Capt. Peter Tufts

Capt. Peter Tufts

• Birth: 5 May 1648 - Charlestown, Suffolk, MA
• Parents: Peter Tufts, Mary Pierce
• Wives: Elizabeth Lynde, Mercy Cotton, Prudence Putnam
• Death: 20 Sep 1721 - Medford, Middlesex, MA
• Burial: Salem St Burial Grd, Medford, Middlesex Co, MA, USA, Plot: 251

Captain Peter Tufts bought the Peter Tufts House from his father in 1680. The house was named for him, but was built by his father, Peter Tufts, Sr.

Estate

Middlesex, Massachusetts, United States. Middlesex County, MA: Probate File Papers, 1648-1871. (American Ancestors, 2014) Case 22995: Peter Tufts 1721.

Will of "Peter Tufts of Medford ... Yeoman", dated 24 Jul 1719, proved 2 Oct 1721, names wife Prudance [mentions Articles of Con't bearing Date the 11th of June 1717], eldest son Peter Tufts, son Thomas, son John, son Simon ["until he shall take his first Degree at the College in Cambridge], daughter Mercy the wife of John Bradshaw Jun'r, daughter Sarah Tufts, daughter Dorothy Tufts [under 21], daughter Lydia Tufts [under 21], daughter Elizabeth Hurd and Mary Austin. Sons Thomas and John to be executors.

References

• Tufts, Larkin T., Tufts Genealogy - Earlier Generations, The New England Historical & Genealogical Register (NEHGS, Boston, Mass., 1897) Vol. 51, Page 301 GoogleBooks
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Tufts_House
• https://www.werelate.org/wiki/Person:Peter_Tufts_%282%29
• http://www.cyberancestors.com/cummins/ps21/ps21_321.htm

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Biography
Peter Tufts. Jr., was born in Medford, Massachusetts May 5, 1648, the son of Peter Tufts and Mary Pierce Tufts.[1][2][3][4]

Peter was married three times. First, He was married in Charlestown, Suffolk County, Massachusetts to Elizabeth Lynde on August 26, 1670. After her death, he married Mercy Cotton in Medford on August 26, 1684. Finally, he was married to Prudence Unknown, widow of William Wyman, after 1715.[1][5][3][4]

Peter died September 20, 1721 in Medford.[1][6][7][3][4]

Additional comments in support of the above facts: PETER TUFTS was born on 5 May 1648, in Medford, Middlesex Co., MA. He was the son of Peter Tufts and Mary Pierce. Peter died in Medford on 20 September 1721, at the age of 73.[7] He was buried in Salem Street Burying Ground, Medford. At the age of 22, Peter married Elizabeth Lynde on 26 August 1670, in Charlestown, Middlesex Co., when she was 20 years old.[8] They had five children: Elizabeth, Anna, Peter, Mary and Thomas.

Peter Tufts was the eldest of twelve children in the family of Peter and Mary (Pierce) Tufts, emigrants from Norfolk, England to Massachusetts. Son Peter was supposedly born in Medford and his younger siblings in nearby Malden. At the age of 22, he married 20-year-old Elizabeth Lynde, only daughter of four children born to Thomas and Elizabeth Lynde. The Lyndes were also new Americans, with Thomas coming from Bedfordshire, and lived in Malden also.

Peter was recorded in depositions in 1679 at age 30[9] and again in 1683, stating that his age was 34.[10] By 1683, Peter and Elizabeth had five children, and they lived in a home that stands today. The Peter Tufts House is considered by some to be the oldest all-brick house in America. Peter Sr. designed and built it around 1678, and his eldest son’s growing family occupied the residence.

“Peter Tufts was then thirty-six years old and was prominent thereafter in Medford affairs. The dark angel of death had visited the big brick house and taken Peter's wife Elizabeth, and four children were needing a mother, and after a year Peter brought home a second wife, Mary, who was to increase the family brood to sixteen.

There were four children, and perhaps a like increasing number in the other dwellings along up the Mystic, and Peter was leftenant and forty-five years old when Meadford people felt the need of a meeting-house. And Peter Tufts was one of the committee that got it erected, and one of the more important ones who seated the town therein. He lived farthest away, but they found the central location on the ‘great rock’ where the road led off to Woburn.”[11]

But tragedy had not departed the brick home at Medford. Peter’s second wife was Mercy Cotton, and she would deliver thirteen more children to the family. Six of the first seven did not survive infancy, including two daughters named Mercy and two more named Dorothy. The survivor, John, would be selected as the town’s minister in 1712. Five of Mercy’s thirteen would reach adulthood, including the third Mercy and Dorothy. The only other son to survive, Simon, was the first physician in Medford.[12]

On 17 October 1699, Peter Tufts was commissioned Lieutenant of the cavalry troop.[13] Later named Captain, he carried that title for the remainder of his life. In June 1715, Mercy Cotton Tufts passed away at the age of 48, leaving the five surviving children. Peter married once more, to Prudence Putnam, the widow of William Wyman. Peter was 69 years of age and Prudence 55. They were together for just over four years.

In March 1718, Peter joined eleven other Medford residents in appealing that town meetings be held according to law. The response from the selectment was that only inhabitants with estates worth £20 or more would be allowed to vote in meetings.[14]

Peter passed away in 1721 and joined his second wife at the Salem Street Burying Ground in Medford.

Here lyes Buried the Body of the Truly Respected Capt PETER TUFTS Who Decd Sept ye 20, 1721. Aged 73 Years.

Also here lyes Buried ye Body of Mrs MARCY TUFTS Virtuous Consort of Capt PETER TUFTS Who Decd June ye 18, 1715. Aged 48 Years.

Prudence survived for over twenty years.

Sources
↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Booth, Edward C., M.D. The Tufts Family in Somerville, "Historic Leaves" (Somerville Historical Society, Somerville, Mass., April 1902) Vol. 1, No. 1, Page 21
↑ U S Find a Grave Index; Memorial # 26920681
↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 North American Family Histories, 1500-2000; "Tufts Geneology - Early Generations" by Larkin T Tufts and Edward C Booth, MD. pages 1-2
↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Savage, James; Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England; Volume 4; pages 272-273
↑ Massachusetts Marriages, 1633-1850
↑ U S Find a Grave Index; Memorial # 26920681
↑ 7.0 7.1 Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 (Provo, UT, Ancestry.com), Medford Deaths, page 445.
↑ Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 (Provo, UT, Ancestry.com), Charlestown Births, Marriages and Deaths, Volume 3, page 366.
↑ Middlesex County, Massachusetts Deponents, 1649-1700; Ancestry.com.
↑ Essex County, Massachusetts Depositions, 1645-1686; Ancestry.com.
↑ Medford Historical Society Papers, Volume 29, page 68; http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2005.....
↑ Medford Historical Society Papers, Volume 29, page 69.
↑ Tufts, Larkin T. and Booth, Edward C., Tufts Genealogy – Earlier Generations (reprinted from New England Historical and Genealogical Register, July 1897, unknown publisher), page 2; Ancestry.com.
↑ The Medford Historical Register, Vol. XVI, No. 4, October 1913, page 81; https://archive.org/details/medfordhistoric01socigoog/mode/2up