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Joshua Whitney, son of Colonel David Whitney and Elizabeth Warren
Amy Blodgett (1724–1819), daughter of Doctor William Blodgett and Sarah Hall
Joshua Whitney, the son of David and Elizabeth Whitney was born on 11 October 1718 in Plainfield. [1] He died on 10 February 1761, age 42 years, three months and 29 days, in Plainfield. He married Amy Blodgett as her first husband "about the 8th of Apr., 1743" in Plainfield. [1]
Amy Blodgett, the daughter of William and Sarah Blodgett, was born on 16 February 1723/4 in Plainfield. [1] She died on 24 December 1819 in Canaan, Litchfield County, Connecticut. She married second Captain Isaac Lawrence. Isaac, the son of Captain Daniel Lawrence, was born on 25 February 1704/5 in Groton, Middlesex County, Massachusetts. [2] He died on 2 December 1793, age 88. [2] He married first Lydia Hewitt on 19 December 1727 in Plainfield. [2] She died on 14 November 1765. [2] Amy married third George Palmer of Stillwater, Saratoga County, New York at age 74.
Joshua's son David said he was born in Norwalk [in New London County] on 25 March 1757 and that he was told that his father moved to Plainfield when he was three. [3]
From the journal of Joshua Whitney's grandson John Bacon: [4]
Isaac Lawrence moved from Plainfield to Canaan in the northwest corner of Connecticut. He was a captain in the militia there, a town selectman for 17 years, and a deputy to the General Assembly of the Colony of Connecticut in 1765. [2]
In 1752 all 101 members of the Congregational Church of Canaan voted to move to Stillwater. There they formed the Congregational Church of Stillwater. George Palmer was an early arrival. He bought mills and 200 acres from Isaac Mann. In 1773 he bought 305 more acres from Isaac Mann's estate, which covered the present Stillwater Village. [5]
In October 1762 Tarball Whitney, administrator of the estate of [his brother] Joshua Whitney of Plainfield told the court that Joshua's debts exceeded his personal estate and requested permission to sell some of his real estate. This was granted. [6]
Children of Joshua Whitney and Amy Blodgett:
i. Abigail Whitney was born on 10 January 1744. She died on 21 September 1821 in Woodstock. She married Captain Asa Bacon.
ii. Mary Whitney was born on 7 January 1746. [4] She died on 22 November 1817 in Canaan. [4] She married Lemuel Kingsbury on 7 May 1767 in Canaan. [4] Lemuel, the son of John and Esther Kingsbury of Canaan was born on 4 April 1743. [4] He died on 24 November 1804 in Canaan. [4] Lemuel was Mary's first cousin as Esther Kingsbury was Mary's aunt Esther Whitney.
Lemuel was a cornet in Sheldon's Light Dragoons in 1776. He was a representative from Canaan to the General Assembly in 1784. He moved to Poultney, Vermont, but returned to Canaan. He owned a slave named Cuff, but freed him on 13 April 1780. [7]
iii. Huldah Whitney was born in 1748 and died in 1750. [4]
iv. Joshua Whitney was born on 28 November 1750. [4] He died in March 1822 in Bridport, Addison County Vermont, leaving several children. [4]
Joshua was named in his grandfather Colonel David Whitney's will of 27 October 1769.
v. Josiah Whitney was born on 11 August 1752. [4] "His friends never knew where or when he died." [4]
vi. Huldah Whitney was born on 20 January 1755. [4] She married her stepbrother Elias Palmer. [5] Elias was born on 29 September 1756 and he died on 4 November 1838. [5] He married second Mrs. Mercy Keyes. [5]
vii. David Whitney was born on 25 March 1757 in Norfolk. [3][4] He died on 10 March 1850 in Addison County, Vermont. [3] He married [second?] Eliza Wilson on 30 March 1818 in Addison. [3] She married second Calvin Solace on 8 March 1855. [3] He died on 26 October 1865, age 79, in Bridport, Addison County. [3]
David said that when he was ten he went to live with his sister [presumably Mary] in Canaan. [3]
David was a Revolutionary War soldier and he later applied for a pension under the 1832 act. He said that he enlisted as a private from Canaan in 1775. He served five months from September 1775 in Captain Joshua Stanton's company, Colonel Charles Burrell's regiment. From March 1776, he was a minute man under Captain Gresham Hewitt. In June 1776 he enlisted in Captain Edward Roger's company, Colonel Gay's regiment and was in the retreat from New York and the battles of Harlem Heights and White Plains. He was discharged on 25 December 1776. In the spring of 1777 he served two weeks in Captain Ruleff Dutcher's company and was at the burning of Danbury. He served three months in Captain Timothy Gaylor's company, Colonel Hooker's regiment. In 1778 he was a minute man in Captain Dutcher's company and about July was called out and served two months under Major Bull. About the time of the burning of Norwalk he served two weeks under Captain Dutcher and was in battle there. The following October he served three months. Following the war he moved to Addison in Addison County, Vermont. [3]
The first town meeting of Addison was held on 29 Mar 1784 and David was appointed a fence viewer. He took the freeman's oath there in 1790. He had a farm on the north bank of Ward's Creek in Addison, where he lived until a few years prior to his death, when he moved to Bridport. He was a member of the constitutional conventions of 1793, 1814, 1836, and 1843. He represented Addison in the legislature in 1790, 1792, 1793, 1797, 1808 to 1815, and 1824. [8]
Eliza (Wilson) (Whitney) Solace, age 50, testified for a widow's pension on 1 March 1853 in Addison. [3]
viii. Amy Whitney was born on 23 March 1761. [4] She married Nathaniel Stevens of Canaan. [4]
Amy and Nathaniel were living in 1825. [4]
References:
1. "Connecticut: Vital Records (The Barbour Collection), 1630–1870," database with images, AmericanAncestors.org, 11 (Blodgett), 142 (Whitney).
2. Robert M. Lawrence, Historical Sketches of the Lawrence Family (Boston: Rand Avery Co., 1888), 45–47.
3. "Revolutionary War Pensions," database with images, Fold3 (https://www.fold3.com) > Connecticut > W > Whitney > David Whitney.
4. David W. Dumas, ed., "Bacon - Adams - Whitney - Kingsbury Family Record," New England Historical and Genealogical Register 138 (1984), 32–38. Records compiled by John Bacon (1774–1846), record of John Bacon, son of Captain Asa Bacon and Abigail Whitney.
5. Dorothy Chapman Saunders, "Early Connecticut Settlers in Saratoga County, New York: History of Saratoga County, New York, Nathaniel B. Sylvester, 1878," Connecticut Nutmegger 25 (1992): 380–98, specifically 188.
6. Charles J. Hoadley, The Public Records of the Colony of Connecticut, vol.12 (Hartford: Press of the Case, Lockwood and Brainard Co., 1881), 108.
7. Frederick John Kingsbury, Genealogy of the Descendants of Henry Kingsbury of Ipswich and Haverhill, Massachusetts (Hartford: Case, Lockwood and Brainard, 1905).
8. H.P. Smith, History of Addison County (n.p.: D. Mason & Co. Publishers, 1886), 363, 371, 376.
25-Jun-2023