Fishing For More Fishers In Colonial America ~ Anthony Fisher Jr.

Today I’m going to talk about my 10^th great grandfather, Anthony Fisher III. He is the father of Eleazer Fisher, who I wrote about last month. I have found A LOT of information for Anthony, which is amazing, however, there is conflicting information, some of which I couldn’t find sources for. I ended up confused and overwhelmed sifting through it all. So, I decided to take a step back, take a deep breath, and keep it simple. I put aside the plethora of information from papers, books, etc., that people had written and instead just focused on information from records that I could find.

According to the record of birth for Eleazer, he was born in 1669 in Dedham, Massachusetts, and his parents names were Anthony and Johanna Fisher. Therefore, we know the Fisher family was in Massachusetts by 1669, and we know we are looking for an Anthony and Johanna Fisher.

I started with The Record Of Births, Marriages And Deaths, And Intentions Of Marriage, In The Town Of Dedham, Volume One in search of records for births of their children.

BIRTHS:

·        1648: “1648…Mehitabell, the Daughter of Anthony & Jon Fisher, was borne    the 27 of ye 4 mo.” (p.4)

·        1654: “Josiah, Son of Anthony & Joan Fisher, born May 1: 1654.” (p.7)

·        1658: “1658…Sarah, the Daughter of Anthony & Jane Fisher, was borne 27: 8 mo., 1658.” (p.7)

·        1669: “Eliezer, Son of Anthony & Johanna Fisher, was borne 18^th Sept., 1669.” (p.11)

I then moved on to marriage records and found the following possible matches.

MARRIAGES:

·        1677: “1677…John Guild & Sarah Fisher married the 22d 3m.” (p.17)

·        1679: “James Fales and Deborath Fisher marryed the 20: 8: 1679.” (p.17)

·        1679: “Josiath Fisher and Meletiah Bulling marryed 27^th: 11: 1679.” (p.17)

·        1685: “Benjamin Coalburne & Abia Fisher was marryed March 5.” (p.20)

*There was no year for Benjamin and Abia’s marriage, however, the ones above this entry were for 1685.

I then moved on to death records and found a match for one of them.

DEATH:

·        1688: “Abia Coalburne deceased Nouemb. 18.” (p.21) Sadly, this means they would have been married less than four years when Abiah died.

I felt I was getting too far ahead for the generation I was searching for, and was about to stop when I came across a record of birth that stood out me because it was for a daughter of Josiah Fisher, named Johanah (b. 1686). Could this be our Josiah, and his daughter is named after his mother? This caused me to search some more and I found a few records.

BIRTHS:

·        1681: “Bethia, daughter of Josiah & Melitiah Fisher, was borne 10: 10: 81.” (p.18)

·        1683: “Josiah, the son of Josiah & Militia Fisher, was borne the 25: 9: 83. (p.18)

·        1686: “Johanah, ye daughter of Josiah & Mehetabell Fisher, was borne September 3, 1686. (p.22)

MARRIAGE:

·        1693: “Josiah Fisher & Joanna Morse, was married September 1, 1693.” (p.24)

The marriage record for Josiah and Joanna prompted me to look for a death record for Melitiah, which I found in the 1693 death records:

DEATH:

·        1693: “Milatiah Fisher, deceased April 23, 93.” (.p.25)

After spending hours going over the records for the time frame in question in this source, I decided it was time to look for records elsewhere. My go-to source for all things New England is, of course, the New England Historic Genealogical Society’s website, americanancestors.org. It did not disappoint!

At the top of the list for things I was hoping to find were birth records for Abia and Deborah, and I found both, as well as another child, in the Dedham Church Records.

BIRTHS:

·        1656: “Abiah ye daughter of Anthony Fisher jun. was also baptised ye same day” (record from above had the date 3d 6m 1656)

·        1660: “THE FIRST CHURCH… Deborah daughter of our br: Antony Fisher juni was baptised 24d 12m 1660.”

