William Blake

   FamilySearch ID: LHQG-T4F.

  General Notes:

Baptisms of four of his children at Pitminster. There is no evidence as to where he was between 1624 (son James' baptism) and 1636, when he is found in America.

No foundation for the claim he emmigrated in 1630 on the ship 'Mary and John'. p12

14 May 1636: signed articles of agreement at Agawam, now Springfield, to create a 'plantation' at that site on the Connecticut River. (handwriting matches signiture on later Dorchester records and elsewhere); on the same date he is assigned land and a home lot in this plantation. Evidently gave up the plan to settle in Conneticut, for his name never again appears at that settlement and he returned to Dorchester.

2 Jan. 1637/8: Dorchester: ordered, with others, to have "confirmed to them the ground joyneing to there hoame lotts to the other pale alowing 3 goad for a highway" - first indication of land ownership at Dorchester.

March 1637/8, he shared in the division of lands at the 'Neck' (South Boston) where his son James built a house by 1680.

Dorchester records between 1652 and 1700 were examined by BLAKE, pp 14-15 to determine the location of his dwelling house. The conclusion was that he lived on the "eastern slope of Mount Bowdoin, perhaps not far from the corner of the present (1898) Bowdoin Street and Union Avenue."

14 March 1638/9: made a freeman of the Colony. He and his wife members of the Dorchester church before Nov 1639. (Church Records)

1641: Constable

1645: on committee to build a new meeting-house

1645-47 and 1651: Selectman

1656 - 1663: Town Clerk of Dorchester:

(General Town meeting of 23 Nov. 1656): "Brother William Blake the elder was Chosen Recorder for the towne of Dorchester and to attend the Select men from time to time to scribe and trascribe shuch orders and Records as should by them bee Committed unto him and for that end wee the Select men doe order that the sayde william Blake doe take the towne Books or Booke into his hands and Keeping as likewise the mapp or mapps Conserninge the towne and Keepe them securely and not Deliuer the same to any but by order from some of the Select men."; At the same time he was chosen "clerk of the writts for the county of Suffolk" and paid twenty shillings per year.

3 September 1661: Will names his wife and five children. The first bequest, however, is to the "towne of Dorchester twenty shillings to be bestowed for the repairing of the buriing place soe ye swine and other vermine may not anoy the graues of the saints: pvided it be repaired within one yeare after my decease" (This request was acted on by the selectman at a meeting 12 Sept. 1664). The will is reprinted in full in BLAKE.

28 Jan 1663/4: Will is probated and estate inventoried to the value of £224.12.00 at a County Court at Boston. ⁷⁵⁸

William married Agnes Thorne, daughter of Hugh Thorne and Unknown, 23 Sep 1617 in Pitminster, Somerset, England. (Agnes Thorne was christened 12 Jan 1593/94 in Pitminster, Somerset, England and died 22 Jul 1678 in Dorchester, MA.)