Henry Straight1652 – 1728

Early Settlers Memorial

Founders and early settlers of the town of East Greenwich, Rhode Island 1677-1716.

Henry Straight is the earliest known direct descendant of Robert Edward Straight and Geraldine (Straight) Rougas. Plaque attached to boulder is located in front of the former old jail, at the foot of King Street in East Greenwich, Rhode Island. Founders Rock lists the name of Henry Straight. The asterisk (*) next to the person’s name means “a founder: Granted a first farm lot as compensation for service in the King Philip War 1675-1678 . Henry Straight was an early settler who was granted land by″ the King of England, but apparently not a founder because he does not have an asterisk before his name. Henry Straight’s name first appears in the Colonial Records of the original Town Records of Portsmouth, Rhode Island, page 342, dated 20 Dec 1667. These records show only two children by his first wife. He was married at least twice: First to Hannah, mother of his children; & second to Mary Long. He lived at various times in both East & West Greenwich, RI, as well as Portsmouth RI. Henry died June 4th 1728 in East Greenwich, RI.

Henry Straight

It should be noted from the start of this research that the vast majority of information found online is very often unverified and undocumented, making it incorrect or substantially inaccurate. Conclusions should only be made when sufficient evidence exists to allow them. With that said, there is speculation as to Captain Thomas Straight of Watertown, Mass being the father of Henry, but without conclusive evidence he is not included in this genealogy.

Highlighted names denote direct parent line of Robert E. Straight and Geraldine (Straight) Rougas

Henry Straight

Born ca 1652; died 4 Jun 1728 - E Greenwich, Kent Co, Rhode Island. Married (1) Feb. 13, 1676-7 Hannah (mother of his children). Married (2) (? 1685/ after Mar 1684) to Mary Long, b 9 Jun 1665 Dorchester, Suffolk Co, Mass, d 1757, daughter of

Joseph Long and Mary Lane Farnsworth.

Henry lived in Portsmouth, R.I., and E Greenwich, R.I.Occupation: He was a wheelwright, which is a person who builds or repairs wheels, and an officer of the law

Time line:1668, 24 Dec: Henry Straight signs Portsmouth town record as an apprentice without a guardian to Gershom Wodell for 6

years.1671, 1 Mar: Portsmouth town records Henry registered his ear mark for cattle1673, 8 Feb: Employed by Thomas Cornell and testifies at his trial for the murder of his mother Rebecca Cornell1676-7, 13 Feb, Married by Justice John Heath to first wife Hannah1679, 8 Nov: Henry receives right from town assembly to build on land in E. Greenwich1684, 5 March: Mary Long Adams granted a Divorce from 1st husband and petitioned to marry Henry Straight,

(Massachusetts State Archives, Domestic Rel, Vol 9 pg 113. p.3,4,5.)1684, 12 Sept.: Henry becomes Constable of E. Greenwich R.I.1699: Henry becomes deputy 1703 Henry was elected to the town council. In 1704 he resigned, stating that he was unwilling to serve any longer. In 1705 and again in 1709 he was elected Grand Juryman.1718, he deeded to his son Henry, a blacksmith of East Greenwich, one half of his lands, his wife releasing her dower rights. 1726, April 30, he deeded to his son John the east half of his homestead farm of 163.75 acres.Henry Straight died at East Greenwich June 4, 1728, about 76 years of age.

Children1. Henry Straight Jr., born 8 Jan 1676/77 E Greenwich, married (1) Hannah Tolman, married (2) Mary Webb.

2. John Straight, born 1 Mar 1678/79 E Greenwich, R.I.,Married (1) Rose/Rosanna (?Westcott), Married (2) Elizabeth Sheldon Sutherland.

3. ?Mary Straight, born 8 Dec 1680 Exeter, Washington Co, R.I.

Sources:"Henry Straight of Portsmouth, Rhode Island 1652-1728 and Some of His Descendants", 1945, Theodore S. Lazell, and further data added to this record by Frank Harvey Straight, 1952, and more additions by George Straight, Lt, USN (Ret),1966. "Genealogical Dictionary of Rhode Island" Austin“E. Greenwich Land Evidences” vol 3 pg 68 and vol 4 pg 203“Straight Genealogy” Michael D. Nestor

ii8 Z\)c (Brccne Ifamil^

dren married a wife of Westcott blood ; one married a Matteson ; and two

of her grandchildrenmarried Mattesons also.

We do not know all of John Greene of Bristol's children,owing to the

burning of the North Kingstown records. They had James, Thomas,

Martha, Enfield,Sarah, and perhaps others. Order of birth unknown.

