Robert Bartlett, of the Plymouth Colony

• Not the same as Robert Bartlett, of the Hartford Colony
• Not proven as son of Robert Bartlett, Sr., of Puddleton

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Robert Bartlett

• BIRTH: Born by about 1604 based on estimated date of marriage.
• DEATH: Plymouth between 19 September 1676 (date of will) and 29 October 1676 (date of probate).
• Parents: Unknown
• Wife:  Mary Warren
• Dea. & Lt. George Bartlett, of Guilford was not his son
• John Bartlett, of Windsor was not his son
• Deborah Cowls was not his daughter

Biography

GEDCOM Note

ROBERT BARTLETT

• ORIGIN: Unknown
• MIGRATION: 1623 on Anne
• FIRST RESIDENCE: Plymouth
• OCCUPATION: Wine cooper
• CHURCH MEMBERSHIP: On 1 May 1660 at Plymouth court "Robert Bartlett appeared, being summoned in answer for speaking contemptuously of singing of psalms, and was convict of the fact ..." [PCR 3:185-86].
• FREEMAN: In the "1633" Plymouth list of freemen in proximity to those admitted on 1 January 1632/3 [PCR 1:4]. On list of 7 March 1636/7 [PCR 1:53]. In Plymouth section of lists of freemen of 1639 and (apparently) 1658 [PCR 8:174, 197].
• EDUCATION: Signed all deeds by mark. Inventory included books valued at 7s.
• OFFICES: Committee to lay out highways, 2 May 1637 [PCR 1:58]; Plymouth petit jury, 6 June 1643, 28 October 1645, 7 June 1648, 6 March 1649/50, 4 October 1653, 7 March 1653/4, 3 October 1654, 3 May 1659 [PCR 2:126; 7:35, 41, 47, 67, 70, 72, 93]; Plymouth grand jury, 5 June 1644, 2 June 1646, 17 May 1649, 7 June 1652, 8 June 1655 [PCR 2:71, 102, 3:9, 78; PTR 1:28]; surveyor of highways, 4 June 1645, 4 June 1661 [PCR 2:84, 3:215]; committee to lay out land, 24 May 1660 [PTR 1:41]. In Plymouth section of 1643 list of men able to bear arms [PCR 8:189].
• ESTATE: In the 1623 Plymouth land division granted one acre as a passenger on the Anne [PCR 12:6]. In the 1627 Plymouth division of cattle "Robert Bartlet" was the twelfth person in the tenth company [PCR 12:12]. Assessed 9s. in the Plymouth tax lists of 25 March 1633 and 27 March 1634 [PCR 1:10, 27].

On 1 July 1633 it was ordered that "Mrs. Warren & Rob[er]t Bartlet mow where they did last year ..." [PCR 1:15]. On 28 May 1635 "Thomas Litle came before the Governor and acknowledged that he had given unto Robart Bartlet a parcel of land at the end of his lot beyond Eel River," and describes himself as brother-in-law to Bartlett [PCR 1:34]. On 14 March 1635/6 it was ordered that "Mrs. Warren, Rich. Church, Tho. Litle, & Rob[er]t Bartlet mow where they did last year ..." [PCR 1:41]. On 20 March 1636/7 it was ordered that "Richard Church, Rob[er]te Bartlet, & Thomas Little, [have] hay ground where they had the last year, and to take further supply where they can find it, in places not granted to others, and Rob[er]te Bartlet to have the swamp or pit at the head of Mr. Bradford's ground" [PCR 1:56]. On 5 May 1640 "Richard Church, Rob[er]te Bartlett, Thomas Little, & Mrs. Elizabeth Warren are granted enlargements at the heads of their lots to the foot of the Pine Hills ..." [PCR 1:152].

On 7 February 1637 "Mrs. Elizabeth Warren of the Eele River widow for and in consideration of a marriage solemnized betwixt John Cooke the younger of the Rockey Nooke and Sarah her daughter" granted to the said John Cooke "eighteen acres or thereabouts and lying on the north side of Robert Bartlett's lot formerly also given the said Robert in marriage with Mary another of the said Mrs. Warren's daughters" [PCR 12:27]. On 11 November 1637 John Cooke exchanged this eighteen acre parcel with Robert Bartlett for a "lot of land of like quantity lying on Duxborrow side betwixt the lots of Thomas Morton and Jonathan Brewster" [PCR 12:28]. On 9 April 1649 Richard Church sold to Robert Bartlett for £25 a "house and housing and land with all the meadow ground with the addition that he had of Goodman Kemton at the Eel River" [PCR 12:165-66]. On 7 March 1652 Robert Bartlett held a full share as a purchaser of Dartmouth [MD 4:185-88, citing PCLR 2:1:106-07].

