated an imp appeared “in the clear day-light.”

Winthrop recorded evidence against Jones and the outcome of her trial, which states:

“At this court, one Margaret Jones, of Charlestown, was indicted and found guilty of witchcraft, and hanged for it. The evidence against her was:
1. That she was found to have such a malignant touch, as many persons, men, women, and children, whom she stroked or touched with any affection or displeasure, or etc. [sic], were taken with deafness, or vomiting, or other violent pains or sickness.
2. She practising physic, and her medicines being such things as, by her own confession, were harmless, — as anise-seed, liquors, etc., — yet had extraordinary violent effects.
3. She would use to tell such as would not make use of her physic, that they would never be healed; and accordingly their diseases and hurts continued, with relapse against the ordinary course, and beyond the apprehension of all physicians and surgeons.
4. Some things which she foretold came to pass accordingly; other things she would tell of, as secret speeches, etc., which she had no ordinary means to come to the knowledge of.
5. She had, upon search, an apparent teat … as fresh as if it had been newly sucked; and after it had been scanned, upon a forced search, that was withered, and another began on the opposite side.
6. In the prison, in the clear day-light, there was seen in her arms, she sitting on the floor, and her clothes up, etc., a little child, which ran from her into another room, and the officer following it, it was vanished. The like child was seen in two other places to which she had relation; and one maid that saw it, fell sick upon it, and was cured by the said Margaret, who used means to be employed to that end. Her behavior at her trial was very intemperate, lying notoriously, and railing upon the jury and witnesses, etc., and in the like distemper she died. The same day and hour she was executed, there was a very great tempest at Connecticut, which blew down many trees, etc.”

Jones was hanged from a tree on June 15, 1648 at Gallow’s Hill on Boston Neck, a narrow stretch of land connecting Boston peninsula to the mainland. As Winthrop states in his journal, a storm hit Connecticut the day of her execution: the state’s first tornado.
Jones’ husband, Thomas, had also been accused of witchcraft and arrested but was released after his wife’s execution. According to Winthrop’s journal, Thomas tried to leave the colony on a ship called the “Welcome” but it had a heavy load and had trouble keeping its balance. When it became known that the husband of a convicted witch was on board, the captain quarreled with him and he was arrested and taken off the ship, after which, the ship reportedly stayed upright.
About 80 people were accused and arrested for witchcraft in New England between the years 1647 and 1688 and 12 were executed before a new witch hunt began a few years later in Salem in 1692. Coincidentally, Reverend John Hale played a big part in bringing the Salem Witch Trials of 1692 to an end after his own wife was accused of witchcraft during the hysteria.

Sources:
“Winthrop’s Journal, History of New England, 1630-1649”; John Winthrop; 1853
“The Discovery of Witches”; Matthew Hopkins; 1647
“The Encyclopedia of Witches, Witchcraft and Wicca;” Rosemary Guiley; 2008
“Witch-Hunting in Seventeenth-Century New England: A Documentary History 1638”; edited by David D. Hall; 2005 
“Modest Enquiry Into the Nature of Witchcraft;” John Hale; 1702