THOMAS GREENES He married Elizabeth and had Thomas,

Hannah, Nathaniel,Mary and Benjamin.

ENFIELD GREENE-PHILUPS\

Martha Piiillips-Matteson^. Married John Matteson*, [John^ Francis",Henry\]her third cousin. They had Joshua,Susanna, Enfield,Hannah, John and Elizabeth.

Freelove Phillips-Matteson^. Married Abraham Matteson^,[Abraham*,Kezekiah^,Henry^.] He was related to her twice over, as his mother was a Westcott. They had

Margaret,Elizabeth,Lydia,John, Abraham, Daniel and Thomas.

JAMES GREENE'. He was married May i8, 1727, by Thomas Spen-cer,

Justiceof the Peace, to Elizabeth, oldest daughter of John and Rosanna

Westcott-Smith-Straight,a distant relative. Elizabeth's father had this

pedigree: CaptainThomas Straight,who probably acquiredthe title in the

Pequot War of 1637, married Mary Long, daughter of Joseph and Mary

Long. By this wife he had Henry Straight,born in Watertown, Mass.. in

1 65 1. Henry came to R. I. and married Hannah Torman. They had two

sons, Henry and John, and John, born March i, 1678, married the young

widow of Daniel Smith, who had been Rose or Rosanna Westcott.

The descent of Rose, (Rosanna,)wife of John Straight,was this :* About

1565,Meribe, of Gershom and Meribe Lascelle,early P'rench Huguenots,

was married in England to William Wardwell, son of Richard and MaryIthell-Wardwell. A daughterof this couple,Rosanna, married a Waite, and

Mehitable Waite of the next generation married Richard Hill. Amongother children these Hills had John, the head of the line of Hills from which

Usal and " Wealthy " John Greene afterwards took wives, and Rose or

Rosanna, born in 1613. All of the last mentioned partiescame to America.

Their home in England had been at Great Torrington,in Devonshire.

The Westcotts were of Great Torringtonalso. Richard Westcott had

married Mary Parsons in 161 1. Their son Stukeley Westcott, came to

Ma.ss. about 1635,the same year Rose Hill came over. They were nearlythe same age, and old friends,and it is all but certain they married. All

through their line the unusual name of Rosanna has gone down. Up to

1750 the name never occurred in R. I. records but what a relationshipcould

be traced straightback to this Stukeley Westcott and wife.

Their oldest son was Amos Westcott. He married two sisters,the

* The trans- Atlantic records that apply are scant, but I believe this to be substantially correct. It is

the result of much research.

Military Service

There is no documentation at this time of Henry serving in the Colonial war, however there is mention in the extensive research compiled for the Straight-Spencer historical cemetery that he was granted land in appreciation for his service in the King Philip War 1675-1678, therefore there is a strong probability that this Straight family is descended from colonists who fought in King Philip's War. It should also be noted that his grandchildren fought in the Revolutionary War. Below is a short article that gives a brief look at the King Philip conflict, and here is a web link to some pages from the Straight/Spencer historical cemetery web site.

http://www.straightspencerhistoricalcemetery.org/home/henry-straight-family/

King Philip War 1675-1676

Jun 24, 1675: In colonial New England, King Philip's War begins when a band of Wampanoag warriors raid the border settlement of Swansee, Massachusetts, and massacre the English colonists there. In the early 1670s, 50 years of peace between the Plymouth colony and the local Wampanoag Indians began to deteriorate when the rapidly expanding settlement forced land sales on the tribe. Reacting to increasing Native American hostility, the English met with King Philip, chief of the Wampanoag, and demanded that his forces surrender their arms. The Wampanoag did so, but in 1675 a Christian Native American who had been acting as an informer to the English was murdered, and three Wampanoag were tried and executed for the crime. King Philip responded by ordering the attack on Swansee on June 24, which set off a series of Wampanoag raids in which several settlements were destroyed and scores of colonists massacred. The colonists retaliated by destroying a number of Indian villages. The destruction of a Narragansett village by the English brought the Narragansett into the conflict on the side of King Philip, and within a few months several other tribes and all the New England colonies were involved. In early 1676, the Narragansett were defeated and their chief killed, while the Wampanoag and their other allies were gradually subdued. King Philip's wife and son were captured, and on August 12, 1676, after his secret headquarters in Mount Hope, Rhode Island, was discovered, Philip was assassinated by a Native American in the service of the English. The English drew and quartered Philip's body and publicly displayed his head on a stake in Plymouth. King Philip's War, which was extremely costly to the colonists of southern New England, ended the Native American presence in the region and inaugurated a period of unimpeded colonial expansion.