On 30 January 1653 Samuel Hicks of Plymouth, planter, sold to Robert Bartlett of Plymouth, cooper, for £18 eleven acres of upland on the south side of Plymouth [MD 5:94-95, citing PCLR 2:1:97]. Robert Bartlett appears in a March 1651 Plymouth town list of those "that have interest and proprieties in the town's land at Punckateesett over against Road Iland" [PTR 1:37]. On 22 March 1663 the lots at "Puncateesett" were described, Robert Bartlett sharing the 24th lot with James Cole Sr. [PTR 1:67]. On 8 March 1668/9 Robert Bartlett of Plymouth, cooper, sold to John Almey of Portsmouth, Rhode Island, merchant, for £3 his share in land granted by the town of Plymouth in 1649 "lying over against Rhode Island aforesaid, at the place commonly called and known by the name of Punckateesett" [PCLR 3:328]. On 27 June 1659 Robert Bartlett of Plymouth, cooper, engaged to pay to Benjamin Foster, the son of Richard Foster, £8 when he reaches the age of twenty-one, on the condition that Bartlett would have the use of Richard Foster's land for the term of ten years; and "Mary the wife of the said Richard Foster deceased" engages to bring up the said Benjamin Foster, who is now four years old [MD 14:15-16, citing PCLR 2:2:28]. In 1660 the town of Plymouth granted to Robert Bartlett fifty acres "lying between the sea and the fern swamp between the Eelriver and Mannomett ponds" [PTR 1:43]; the bounds of this grant were described on 20 February 1662 [PTR 1:54]. On 26 January 1663 the town of Plymouth granted to those living at Eel River a quarter-mile extension on their lots, towards the pine hills [PTR 1:59]. On 21 February 1663 the town of Plymouth granted to Robert Bartlett eight acres of meadow that had been in dispute [PTR 1:61, 62]. On [blank] July 1667 the town of Plymouth granted to Robert Bartlett "a piece of swamp ... to make meadow of lying adjoining to his meadow at the Eelriver" [PTR 1:89].

On 14 July 1670 Robert Bartlett of Plymouth, wine cooper, gave to "my son-in-law James Barnabey, cordwinder" of Plymouth and "my daughter Lydia Barnabey his wife" twenty acres "by me purchased of the said my brother-in-law Richard Church," and four acres of upland meadow added to it [MD 3:112, citing PCLR 3:297]. On 17 February 1670/1 Robert Bartlett of Plymouth, cooper, sold to Thomas Burge Jr. of Newport, Rhode Island, for £50 half his share of land at Acushena in Dartmouth and half his share of land at Pascomansucke in Dartmouth (reserving one-third of the last named share) [MD 3:112, citing PCLR 5:118; RILE 1:140]. On 14 July 1673 "Robert Bartlett of the town of Plymouth ... wine cooper" granted to "my son Joseph Bartlett" for love and affection "all that my farm, messuage, tenement and seat, which I now live in and am possessed of, in the township of Plymouth aforesaid, situate and being at a place or river commonly called Eel River: viz: all that my house and land there"; four acres of marsh meadow there; and two acres of fresh or upland meadow; to be entered upon by his son on the death of the grantor and his wife [MD 3:112-13, citing PCLR 3:301]. On 19 September 1676 Robert Bartlett made a nuncupative will, bequeathing to "my wife all my estate yet undisposed of whether it be in lands or movables, goods, chattels, debts. I give all unto my wife to be absolutely at her dispose among my children" [MD 3:114, citing PCPR 3:2:87]. The inventory of the estate of Robert Bartlett was taken 29 October 1676 and totalled £170 16s. 6d., including £100 in real estate: "2 dwellinghouses and a barn, upland and meadow" [MD 3:114, citing PCPR 3:2:87]. On 6 March 1676/7 "Letters of administration is granted by the Court unto Mary Bartlett & Joseph Bartlett to administer the estate of Robert Bartlett, deceased" [PCR 5:220]. On 13 February 1677 "Mary Bartlett widow and late wife unto Robert Bartlett deceased" sold to "my son Joseph Bartlett" for £300 all the estate which was reserved to her use for life in the deed of gift from her husband Robert Bartlett to the said Joseph Bartlett, as well as fifty acres of upland "near a place commonly called the salt marsh ... between the Eelriver and Mannomett Ponds," fifty acres of upland lying between the land of Ephraim Morton Jr. and the land that did belong to James Barnabey deceased, a parcel of meadow on the Eelriver, and all personal estate given her by husband Robert Bartlett in his will [MD 3:115-16, citing PCLR 4:223].

