Jonathan Porter, of Huntington

Is there sufficient evidence to support as child of Samuel Porter & brother of Sgt. John Porter, of Salem?

Jonathan Porter was admitted as a freeman in Massachusetts Bay colony in 1641. Jonathan Porter sold land to Osmand Trask in 1653 in Essex County, Massachusetts.

Jonathan Porter of Salem and his wife Eunice removed to Huntington, Long Island. NEHGR, Volume 7, p. 359, Early Settlers of Essex and Old Norfolk

In 1636 Jonathan Porter and his wife Eunice, with their children, moved from Beverly to Salem in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. About 1654, after eighteen years of active civic life in Salem, he left the Massachusetts Bay Colony with his wife and three married daughters to settle in Huntington, Long Island, New York. He left no posterity in Massachusetts.

After the death of her husband in 1660 in Long Island, Eunice filed suit in Salem for return of value of property that her husband sold to Osmand Trask in 1653. Her claim was that one-third the value of the property was her dowry. The details of this legal case can be found in Records and Files of Quarterly Courts of Essex County, volume 2, pp 251-152.

Eunice remarried about 1660 to Giles Smith of Farfield, Connecticut. Additional information is available in the Huntington, Long Island town records available through archive.org.

Some information is available in Long Island Genealogies, by Mary Bunker, p. 54.

Family notes

PORTER, Jonathan, Salem 1636, a sergeant in 1647, and in (vol. 3, p. 462) Sept. of that yr. had gr. of 200 acres, was selectman 1653 and 4, but late in that year conveyed his estate at Salem to son-in-law James Chichester, on condition that he should provide for his widow Eunice if she outlived him and removed to Huntington, L. I. had died bef. 1660, when Eunice sued for her right in November of that year. and in 1670 estate was divested to the heirs, who were all females. His three daughters married respectively James Chichester, Edward Harnett, and Stephen Jarvis; and the widow Eunice re-married Giles Smith of Fairfield. Early Settlers of New England, James Savage.

Biographical notes

http://hausegenealogy.com/porter.html

Our family line can be traced back to SAMUEL PORTER (1567 - 1660) of Dorchester, Devonshire, England. Samuel apparently sailed to the United States as part of the great Puritan emigration. He married a woman named SARAH (1568 - 1599) and they had a son, JONATHAN PORTER (1602 - 1665) who married a woman named EUNICE.

Jonathan is recorded as a church member on 05 Apr 1640 in Salem, Essex County, Massachusetts, and on the second of June in 1641, Jonathan took the oath as a free man. He and Eunice had at least three daughters: Elizabeth Porter (1620 - 1670), Eunice Porter (1621 - 1661), and our ancestor, MARY PORTER (1625 - 1661).

Fortunately, our ancestors had left the area by then -- and not by their own choice: When the Quaker religion spread to Massachusetts in the early 1650s, Jonathan Porter became a member -- and as a result he was fined and run out of town by the Puritans.

The Porter left Salem for Huntington, Suffolk County, New York, in 1658 in the company of the Harnett, Chichester and Jarvis families, all Quaker adherents. An accurate date for their move to Huntington, Long Island can be established by a meeting held in Salem on the 31st of August in 1658, where "Edward Harnet, Taylor [tailor], beeinge now about to remove out of the town," apprentices Jeremiah, son of Alice Chichester.

All four families are closely associated in early Long Island records, and all three of Jonathan and Eunice Porter's daughters married within that small group; Elizabeth married Edward Harnett, Jr., Eunice married James Chichester, and our ancestor, MARY, who wed STEPHEN JARVIS (1625 - 05 Aug 1693), who was born in England, possibly Stafford County, and sailed to America on the ship "Primrose." He arrived in Salem in1656. He and Mary were wed in Salem, but moved along with Jonathan and Eunice Porter to New York. Jonathan conveyed his estate at Salem to James Chichester, his son-in-law (by way of daughter Eunice), on the condition that he care for his widow, should she outlive him.

References

• “1626-1637” By Sidney Perley. Page 373. GoogleBooks Jonathan Porter,' a planter, lived in that part of Salem which is now Beverly. ... 'Jonathan Porter married Eunice , and removed to Huntington, L. I., in 1665; she was his wife in 1660, and married, secondly, Silas Smith oi Fairfield; children: 1. Mary, baptized Oct. 12, 1645; 2. Jonathan, baptized March 12, 1648.
• http://hausegenealogy.com/porter.html
• ”History and Genealogy of the Families of Old Fairfield, Volume 1.” edited by Donald Lines Jacobus. Page 490. GoogleBooks Jonathan Porter left by his widow Eunice 3 married daughters in 1670: Chichester, Hornett, Jarvis. “Genealogical Guide to the Early Settlers of America: With a Brief History of ...” By Henry Whittemore. Page 431. GoogleBooks Shows two different Jonathan Porters of Salem.