King Philip's War of 1675-1676 (also known as Metacom's Rebellion) marked the last major effort by the Indians of southern New England to drive out the English settlers.

King Philip's War in New England(America's First Major Indian War)

by Michael Tougias

The bloodiest war in America's history, on a per capita basis, took place in New England in 1675.

At the center of this cataclysm was one man, Metacom, leader of the Pokanokets, a tribe within the Wampanoag Indian Federation. At an early age, when relations between the natives and settlers were less stressed, Metacom was given the nickname of King Philip by the English, because of his haughty mannerisms. One of the many ironies of this conflict is that Philip was the son of Massasoit -- the same Massasoit who had helped the Plymouth Pilgrims survive their first winter in the New World. A father's kindness would became a son's curse.

In the 55-year span between the arrival of the Mayflower and the outbreak of King Philip's War, the English had prospered, multiplied and expanded their settlements while the natives were in a slow state of decline from diseases introduced by the Europeans and loss of tribal lands to the whites.

By 1675, with the stage now fully set for conflict, Philip stepped forward to make a stand. In a prophetic moment he warned the whites of his intentions, saying "I am determined not to live until I have no country." The war actually began after Wampanoag braves killed some English owned cattle near their tribal headquarters in what is now Bristol, Rhode Island. English livestock was always a source of friction as cattle repeatedly trampled Indian corn.

A farmer then retaliated by killing an Indian, setting in motion a native uprising that would eventually threaten to wipe Massachusetts Bay and Plymouth Bay Colonies out of existence.

The Nipmuck Indians, who lived in what is now central Massachusetts, joined forces with Philip's Wampanoags. Together they presented a very formidable force. One of the first towns they attacked was Brookfield, a frontier settlement deep in the land of the Nipmucks. The siege of Brookfield would turn out to be one of the most dramatic incidents of the entire war. The natives first laid an ambush for soldiers led by Captains Hutchinson and Wheeler. Eight soldiers were killed in the trap. The rest of the company barely made it back to the garrison at Brookfield.

The native warriors pursued them and burned every building in the town. They surrounded the wooden garrison where surviving soldiers and settlers huddled, then pushed a flaming cart to the side of the building and watched as the flames began licking their way up the wall. Using the last of their drinking water the settlers succeeded in slowing the blaze.

The settlers now faced an awful choice -- to stay inside meant death by fire, to flee meant being scalped and killed by enraged Nipmucks. But luck was with the settlers. The clouds opened and a seemingly miraculous heavy rain shower fell and doused the flames. Soldiers soon arrived from eastern settlements and the survivors were rescued. The town of Brookfield, however, was abandoned and lay in ashes for eleven years, until 1686.

Next the Nipmuck and Wampanoag warriors turned their attention to the settlements along the Connecticut River Valley. The fertile valley along the Connecticut River produced thousands of bushels of grain each year and was known as the breadbasket of New England. English farms were scattered throughout the region. The natives knew the population was sparse there compared to the Boston area.

In autumn of 1675, the Nipmucks and Wampanoags were joined on the warpath by tribes that lived along the Connecticut River including the Pocumtucks (residing in along the northern part of the river), Squakheags (residing in present day Northfield) and the Norwottocks (greater Hadley).

They concentrated their attacks on the area known as Pioneer Valley and attacked town of Deerfield (known to natives as Pemawachuatuck "at the twisted mountain") causing the town to be abandoned by the English.

After the attack on Deerfield, Captain Lothrop was ordered to march his soldiers back there to retrieve any remaining grain and bring it to the garrisons at Hadley, Northampton and Hatfield. The trek to Deerfield went without incident. The soldiers and farmers were able to load several wagons with grain and crops for the return trip. But on this particularly warm day, the soldiers let their guard down while marching back to the south, placing muskets in the wagons and stopping to pick wild grapes to quench their thirst.

At the point where their path crossed a brook, large trees felled by the Indians, blocked their way. As the English bunched together on the trail, the Indians sprang their trap. Within minutes 71 soldiers were killed. The brook ran red with blood, earning it the name 'Bloody Brook.' Period writer William Hubbard called the loss "the saddest day that ever befell New England."