Family

MARRIAGE: By about 1629 Mary Warren, daughter of RICHARD WARREN (on 7 March 1636/7 Elizabeth Warren, widow of Richard Warren, was made a purchaser in his stead, in part because "of the lots of lands given formerly by her unto her sons in law, Richard Church, Robert Bartlett, and Thomas Little, in marriage with their wives, her daughters" [PCR 1:54], and this was confirmed on 5 October 1652 [PCR 3:19]); she died between 13 February 1677/8 [PCLR 4:223] and 1683 [PLR 1:132].

CHILDREN (all born Plymouth):

i BENJAMIN, b. say 1629; m. (1) by 1654 Susanna Jenney, daughter of JOHN JENNEY (in her will of 4 April 1654 Sarah Jenney, widow of John Jenney, bequeathed to "my son Benjamin Bartlett," and to Mr. Thomas Cushman "the bible which was my daughter Susanna's" [MD 8:171-75, citing PCPR 1:17-21]); m. (2) after 4 April 1654 Sarah Brewster, daughter of LOVE BREWSTER [MFIP Warren 10-12, citing PCR 4:80, 173-4]; m. (3) before 21 January 1678 Sissilla _____ (named in his will of 21 August 1691 [MFIP Warren 10-12, citing PCLR 4:281; MQ 51:131-34]).

ii REBECCA, b. say 1631; m. Plymouth 20 December 1649 William Harlow [PCR 8:8].

iii MARY, b. say 1633; m. (1) Plymouth 10 September 1651 Richard Foster [PCR 8:13]; m. (2) Plymouth 8 July 1659 Jonathan Morey [PCR 8:22 (marriage contract dated 27 June 1659 [MD 14:16, citing PCLR 2:2:28a])].

iv SARAH, b. say 1636; m. Plymouth 23 December 1656 Samuel Rider [PCR 8:17].

v JOSEPH, b. about 1639; m. by about 1663 Hannah Pope, daughter of THOMAS POPE [MD 19:24, citing PLR 1:84]; "March the 12, 1710 My dear wife Hannah Bartlet died being near 72 years of age, myself being six months younger than she when she died ..." [NEHGR 101:279 (from family Bible)]. (If the date given for the death of Hannah is 12 March 1710/1, then she was probably born in the first half of 1639, which would place her husband's birth late in 1639.)

vi ELIZABETH, b. say 1641; m. Plymouth 26 December 1661 Anthony Sprague [PCR 8:23].

vii LYDIA, b. 8 June 1648 [PCR 8:4, 291 (despite the fact that this is published as a birth of 1647, it is clear from the sequence of the records that it should be for 1648)]; m. (1) by about 1670 James Barnaby [PCLR 3:297]; m. (2) shortly after 30 October 1677 John Nelson as his second of three wives [TAG 56:33-34; MFIP Warren 16-17]; she d. Plymouth 11 September 1691 [PVR 135].

viii MERCY, b. 10 March 1650/1 [PCR 8:11]; m. Plymouth 25 December 1668 John Joy of Boston [MFIP Warren 17; PCR 8:32 (not Ivey)].

