William Hiscock, of Damariscotta

NOT THE SAME AS Rev. William Hiscox, of RI Do not confuse the RI Hiscox/Hiscocks with the Maine/Mass./Conn. Hiscox/Hiscocks. Both lines have spelled their names Hiscock or HIscox.

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Eva Hiscock Johnson did extensive and thorough research on this family in about 1964-1976. She reports that Sophronia Hiscock, daughter of Thomas Hiscock and Anna Jackson, was in possession of the Family Bible. The following information is from her notes.

William Hiscox was born in 1636 in Ireland of Scottish parents who had migrated from Edinburg Scotland to Northern Ireland sometime between 1614 and 1636.

In the 17th century, men were eager to move from their homes in southern Scotland to Ulster, Ireland mainly for economic reasons.  Lowland Scotland was becoming overpopulated.  The land was harsh.  Rents were high.  And Ireland was a familiar territory not that far away.  Scots settling in Ulster could expect to rent land for a period of 21 to 31 years, sometimes longer (as much as three lifetimes).  This was seen as a sure way to improve one’s economic standing. The lands of Northern Ireland lent themselves to the same farming practices that these families knew in Scotland. By 1619 over 8000 families had relocated to Ulster.  By 1715 over 1/3 of Ulster’s 600,000 inhabitants were Scottish.

The Scots were not long settled in Ulster before misfortune and persecution began to harass them. The Irish rebellion of 1641, said by some to have been an outbreak directed against the Scottish and English settlers, regarded by the native Irish as intruders and usurpers, caused them much suffering; and Harrison says that for "several years afterward 12,000 emigrants annually left Ulster for the American plantations." [Scotland's Mark on America, p 14.]

Some of the younger men were so dissatisfied with this treatment that they decided to emigrate to the the New England colonies where they could purchase farm land from the Indians. And so it came about that a shipload of young Scotch-Irish men left Ireland in the spring of 1657 on a voyage that took them to the shores of the Province of Maine. The Captain knew of a safe harbor to anchor the ship at the Trading Post of the Wawenoc Indians up the Damariscotta River.

William Hiscock made friends with the women who tended the Post. They were dressed in colorful English garments and speaking some English learned from long association with the traders. William showed them the shining silver pence and shillings he had in his pocket and explained how he could buy and sell goods for them with English money at a better advantage than by trading. When the next ship arrived to trade at the Post, the traders found William Hiscock in charge and came to realize that their bargaining days were over and carried that message back to their sponsors.

William helped them in many other ways, and before long he was given one of the maidens to be his wife by her mother. It was she who staked out the land where he would build their dwelling, for that was the Indian custom. William Hiscox married the Wawenock Maiden in 1657, and that was the way the Hiscox family started in Damariscotta, Maine.

Eva Hescock Johnson also writes that William HIscock died in the Wawenoc settlement where he lived most of his life, during the Battle of Damariscotta in 1697. His son Thomas lived there also and married a Wawenoc woman there. At least Thomas' oldest 2 children, Richard and William, were born there as well.

Mrs. Johnson gleaned a lot of her information from the Boston Public LIbrary, which she said there are 1000 or more books on Maine history and its people. She used many other sources, including the old family Bible.

From the family records of a descendant, Harold Hescock, who may also have gotten Mrs. Johnson's documents:

• Birth: 1636 in Ireland
• As far as we know he landed in Damariscotta, Maine
• He was killed in a battle between the English and the Wawanco [Wawenoc] Indians along with one of his sons [William]. It would appear that the Hescocks [Hiscocks] were on the side of the Indians and lost the fight. [The Battle of Damariscotta in 1697.]
• He had two sons one of which [Thomas] survived and who also had married an Indian.
• Once when talking to Ethan Nathan Hescock (Bn 1875.), he made reference to hearing Indian stories when he was a child, but he forgot to say that the stories he heard was about his own family.

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Damariscotta, Lincoln, Maine, USA The area was once inhabited by the Wawenock (or Walinakiak, meaning "People of the Bays") Abenaki Indians, who left behind 2,500-year-old oyster shell middens along the banks of the Damariscotta River. The Whaleback Shell Midden is now a state historic site. The land became part of the Pemaquid Patent, granted by the Plymouth Council in 1631 to Robert Aldsworth and Gyles Elbridge, merchants from Bristol, England. At Pemaquid (now Bristol), they built a fort and trading post.