Troops led by Captain Moseley heard the muskets firing at Bloody Brook and raced to the scene but arrived too late to save Lothrop and his men. They attacked the Indians but could not surround them. The natives recognized Moseley and were said to have taunted him: "Come, Moseley, come! You seek Indians, you want Indians? Here is Indians enough for you!" By nightfall, after several hours of exchanging fire, Moseley's men were forced to abandon the field of battle. They returned the next day to bury the dead, many of whom were still lying in the stream.

After this disaster, the English were in disarray, even concluding the war was the result of God punishing the Puritans for not abiding by strict religious codes. The Puritans then lashed out at easy scapegoats, persecuting Quakers and imprisoning or hanging neutral and Christian Indians.

In October, hostile Indians struck again with raids on the towns of Hatfield, Northampton and Springfield where 30 houses were burned. Attacking warriors now included members of the Agawam tribe. This tribe had been peaceful but became hostile after settlers took some of their children as hostages as a precautionary move against an attack. That only served only to enrage the Agawams and they extracted their revenge at the burning of Springfield.

As winter set in, the attacks diminished. The natives moved some of their warriors, women and children from the camp at present day Turner Falls to another camp at the foot of Mount Wachusett.

From there they could easily strike towns to the east and hopefully tighten the noose around their ultimate prize, Boston.

But it would be a difficult winter for the Indians. The Algonquins usually grew most of their food in garden plots. But with the constant movement during the first few months of the war the crops had gone untended. Now hunger, as much as skirmishes with the English, took its toll. The English meanwhile, were also becoming desperate, with the central part of Massachusetts now firmly in the hands of the natives.

One of the biggest fears of the English was that the powerful Narragansett tribe might soon enter the war. The Narragansetts resided in what is now Rhode Island and had lived peacefully with the followers of Roger Williams. But neutrality meant little in Colonial New England.

December of 1675 found the colonists so desperate they decided to make a preemptive strike against the neutral Narragansett tribe. The result would become known as the Great Swamp Massacre.

Led by General Winslow and celebrated Indian fighter Benjamin Church, a thousand soldiers from Massachusetts Bay Colony, Plymouth Colony and Connecticut Colony marched into Narragansett territory in southern Rhode Island.

An Indian traitor betrayed his people and told the English the location of a large Narragansett winter camp. The fortress-camp was surrounded by a palisade deep within a swamp. The soldiers descended on the camp during a blizzard. A single felled tree across a moat provided entry and the English swarmed over the log. Many soldiers were shot, falling into the moat. But repeated waves of English finally breached the fort. The horrors and confusion of the raid are best told in Benjamin Church's own words when he came upon a fallen comrade, Captain Gardner:

"...blood ran down his cheek, (and I) lifted up his cap, and called him by name. He looked up in (my) face, but spoke not a word, being mortally shot through the head. And, observing his wound, found the ball entered his head on the side that was next the upland where the English entered the swamp. Upon which, having ordered some care to be taken of the Captain, (I) dispatched information to the General that the best and forwardest of his army that hazarded their lives to enter the fort, upon the muzzle of the enemy's guns, were shot in their backs and killed by them that lay behind."

The Narragansetts, however, fared worse as over 500 (mostly women and children) were killed in the Great Swamp Massacre with many wigwams put to the torch.

The surviving Narragansett warriors entered the war on the side of Philip and their rage knew no bounds. Medfield, Groton, Sudbury, Plymouth, Rehoboth, Providence and Marlboro, were just some of the towns that were raided and burned. The Indians descended on the town of Lancaster in February of 1676 and succeeded in storming the garrison where settlers had taken refuge. Among those inside was Mary Rowlandson, who gave this account: "At length they came and beset our own house (which served as the garrison) and quickly it was the dolefullest day that ever mine eyes saw. The house stood upon the edge of a hill. Some of the Indians got behind the hill, others into the barn, and others behind anything that would shelter them, from all which places they shot against the house, so that the bullets seemed to fly like hail."

And inside the house: "Some in our house were fighting for their lives, others wallowing in their blood, the house on fire over our heads, and the bloody heathen ready to knock us on the head if we stirred out. Now might we hear mothers and children crying out for themselves and one another, 'Lord what shall we do?'"

Rowlandson was taken captive and spent the next six weeks of the winter being taken back and forth across Massachusetts, barely clinging to life. She was eventually ransomed, an indication of the declining power of the Indians, who were now without food, short on muskets and powder, and facing superior numbers of colonists.

And now they were about to suffer another massacre, this time at their main camp on the Connecticut River.