COMMENTS: In 1959 John G. Hunt suggested that Robert Bartlett of Plymouth was the same as a Robert Bartlett baptized at Puddletown, Dorsetshire, on 27 May 1603, and twenty years later Paul Prindle published a fuller pedigree of this Dorsetshire family, but at the moment this proposed identification remains only a possibility [TAG 35:214, 55:164-70]. Robert of Puddletown had brother Benjamin and sisters Mary, Lydia and Elizabeth, all names used by Robert of Plymouth.
Clues as to the ages of the children of Robert Bartlett are sparse, and several attempts have been made to determine the birth order of the children. Aside from the evidence of birth dates for the last two children, the date of freemanship for son Benjamin and the age at death for son Joseph, our most useful information comes from the marriage dates for the older daughters. The statement has frequently been made that Benjamin must have been born by 6 June 1633, since he was made free on 6 June 1654 [PCR 3:48]. But he had by 4 April 1654 already married and buried one wife, and was soon to marry a second, which suggests a man a few years older than twenty-one in that year. If we place the birth of Benjamin in 1629, then we have a gap of about six or seven years in which to place daughters Rebecca and Mary (1629-1636), but to do this we must assume that they both married when they were about eighteen, rather than rely on our usual rule of marrying daughters at age twenty in the absence of other evidence. There would be nothing unusual about this, and the resulting sequence of births for the elder children is in agreement with the evidence. Note also that under almost any interpretation there is a gap of about six years between the births of the sixth and seventh children of this couple. On 25 December 1635 Robert Bartlett took Richard Stinnings as an apprentice for nine years, his time to begin on 1 December 1635 [PCR 1:35]. On 4 August 1638, for £6 10s. and twenty bushels of Indian corn, John Barnes assigned to Robert Bartlett the remaining term of service of Thomas Shreive (being three years from the first day of August instant), Robert Bartlett also paying Shreive £3 6s. 8d., and Shreive agreeing to serve an additional year for another £5 [PCR 12:32].

BIBLIOGRAPHIC NOTE: The most complete treatment of Robert Bartlett and his family may be found in George E. Bowman's account of the descendants of RICHARD WARREN in MD 3:105-17. This article includes abstracts of all records relating to Robert Bartlett and complete transcripts of the probate documents and some critical deeds, and is only slightly marred by a misguided effort to represent dates in both Old Style and New Style. A shorter but also excellent account may be found in Moore Anc 60-72. Paul W. Prindle included a solid version of the family in his limited edition Ancestors and Descendants of Timothy Crosby Jr. (Orleans, Mass., 1981), 2:342-50. For a more recent brief presentation of this family see Robert S. Wakefield, Janice A. Beebe, et al., Richard Warren of the Mayflower ... (MFIP, 4th ed., 1991 [referred to above as MFIP Warren]), which carefully presents the evidence for the marriages of the children.

SOURCE: Great Migration

GEDCOM Note

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prob Bapt.

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Ancestral File gives his death date as 5 Nov 1688 in Manomet, Plymouth, Massachusetts. Bridgewater Settlement gives his death date as 1676, æ 73.

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Robert Bartlett, designated a cooper in later records, arrived in Plymouth Colony on the Anne in 1623. During the 1627 Division of Cattle, he was unmarried and listed as part of Francis Eaton’s company. Probably around 1630, Robert married Mary Warren, daughter of Mayflower passenger Richard Warren and his wife Elizabeth Warren. Mary Warren had also been a passenger on the Anne. Robert and Mary Warren Bartlett had 8 children: Benjamin, Rebecca, Mary, Sarah, Joseph, Elizabeth, Lydia, whose birth on 8 June 1647 is noted in the Plymouth Colony Records (PCR 8:4), and Mercy, whose birth on 10 March 1650 was noted in the Plymouth Colony Records (PCR 8:11).

Robert’s name appears in the earliest list of freemen, dated 1633. His public service was limited to serving on juries and as surveyor of the highways. His legal dealings mostly centered on land transactions although, in 1660 he was summoned to court to "answare for speakeing contemptuously of the ordinance of singing of psalmes."

Robert died between September 19/29 1676 (date of his will) and October 29-November 8, 1676 when his will was probated. Click HERE for that will.

Mary died sometime after 1677, when she executed a deed for land. A document by her sons in 1683 refers to her as by then deceased.