·        1663: “Judith ye daughter of Brother Anthony Fisher Jun: was baptised 5day 5m 63.”

I also found a marriage record for Anthony and Johanna.

MARRIAGES:

·        1647: Anthony Fisher & Johana Faxin, was married the 7 of mo.”

Then I found two church records, both for the name Anthony Fisher.

RECEIVED INTO THE CHURCH:

·        1645: “Md Anthony Fisher mentioned in ye beginning after many offences given in his conv’rsation & much means used to convince & reduce him into order at last after god much humbled him & brought him to a penitent co’fession therof he was co’fortably received into ye church 14d 1m 1645.”

·        1645: “THE FIRST CHURCH… Anthony Fisher jun. received into ye church 20d 5m 1645.”

As you can imagine, I am loving that first record! And of course, I wish I had his account of what went on! The dates are so close, it could refer to the same person, I suppose. However, I suspect that the first record is in reference to someone else, who I suspect may be Anthony Fisher Sr.

I also found two death records that are possible matches for Anthony and Johannah Fisher.

DEATHS:

·        1669: “Anthony Fisher, deceased 13^th Febr., 1669.”

·        1694: “Joannah Fisher deceased October 16, 1694.”

I also did a search on ancestry.ca and found a great record, although it is handwritten and it will take me some time to decipher what it says, however, what I can see is quite telling.

Yep, that’s all I got so far. Still, it’s pretty good. I’m pretty sure the rest of it is describing the piece of land.

Here is a time line of the information I found possibly relating to Anthony Fisher and his family:

·        1645: Md Anthony Fisher received into the church, Dedham, MA

·        1645: Anthony Fisher Jr. received into the church, Dedham, MA (May 20^th)

·        1647: Anthony Fisher and Johana Faxin/Faxon were married (July)

·        1648: Daughter, Mehitabell, was born (Apr 27^th)

·        1654: Son, Josiah, was born (May 1^st)

·        1656: Daughter, Abiah, was baptised (June 3^rd)

·        1658: Daughter, Sarah, was born (Aug 27^th)

·        1660: Daughter, Debora, was baptised (Dec 24^th)

·        1663: Daughter, Judith, was baptised (May 5^th)

·        1669: Anthony Fisher died (Feb 13^th)

·        1669: Son, Eliezer, was borne (Sept 18^th)

·        1677: Daughter, Sarah, m. John Guild (Mar 22^nd)

·        1679: Daughter, Deborah, m. James Fales (Aug 20^th)

·        1679: Son, Josiah, m. Meletiah Bulling (Nov 27^th), had ch. Bethia (1681), Josiah (1683) & Johanah (1686), wife, Milatiah, died (1693)

·        1685: Daughter, Abiah, m. Benjamin Coalburne (Mar 5^th)

·        1688: Daughter, Abiah, died (Nov 18^th)

·        1693: Son, Josiah, m. Joanna Morse (Sept 1^st)

·        1694: Joannah Fishar died (Oct 16^th)

·        1698: Son, Eleazer, m. Mary Lane Avery (Oct 13^th)

·        1722: Son, Eleazer, died (Feb 6^th)

By no means is this a completed project for me. I have a few documents regarding land grants that I am trying to decipher the handwriting on, plus I hope to continue to discover more records pertaining to Anthony Fisher Jr and his immediate family. I also intend to share findings relating to Anthony Fisher Sr in a future post.

Until next time, happy hunting, fellow gene geeks!

SOURCES:

·        Dedham Church Records, MA Vital Records, 1620-1850, americanancestors.org

·        The New England England Historical and Genealogical Register, 1847-2011, ancestry.ca

·        The Record Of Births, Marriages And Deaths, And Intentions Of Marriage, In The Town Of Dedham, Volumes 1 & 2. (1635-1845), Edited by Don Gleason Hill, Town Clerk, Dedham, Mass., 1886.