Mary Bowen 9th great grandma on RootsMagic tree.
Mary was born in Glamorgan, Wales in 1635, a middle child of Griffin and Margaret Fleming Bowen who had at least 12 children. Glamorgan is an historic county in Wales, at the southern most edge on the Bristol Channel. Mary and her siblings, parents all sailed for America in 1638. They were in Boston and on December 6, 1638 the Bowen family joined The First Church in Boston. They lived at Muddy River on the Charles River. “On the 25th of March 1639 Mr Gryffen Bowen had a great Lot granted to him at Muddy River”. By 1648 Mary’s mom and dad sailed back to Wales, or England to live. The kids all stayed America.
Mary married Benjamin Child in Massachusetts around 1652 and they went 4 miles south to Roxbury, Massachusetts. In Roxbury Mary and Benjamin joined the First Church of Roxbury. Churches also served a meeting houses, Benjamin was one who provided money to build the church and meeting house. Mary’s sisters, their husbands were also in Roxbury.
Mary and Benjamin had 12 children between the years 1654-1673. Mary’s husband and dad died around the same time about 1678, she is mentioned in both wills. In her dad’s will, “Widow Child had a share in the distribution of Griffith Bowen’s estate.“ Mary was administrated of her husband’s estate, she provided an inventory which included the lands, livestock, 3 silver spoons and a silver cup, a feather bed, bolsters & blankets, a rug, 10 lbs. of flax, a frying pan and an iron pot.
Mary died at age 72 on Halloween 1707, “The widow Mary Child dyed the last day of October at night”. Both she and Benjamin are buried in Eliot Burying Ground in Roxbury, their headstones are long gone.
Sources
- The New England historical and genealogical register 1893 volume 47 at Archive.org
- Glamorgan, Wales at Wikipedia
- Lineage of the Bowens of Woodstock, Connecticut at HathiTrust
- Genealogy of the Child, Childs and Childe families at HathiTrust, Benjamin’s will


John sold bacon and beef to the Continental Army during the American Revolution. His neighbor George Marquart had the mutton and Jacob Yeiser provided the brandy. At some point John fought in the American Revolution. There’s no military records yet, but his headstones recognize his service in the American Revolution and the French Indian Wars. John has a headstone probably original from his death in 1803 and then a newer marker which his descendants set out out in 1994.
Once they were in America the Bulkeleys lived in Concord where Edward was a freeman on May 6 1635. He married Lucien, last name unknown, in 1640 and they had 6 children. Around 1660 Edward built a house in Concord, on Main Street. “А deed referring to the property, with a dwelling on it, records the 1663 transfer of 10 acres of land located on today’s Main Street to Edward Bulkeley by his mother, widow of one of Concord’s founders and its first minister, Peter Bulkeley.” Today this home is at 92 Sudbury Road in Concord, a private residence, the house was moved in the 1800s. Edward died in 1696, his wife Lucien died in 1690. They are both probably buried at Old Hill Burying Ground in Concord, no headstones remain.
Meanwhile John Jacobs’s younger bother William had enlisted in the army for World War 1. He was a private in the Minnesota 34th Engineers, with men from Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska. They trained at Camp Cody, New Mexico and were in the war until the 1920s. Marvin Cone, Iowa artist and friend of Grant Wood was in this same unit and designed the insignia. William returned from World War 1 in 1920 and Tena and William married at Ebenezer Lutheran Church on February 22, 1920.
Henry, a year after his marriage, sailed to America and on the 1855 New York census he lived in Monroe County, New York, he was a servant and boarded in the home of Lucy Blodgett. Within a year his wife and baby son William came to America too. By 1860 Henry had his own home, a next door neighbor of Lucy Blodgett and her family. On the 1860 census Henry is a Miller, his kids range from age 6 to 2 months, older brother William is also in the home. Henry and Philippa would have 7 kids total, 4 sons and 3 daughters: William born in England, and Richard, Emily, Lucy, Harry, Mary and Milton, all born in New York.


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