Some colonists moved upriver from the village at Pemaquid about 1640 to settle what is today Damariscotta. But the settlements were attacked in 1676 during King Philip's War, with the inhabitants either driven off or massacred. Attempts to rebuild alternated with further attacks during the French and Indian Wars. The Province of Massachusetts Bay constructed Fort William Henry at Pemaquid in 1692, but it was destroyed in 1696. Its replacement, Fort Frederick, in 1729, successfully resisted the region's final two attacks, and was pulled down at the Time of the Revolution so that the British could not occupy it. With peace at last, Damariscotta grew as a trade center. It was incorporated as a separate town on March 15, 1848, set off from parts of Bristol and Nobleboro.

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https://www.maine.gov/dacf/parks/discover_history_explore_nature/hi...

"As a point of contact and conflict with the French and the Native Americans who often joined them, Pemaquid [now Damariscotta] was subject to several devastations. The first occurred in 1676, when the Abenaki Indians [or was it the English?!] burned the village during a King Philip's War regional uprising. Fort Charles, a wooden fortification, was constructed the following year, but it and the rebuilt village were demolished in a 1689 attack. In 1692, Fort William Henry, probably New England's first stone fortification, was erected by the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Within four years it too was leveled, and the Pemaquid settlement was abandoned for 30 years."

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https://www.ancestry.co.uk/boards/surnames.hiscox/8.20.21.23.27/mb....
(Ancestry.com Message Board) My Hiscox family was also in Maine, Pemaquid? in the early 1600's. I read the story about the Wawenok Indians, but thought it was a fanciful story. My twin sister had her DNA tested by Ancestry and hey found 3% East Asian ancestry in her DNA. We know of no other possible source except the Hiscoxes and the Wawnocks. Does any other HISCOX else have confirmation through DNA?

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https://www.ancestry.com/boards/surnames.dana/51.53.65.68.71.120.1....
"Samuel Hiscock/Hiscox father is named Thomas Hiscox, his father is named Samuel Hiscox, and Samuel Hiscox father is named William Hiscox. William Hiscox came here by boat from England/Ireland? and Married into a Indian tribe in Maine the tribe was named Penobscott. Their son [Samuel - should be Thomas] also married into the same tribe. "

Note from LJB - I believe there is an extra Samuel in there. From what I have found, the line is William > Thomas > Samuel. I believe it was William and Thomas who married into the Wawenoc sub-tribe of the Abenakis. This may be a confusion with the RI Hiscox line.

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This line is from Farmington and Waterbury, CT:

• There is another William (not from Maine, nor did he marry an Indian woman) https://ancestors.familysearch.org/en/MPRY-Q7M/william-hickocks-160... - imm 1635, to Farmington, CT (which was not settled then)
• Son Samuel https://ancestors.familysearch.org/en/MS43-BH7/samuel-hickok-1643-1695 - Waterbury, CT
• Son Deacon Thomas https://ancestors.familysearch.org/en/LX6S-DL3/deacon-thomas-hickco... Farmington, CT, d Waterbury, CT
• Son Capt. Samuel https://ancestors.familysearch.org/en/LZ21-9KZ/capt-samuel-hickox-1... - Waterbury, CT

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http://cody-family.org/history/thejazzage/wyoming/fjhiscock/fjhisco...

"Before we tell F.J. Hiscock's own story, we'll trace his lineage and show evidence of his relationship to our Cody family. We find his Hiscock pedigree to be;

Joseph Jesse "Fay" Hiscock (1873-1951) ↑
Levitus Hiscock (1832-1901) & Minerva Jane Barney (1839-1907) ↑
Alanson Hiscock (1797-1839) & Betsy Cross (1803-1889) ↑
Isaac Hiscock (1769-1848) & Phebe Crandall (1776-1869) ↑
James Hiscock Sr. (1730-1775) & Anna Kimball (1729-1823) ↑
Samuel Hiscock Sr. (1690-?) & Mary (~1695-?) ↑
Thomas Hiscock (1660-1747) & Wawenock Abenaki ↑
William Hiscock, the Immigrant (~1636-1689) & Wawenock Abenaki "

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from another descendant -

I show William II (Maine) born in 1638 in Somerset, England.

Father: William I Hiscock born 1603 Long Ashton, Somerset, England,
Died 1666 Long Ashton, Somerset, England

Grandfather: Robert Hiscock baptized 19 Aug, 1576 Long Ashton, Somerset, England
Buried 12 Mar 1644, Long Ashton, Somerset, England