Here's a summary - the reasoning will follow:
- Andrew and Rachel Langworthy had 10 children born before March 8, 1686, and all were still living at that time.
- Four of these 10 children were born before Nov 1, 1675. These would include Samuel, John (probably) and Andrew (probably).
- The other six children were born between Nov 1, 1675 and March 8, 1686. One of these may have been James, born ca 1680, but we know little about the others. It's likely that some them were daughters.
- Three of the 10 children died between March, 1686 and September, 1688, probably in a measles epidemic that swept the area.
The details:
How many children did Andrew and Rachel have, and when were they born?
In 1763 Ezra Stiles, who became the president of Yale, transcribed the gravestone of Samuel Hubbard, which was remarkable for the amount of information it conveyed. Unfortunately the stone was destroyed around 1765, so this transcription is all that remains. The stone, dated ca September, 1688, recorded the grandchildren of Samuel and Tacy Hubbard by each of their three daughters:
- Ruth, wife of Robert Burdick: 11, 1 dead, 10 living
- Rachel, wife of Andrew Langworthy: 10, 3 dead, 7 living
- Bethiah, wife of Joseph Clarke: 9 living
All three of Samuel Hubbard's sons-in-law were among the party which agreed to purchase land in Westerly in 1661. Only Robert Burdick and John Clarke actually moved there - Andrew Langworthy sold his Westerly land to William Reape before 1670. Andrew and his family stayed in Newport and it would seem from Samuel Hubbard's letters that the Langworthy family lived close to the Hubbards.
When King Philip's war broke out, many of the Westerly settlers went back to Newport for protection. Here are excepts from two of Samuel Hubbard's letters:
- (Nov 1, 1675) "My wife and 3 daughters, who are all here by reason of the Indian war, with their 15 children, desire to remember their christian love to you."
- (Nov 1676) "In the midst of these troubles of the war.... we sent a boat ...and my two daughters, and their children (one had eight, the other three, with an apprentice boy) all came... My son Clarke came afterwards before winter, and my other daughter's husband in the spring, and they have all been at my house until this day."
From these letters we learn that Samuel Hubbard had 15 grandchildren on November 1, 1675. The Burdicks had eight, the Clarkes had three, so Andrew and Rachel must have had four living children at the time.
Again from Samuel Hubbard:
(March 8, 1686) "And I may say with old Jacob, Gen.32, 10, that I came over with myself and God have made me 3 bands. This day I heard God have added one grandchild more to my store, that now I have grandchildren 28...."
The Westerly records show that the new grandchild was was Thomas Clarke, the eighth of the Clarke children. Because Ruth Burdick was 46 in 1686, it's likely that all 11 of the Burdick children had been born (this agrees with the Burdick Genealogy) and we know from another of Samuel Hubbard's letters that one of them had died: (Sept 25, 1683) "... at Westerly, the first day after the Sabbath, brother Burdick buried a son".
So in March, 1686 Samuel Hubbard had 28 grandchildren, of whom 8 were Clarkes and 10 were Burdicks, implying that 10 were Langworthys. So we now know that all of the Langworthy children were born before March 8, 1686 and that all of them were still alive at that date.
Now recall that the Hubbard memorial stone said there were 26 grandchildren living in September, 1688. The Clarkes had had their ninth child in April, so three grandchildren must have died between March 8, 1686 and September, 1688. They must have been children of Andrew and Rachel, because the only Burdick death was in 1683 and all the Clarke children were still alive in 1688. The probable cause of the death of Andrew and Rachel's children appears in another of Samuel Hubbard's letters:
(May 7, 1688) "The mesles is not gone here, my daughter Rachel have them and some of her family."
So summarizing the above argument:
- Andrew and Rachel (Hubbard) Langworthy had ten children.
- Four of them were born before Nov 1, 1675.
- Six children were born between Nov 1, 1675 and March 8, 1686.
- Three of the children died between March 8, 1686 and November, 1688, probably of the measles.
Who were the children of Andrew and Rachel?
We can be sure of just one:
- Samuel: Affidavits by John Phillips and his wife Ruth, and by Joseph Crandall, both given in 1716 (after Samuel's death), stated that he was the oldest son of Andrew Langworthy. The implication, of course, is that there was more than one son.
According to Torrey's "New England Marriages", Samuel was married in 1680, so I've assumed his birth date was ca 1660, which would have made him about 20 when he married.
Probable children:
- John: The 1692 rolls of the Sabbatarian Church of Newport, RI, show John and Elizabeth Langworthy as members. Because Rachel Hubbard Langworthy was a founding member of this church, this is taken as evidence that John was Rachel's son.
John's wife, Elizabeth was born ca 1663, so I've assumed that John was born ca 1662, two years after Samuel.
- Andrew, of Little Compton: There are no records tying him to either Andrew or Rachel Langworthy, but his age is about right and his name, of course, makes this reasonable. More compelling is a deed in which Andrew Langworthy of Little Compton sells land in Westerly to Samuel Langworthy of Westerly. Two points raised by this deed:
1) How did Andrew Langworthy of Little Compton acquire the land in Westerly? Although records of land transactions are by no means complete, the only Langworthy known to have land in Westerly before this date was Andrew Langworthy of Newport.
2) Samuel Langworthy of Westerly is identified in another deed as the grandson of Andrew Langworthy of Newport. Deeds of this era generally contain several elaborate sentences in which the grantor guarantees to the grantee that the land is truly his and will never be contested by any of the grantor's heirs. But this particular deed is unusually elaborate in this regard, and may indicate that there was some relationship between Andrew and Samuel which required the extra emphasis. For a transcription of the deed, click here.
Another important consideration is that some of Andrew's descendants were Seventh Day Baptists, which ties him back to Andrew and Rachel.
Possible son:
- James: The argument that James was the son of Andrew Langworthy of Newport rests on a deposition of about 1698 in which Rachel Langworthy, age about 56, and James Langworthy, age about 18, swore they saw an individual at Kingston, RI. Rachel's age agrees with the age of Rachel Hubbard Langworthy (1698 - 1642 = 56), so the assumption is that James was her son, born ca 1680.
It should be noted, though, that James and his family were not Baptists as were Andrew and Rachel. As far as we know, James's children were all married in and members of Trinity Church in Newport, so it seems the family was aligned with the traditional Anglican Church.
The question of "M"
The Rhode Island Historic Cemetery Transcription Project (online) notes the gravestone of "M Langworthy", buried in the Hubbard lot in Middletown, RI. The gravestone is reported to say that "M" died in July, 1676 at the age of 16.
So there are a number of possibilities:
- The above argument is incorrect, implying that either Samuel Hubbard's letters or the Westerly records is wrong, or
- The stone was read incorrectly. If the date were 1686 rather that 1676, then "M" would be one of the 3 children who died during this period, or
- 'M' was a relative of Andrew's but not his child.
The problem is compounded by the fact the the only source cited by the Tombstone Transcription Project is the diary of Ezra Stiles, and the printed version of that diary makes no mention of a gravestone for "M". Pending further information, I've decided not to include "M" as one of Andrew and Rachel's children.
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