Lady Anne Helen Borodell

Born in Bishop’s Stortford, Hertfordshire, England, George Denison arrived in Massachusetts Bay Colony with his father, William Denison aboard the “Lion” in 1632 as part of the Great Migration. His father was among a group of Roxbury, Massachusetts (now part of Boston) men “disarmed” for their support of the theologian and proto-evangelist Anne Hutchinson.

Captain George first married Bridget Thompson of Roxbury, and upon her early death, returned to England to serve in Cromwell’s New Model Army during the English Civil War.

George was severely wounded at the Battle of Naseby. He was sent to Cork, Ireland, for some reason, to recover, at the home of John Borodell, a wealthy Anglo-Irish leather merchant. He was nursed by Borodell’s daughter, “Lady” Ann, whom he later married.

George and Lady Ann emigrated to Roxbury, and eventually were among the first settlers of Stonington, Connecticut, living in a stockaded house there. He was described as “the Miles Standish of the settlement” and was a notable military leader in King Phillip’s War against the Pequot Indians.

After the threat of Indian attacks was over, George and Lady Ann built a “grate house” in the nearby village of Mystic, Connecticut, and were known for “grate feasts” which often included his many children and grandchildren. He served in various capacities for the Connecticut government, and died in Hartford in 1694 while on business there.

Lady Ann lived to the impressive age of 97, dying in 1712 at their home in Mystic, CT.