The wills of Israel Smith and his wife Elizabeth Arnold Smith Hawkins (8th great grandparents) contain inventories along with written wishes. Israel was a yeoman or landowner. He died at 37 in 1726. His inventory included: bookes, livestock, tools, seeds, a gun, a feather bed, blankets, linens, clothing, kitchenware, including pewter platters, 10 pounds of woolen yarns, thirty eight pounds of flax, spinning wools, furniture, tobacco and candlesticks.

Elizabeth outlived 2 husbands, she died at 74 in 1758. She left specific items for her daughters and granddaughters. Naomi Smith Angell inherited a Square Table and five pounds old Tenor. Daughter Elizabeth gets the Long Cloke, Deborah gets the Kettle and divides the featherbed with Ruth. Elizabeth’s will directs that her best buttons are for her granddaughters, “My will is that my Grand Daughter Elisabeth Hopkins have my large Silver Sleeve Buttons. Item, I give my Grand Daughter Martha Smith my Small Silver Sleeve Buttons, my looking Glass.” Elizabeth’s will is transcribed at Rhode Island USGenweb, last will towards bottom.

So in the mid 1700s seeds and buttons.

Sources

Providence, Rhode Island, Wills (1678-1916) and Indexes, Volume 3-4, 1726-1754, page 121, 122, 123, 124 -at Ancestry $

Rhode Island USGenWeb Project, Rhode Island Reading room Wills page 4 public document transcribed at: http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~rigenweb/wills4.html