Rowell Colby

GEDCOM Note

Rowell COLBY was born on 22 NOV 1758 in Newton, Rockingham County, New Hampshire. He died on 27 JAN 1832 in Enfield, Grafton County, New Hampshire. He has Ancestral File number 18GS-BFQ. Rowell Colby, one of the pioneer settlers, came to Enfield, New Hampshire, from Salisbury, New Hampshire, in 1779, and settled on George Hill, where his grandson, Lewis T. Colby, later lived. "He came to the town in March, with a pair of cattle and a sled, camping one night in the woods, where he was entertained with a free concert by a pack of wolves. The roads were indicated by marked trees. He frequently made journeys back to Salisbury, and on one occasion he brought sixty young apple trees on his back, which he planted, and lived to eat the fruit thereof." One of these trees is still living and measures nine feet in circumference. He lived on the place where he first settled until his death. He held several town offices. He commenced with very small means, but added to his possessions until he owned a thousand acres of land. He served in the Revolution and took part in the battle of Bennington.
On 25 August 1838, Lydia Colby, of Enfield, New Hampshire, aged 76 years, disposed: that she was the widow of Rowell Colby, a private in the Revolutionary War who enlisted in the summer of 1777, under Captain Ebenezer Webster, marched to Manchester, Vermont, and was in the battle of Bennington, after which he marched to Stillwater and Bemis Heights. He took an Indian prisoner on the way, and now she has the powder horn he took from the Indian. She also has a copper teakettle, which he said he took from a Hessian soldier on the same tour. She said her husband served in New York for a year in 1776, and that he was serving in 1776, when he enlisted in 1777. His service was in the Continental Army, of Massachusetts and New Hampshire. Lydia, his wife, was granted a pension. (NH pension papers.) He was the father of eleven children, one of whom, the youngest daughter, was living, then over eighty years of age, in Texas, in 1886. His grandchildren of 1886 were: Alstead Brownell, James Edwards, Mrs. Mercy Flanders, William B. Cochran, Wyman P. Colby, Lydia J. Colby, Lewis T. Colby, and Mrs. Mary C. French.
SOURCES: (1) "The Old Families of Salisbury and Amesbury Massachusetts" by David W. Hoyt; (2) FHL Number 1000976, Marriage: Lydia PETTENGILL, Date: 09 Nov 1780; Recorded in: Birth and Marriage Index for New Hampshire; (3) "The Colby Family in Early America" by Frederick Lewis Weis, Caledonia, The Colonial Press, pub 1970. Parents: Zaccheus COLBY and Mary EASTMAN.
He was married to Lydia PETENGILL on 9 NOV 1780 in New Hampshire. Children were: David COLBY, Betsey COLBY, Lucretia COLBY, Mary COLBY, Rowell COLBY, Thomas COLBY, Zaccheus COLBY.

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