! arr in "Anne" 1623 in "Lyon" 1632

NOTE: BARTLETT, ROBERT-Paul W. Prindle, "The Probable Ancestry of Robert Bartlett of Plymouth," TAG 55:164, suggests the Robert Bartlett who arrived at Plymouth on the Anne in 1623 was identical with the Robert Bartlett baptized at Puddletown, Dorset, England, on 27 May 1603. The fact that he was not one of the 1626 Purchasers might indicate that he arrived as a servant and was still in this status in 1626 (see text).
Bartlett married Warren, daughter of Mayflouer passenger Richard Warren, ca. 1629 (Wakefield, Plymouth Marriages, P. 4). On 1 July 1633 he and Mrs. Elizabeth were assigned mowing rights on the same land they had used the previous year, probably close to where Mrs. Warren and her other two sons-in-law lived (PCR 1:15). On 28 May 1635 Thomas Little, who had married Mary Warrer's sister Anna, gave his brother-in-law Robert Bartlett a parcel of land beyond Eel River to build a house on (PCR 1:34). On 1 December 1635 Richard Stinnings (later hanged for murdering an Indian) apprenticed himself to Robert Bartlett for nine years (PCR 1:35). On 4 1638 John Barnes sold Robert Bartlett the remaining three years Thomas Shrive's indenture (PCR 12:32). Though Bartlett held such positions grandjuror and highway surveyor (PCR, passim), he did not serve the higher positions of government. On 7 October 1652 Bartlett petitioned the court because "sondry speeches have pased from som who pretend themselves to bee the sole and right heires unto the lands on which the said Robert Bartlet now liveth, at the Ellriver, in the townships of Plymouth, which hee, the said Robert, had bestowed on him by his mother in law, Mis Elizabeth Warren, in marriage with her daughter; by which said speeches and passages the said Robert had ben dishartened in his proceeding either in building, fencing, etc.," and the court confirmed his right to the lands (PCR 3:19). On 1 June 1658 the court appointed several men to settle the bounds between Bartlett's land and that of his brother-in-law Nathaniel Warren (PCR 3:142). On 1 May 1660 Bartlett was convicted by the Court of Assistants for speaking contemptuously about the ordinance of singing psalms, and he said he hoped it would be a warning to him, and he promised to acknowledge his fault to those he had earlier spoken to (PCR 3:186). On moving to Nauset in 1649, Richard Church sold his real estate at Eel River to Robert Bartlett for L25 (PCR 12:165). Bartlett made a nuncupative will 19 September 1676, sworn 29 October 1676, leaving his estate to his wife to dispose of to their children (MD 3:114-15). Their children were Benjamin, Rebecca, Mary, Sarah, Joseph, Elizabeth, Lydia, and Mercy (MD 3:116-17), all of whom married and had descendants.

Source: Plymouth Colony Its History & People 1620-1621 by Eugene Aubrey Stratton, 1986 ______________________________________________________________________ ______________

!Occupation: Cooper !Immigrated to Plymouth in the Anne in 1623. From 1633, juryman and town officer. He died in 1676 and bequeathed his entire estate to his wife. He was in on the first purchase of Dartmouth. The earliest reference showing his marriage to Mary Warren was in a Court Order dated 7/17 Mar 1636/7, reading as follows: "It is agreed upon by the consent of the whole Court that Elizabeth Warren Widdow the relict of mr. Richard Warren Deceased ...her sonnes in law Richard Church Robert Bartlett and Thomas Little in marriage wth their wives her daughters" [Court Orders, I:107, MD 3:48]. The marriage did not occur until after 1 Jun 1627 (Gregorian=new style). Since his oldest son, Benjamin, was admitted a freeman on 16 June 1654, he was thus born before 16 June 1633. Assuming his daughter Rebecca was 16 years old when married on 30 Dec 1649, she would have been born before 1633. Thus, it is likely that they were married as early as 1629. [MD 3:106] Sources: "The Pioneers of

Massachusetts", by Charles Henry Pope: Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co.; 1969. Bartlett, Robert Merrill, "Pilgrim Robert Bartlett (1603-1676) and some of his descendants" Published by the Society of the Descendants of Robert Bartlett of Plymouth, Inc., Plymouth Mass., Leyden Press, 1966. Address: Dr. Robert M. Bartlett, 1660 Bartlett House, Brook Road, Plymouth, Mass. "Genealogical Dictionary of First Settlers of New England showing 3 generations of those who come before May 1692 on the basis of Farmer's Register." by James Savage. Baltimore: Genealogical Pub. Co.; 1969. Bowman, George Ernest, "Richard Warren and His Descendants, compiled from original sources." In The Mayflower Descendant, Vol III, 1901, pg.45-51, pg. 105-117.