Monday, 31 July 2017

My Ancestor Daniel Robbins, Soldier in the Militia of Massachusetts, American Revolution


I have previously written about the Marshall line on my maternal grandfather, Angus Grant’s side (for a refresher go to January 31, 2017 and May 13, 2016 blog posts). Today I want to focus on my 7th great grandfather, Daniel Robbins. Daniel connects to the Marshall line via his daughter, Mary Robbins (my 6th great grandmother). She married Isaac Marshall (my 6th great grandfather) on May 6, 1772. They connect to the Grant line by their descendant, Samantha Marshall (my 3rd great grandmother) who married John Grant, the grandfather of my great grandfather, George Angus Grant. Okay, now that that’s clear (I hope), back to the Robbins…

Once I found documentation for Isaac Marshall, I was able to find evidence for his marriage to Mary Robbins, which then led to finding a record for her birth. This document gave us her date and place of birth: February 2, 1752 in Norton, Massachusetts, as well as her parents’ names: Daniel and Mary Robbins.

From there I looked for a marriage record for her parents. I found two documents. One document’s heading reads, “Intentions of Marriages Entred” and contains the following information, “Daniel Robins of Walpole and Mary Fisher of Dedham, Jan. 23d 1750/51”. The second, a transcribed record with the heading, “Walpole Marriages” reads, “ROBBINS…Daniel and Mary Fisher, May 7, 1751”.

With this new information in hand to search with I was fortunate enough to find a photo of Daniel and Mary’s shared gravestone on ancestry.ca:
The photo was taken by M Shearer at Lakeview Cemetery,
Kennebec County, Maine on June 24, 2011.

It can be a little tricky to read so here is what it says on their gravestone:

DANIEL ROBBINS

1722 – 1803

Settled in Winthrop

Before 1778

Soldier in Rev. War

His Wife

MARY FISHER

1731 – 1804


The next step was to search through applications for membership to the Sons of the American Revolution. (A big shout out to my Aunt Sis for her help with this!)

I found a few documents containing matching information about Daniel Robbins and Mary Fisher. Here is a breakdown:

MARY FISHER

BIRTH

·        1731 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 6411, 45750)

·        August 29, 1731 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 28324, 60475)



DEATH

·        1805 (Source: SAR Membership # 45750)

·        February 25, 1805 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 6411, 28324, 60475)



DANIEL ROBBINS

BIRTH

·        1722 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 6411, 45750)

·        August 17, 1722 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 28324, 60475)



DEATH

·        1804 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 6411, 45750)

·        March 4, 1804 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 28324, 60475)



MARRIAGE of MARY AND DANIEL

·        May 1, 1751 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 28324, 60475)

·        1751 (Sources: SAR Membership #s 6411, 45750)



From these different applications, we are able to confirm that these are the same people on each application, and from that I was able to find out more information for Mary and Daniels’s ancestors and descendants! However, there are some discrepancies between the SAR member applications and information from other sources. Let’s have a look…

The first discrepancy is in regards to their date of marriage. Since the first record’s heading is “Intention of Marriage” and is from shortly before their actual date of marriage, I don’t see this as a discrepancy. The second record regarding their marriage (May 7, 1751) and the date given on the Sons of the American Revolution Membership Applications (May 1, 1751) are so close that I am not concerned that they are different. It seems likely that there was an error when transcribing the information. Even with the differences, we at least can be confident that Daniel and Mary were married in May of 1751.



Taking a closer look at the Sons of the American Revolution, we find some important military information regarding Daniel Robbins. According to these applications he was a private in the Militia of Massachusetts “in active service in the defence of Lincoln County” under Major William Lithgow in Captain Timothy Foster’s Company. His detachment served between September 1, 1779 and November 4, 1779, “27 days defending frontiers of Lincoln County”.



Four applications give us the name of a son of Daniel and Mary’s (which means he is my 7th great uncle). His name is Asa Robbins. He was born in 1759 and died in 1840. His wife’s name was Olive Clark (1762-1827) and they married in 1788 (one says 1888 which I am confident is a clerical error given their dates of death).

Three of the applications provide us with the names of Daniel Robbins’ parents: William Robbins, born 1650, “Soldier in King Phillips War of 1675”, died August 18, 1725 at Reading, Massachusetts; and Priscilla Gowing, died March 5, 1745. They married in January 1680.

Armed with all of these fantastic new leads, I can’t wait to do some more research!

Until next time, happy hunting, fellow gene geeks!


SOURCES:

·        History of the County of Annapolis: including Old Port Royal and Acadia, William Arthur Calnek, 1897 (https://archive.org/details/cihm_00386)

·        MA, Compiled Marriages, 1633-1850 (americanancestors.org)

·        MA, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 (americanancestors.org)

·        MA, Vital Records, 1620-1850: Norton Births, Vol: Norton-V1, p.122 (americanancestors.org)

·        MA, Vital Records, 1620-1850: Walpole Marriages, p.168 (americanancestors.org)

·        New England Marriages to 1700, Vol.2, p.1281 (americanancestors.org)

·        U.S., Find A Grave Index, 1600s-Current (ancestry.ca)

·        U.S. Sons of the American Revolution Membership Applications, 1889-1970 (ancestry.ca)

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