Benjamin Hastings

ID: I10132

• Name: Benjamin Hastings
• Sex: M
• Title: Deacon
• Marriage 1 Mary Clark

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Benjamin Hastings is listed as the fifth child of Deacon Thomas and Margaret (nee Cheney) Hastings, born on Aug. 9, 1659 (apparently in Watertown, Massachusetts Bay Colony). He died on Dec. 18, 1711, in Hatfield, Province of Massachusetts.

A rather extensive entry exists on Benjamin Hastings, posted on a blog dedicated to the Holme Family at:

http://holmefamily.blogspot.com/2012/07/chapter-14-benjamin-hasting...

According to this entry, the timeline of Benjamin's life was:

• 1659, Aug. 9: Birth in Watertown (sourced: Historical Society, Watertown Records, Watertown, Massachusetts: Fred G. Barker, 1894, 22)
• 1678: Followed his elder brother Thomas westward to Hatfield in western Massachusetts Bay Colony, taking Freeman's Oath on Feb. 8 (sourced: Lydia Hastings Buckminster, The Hastings Memorial, Boston: Samuel G. Drake, 1866, 84). Served as a carpenter in the generation-old community (sourced: George Sheldon, A History of Deerfield, Massachusetts, Deerfield, Massachusetts: Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Assoc., 1895, 618)
• 1683: Married Elizabeth Graves, who was born March 6, 1662, in Hatfield, to Isaac and Mary (nee Church), who moved to Hatfield in 1661 (William Richard Cutter and Henry Bond, authors of two genealogical sources related to the family, had her born in Hartford, Connecticut Colony, where the Graves had moved from). (Sourced: Buckminster, The Hastings Memorial, 84; and Daniel White Wells and Reuben Field Wells, A History of Hatfield Massachusetts, Springfield, MA: F.C.H. Gibbons, 1910, 410)
• 1684, Oct. 21: Hatfield commons is divided among residents, and Benjamin Hastings and his pregnant wife receive lots 36 - Div I, 32 - Div II, and 63 - Div III (sourced: James M. Crafts, History of the Town of Whately, Massachusetts, Orange, Massachusetts: D.L. Crandall, 1899, 45-51)
• 1685, March 15: Elizabeth Hastings gives birth to Samuel (sourced: George Sheldon, A History of Deerfield, genealogies 186)
• 1685, Sept. 7: Father Thomas Hastings dies. Benjamin inherits land bought from elder brother Thomas, as well as a meadow he purchased for 10 pounds, all in Deerfield, a town already subjected to Indian raids. A month earlier, lots were divided on an area called Plumbtree Playne, where Benjamin received a lot near his younger brother Samuel.
• 1686: Benjamin purchases Lot 28 of Deerfield's Town Street from the Howard family but attempts to make a go of settling Plumbtree Playne.
• 1687: Benjamin serves three consecutive terms as a Deerfield Selectman (sourced: George Sheldon, A History of Deerfield, 857)
• 1689, May 17: Benjamin was one of the selectmen who delegated Lieutenant Thomas Wells to represent Deerfield in the Council of Safety that overthrew Sir Edmund Andros and brought down his 3-year-old Dominion of New England (an attempted centralization of colonial government tried by King James II before the Glorious Revolution deposed him). (sourced: Alice C. Baker, True Stories of New England Captives Carried to Canada During the Old French and Indian Wars, Bowie, Maryland: Heritage Books, Inc, 1897, 278-279)
• 1690: An Indian raid disperses the settlement in Plumbtree Playne, and Benjamin removes to Lot 28 of Deerfield's Town Street.
• 1693, March 6: Elizabeth gives birth to their daughter Elizabeth (sourced: Lydia Hastings Buckminster, The Hastings Memorial, 84)
• 1694, Nov. 21: Benjamin sells Lot 28 of Deerfield's Town Street to the Nim family, who find a tragic end there later (sourced: George Sheldon, A History of Deerfield, 618). Possibly the move was made to return his family to Hatfield, where elder brother Thomas resided, though reasons why at this point are purely speculative.
• 1695: Benjamin is elected as a Hatfield Selectman for the first of three consecutive terms (sourced: Daniel Wells and Reuben Wells, A History of Hatfield Massachusetts, 479)
• 1697, Feb. 8: Elizabeth gives birth to twins, Hannah and Benjamin. Hannah is the only survivor, as Elizabeth and Benjamin die in childbirth (sourced: Wells and Wells, A History of Hatfield Massachusetts, 410; Buckminster, The Hastings Memorial, 84; Sheldon, A History of Deerfield, genealogies 186)
• Before late 1698: Benjamin marries widow Mary Parsons, daughter of Nathaniel and Mary (nee Meekins) Clark and survivor of Jonathan Parsons. She brings four children to his three (Samuel age 13, Elizabeth age 5, infant Hannah)
• 1699, Mary gives birth to Benjamin in Northampton, Province of Massachusetts, where the family moved to be close to her network of support. Zeruiah, Joseph, and an unnamed baby girl would follow while the family lived in Northampton.
• 1700, Benjamin serves on a committee to build a bridge over Mill River in Northampton (sourced: Lydia Hastings Buckminster, The Hastings Memorial, 84)
• 1704, Feb. 26: French-backed Indians raid the settlement of Deerfield, capturing Benjamin's eldest child Samuel (age 19, serving on garrison duty), who was brought as a captive to Canada (he serves at a seminary at Cape St. Ignatius from at least his Catholic "baptismal date" of April 18, 1706, to 1710, when he was repatriated).
• 1707, July 16: Benjamin and family moved to Hatfield, where Mary gives birth to Submit, their youngest child (sourced: George Sheldon, A History of Deerfield, Genealogies, genealogies 186.
• 1711, Dec. 18: Benjamin dies in Hatfield. He is survived by Mary, who dies at some future unknown date. (sourced: George Sheldon, A History of Deerfield, Genealogies, genealogies 186)

References

1. Thomas Hastings migrated to New England during the Puritan Great Migration (1621-1640). (See The Great Migration (Series 2), by R. C. Anderson, vol. 3, p. 235) < AmericanAncestors >; (document attached)