Captain Turner (for whom Turners Falls is named) and Captain Holyoke (for whom the city of Holyoke is named) launched a surprise raid in May on the Indian camp at the northern end of the Connecticut River. An English boy who had escaped captivity from the Indians told the captains the exact location of the camp (at the great falls where the natives could spear fish) and the soldiers immediately marched.

Surprising the Indians at dawn, they slaughtered scores of natives as they fled their wigwams. Others tried to swim across the Connecticut River to escape the soldiers' muskets but drowned as the swift spring current swept them over the falls.

Warriors from surrounding areas launched a counterattack, killing Turner as his men fled back to the safety of Hadley. But the damage had been done. This major war camp of the Wampanoags and Nipmucks had been wiped out. As a result the Indian alliance soon collapsed. The few Native Americans who survived either fled north or went on fighting in a lost cause.

Philip, with only a few warriors left, made his way back to his tribal headquarters near Swansea at Mount Hope, where the war had started. Benjamin Church, using friendly Indians as scouts, tracked him throughout the summer while Philip made hit and run attacks on isolated farms in the region. But Church eventually caught up with him. An Indian who was guiding Church fired his musket and sent a musketball through Philip's heart.

The death of Philip effectively ended Native American resistance in New England. But true to his word Philip had gone down fighting "determined not to live until I have no country."

Copyright © 1997 Michael Tougias All Rights Reserved

The Over-Back

The Family Cemetery of Henry Straight

Henry Straight and thirty-two members of his family are buried in the Straight Family Cemetery. The first family recorded to have owned the land (in the 17th Century) was the Henry and Hannah Straight family; hence the name Straight Cemetery, and in 1750 the Spencer family purchased this land. Four members of the Spencer family were also buried in this cemetery after the Straights. The cemetery is now called “The Henry Straight - William Spencer Family Historical Cemetery”. Due to Rhode Island’s separation of church and state, burials were on the land of the family’s farms and not by the church. Henry and Hannah were married Feb. 13, 1676-7 by Justice John Heath. Henry died in 1728, as was the custom at this time both Henry and his wife Hannah were buried in the Straight family Cemetery.

The Henry Straight - William Spencer Family Historical Cemetery, east of Carr’s Pond Road, 36 burials with 0 inscriptions, On Macera’s place (the old Straight Farm). The Straight cemetery is all field stones.

Audrey Mae (nee Spencer) MacDonald sketched the following. By the mid 19th century, the Straight cemetery was referred to as the Over-back Cemetery because it was over the stonewall and to the back of the newer burial ground, the Spencer family cemetery down by Middle Road. This newer burial ground became known as the East Greenwich Historical Cemetery No. 9 because it was the 9th historical cemetery to be recorded in East Greenwich, Rhode Island.

As a child, Audrey remembered the Over-back cemetery was also called the Straight Cemetery, but she could not remember ever being told–or asking–about the Straight name or family.

From Violet E. Kettelle’s book The Rural Roads in East Greenwich In the Teens and Twenties of 1900 Their Farms and Owners With Some History, from pages 60 and 61: “…Henry Straight did not build near the road but a long distance south from the road. His barn was near his house. His burial ground is nearer west side, east of the Macera farm (former Bill Miller’s in the teens). It was at the west end of a swale. All graves were marked by field stones. In recent years someone has dug into some of the graves. Henry Straight died in 1727 and his wife in 1757. E.A.B. (1835-1929) recalled when she was a very small child, some people coming from Providence with a box and corpse to bury in that cemetery over 100 years after Henry died.”

These maps shows Henry and Hannah Straight’s land south of Middle Road and east of Carrs Pond Road.

The lower right hand corner of above map reads: “East Greenwich was created by the General Assembly on 31 October 1677 to provide farms and house lots to each of 48 men who served in King Philip’s war. The town was divided in 1678 on an east-west line into divisions I & II, as shown above. This map is a composite of several surveys dated 1716 (one based on an earlier survey of 1712.), and the roads, boundary lines and names (with acreage) are shown thereon. Where the 1716 owner was not the original owner, the name of the original grantee is show in: [brackets]. Some modern streets and the highways have been added in dotted line, & we have superimposed the modern names of our old roads. This map is prepared by the Founders Club of the East Greenwich Ter-centenary Commission, and copies may be had from the East Greenwich Preservation Society. July 1977″

Henry Straight

Tax Assessors Maps revision dates from 1973 to 2001 HISTORICAL CEMETERY 10 The Straight cemetery is 1383 feet to the south of RI HISTORICAL CEMETERY 9

Henry Straight

163 acres

Henry Straight

Center ground level markerand the hitching post