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John's signature on his will


bio in progress, sources to be added (9/2022)

John was probably born in Dorchester, Massachusetts Bay Colony, about 1646-47. His death record in August 1721 says he was 74. So little is known about his father that it can only be guess the family was in Dorchester in the 1640s. They were certainly there by 1654, according to a deed in wich his father was involved. They moved to Sudbury between 1662 and 1665, but John was a mason and would have apprenticed with someone in roughly 1660. He settled in Marlborough, which is next to Sudbury, so it would be a good guess that he apprenticed in that area maybe a little later than 13 years old, after the family moved to Sudbury.
     John was about 20 or 21 when his father died and was evidently the oldest child. He signed and undated confirmation of an inventory of his stepmother's belongings. Being in his father's estate papers, this was obviously Margaret's intent to separate them from the whole because Edmund was in debt when he died, and his personal estate was legally available for liquidation. John would have been an adult or nearly so to qualify for this kind of declaration. Another signator signed her first name "Mary" and a last name that looks like "Potar," but may have been "Bokar." This may be where the idea came from that Edmund married "Mary Potter," however flawed the reasoning may be. No other evidence has come to light to support the existence of a wife with this name, nor are there any likely Mary Potters, even variously spelled, at this time in New England. There weren't any apparent Mary Bowkers, however spelled. John had a sibling Mary who was a toddler at the time. Whoever she was, she would also need to have known what was Margaret's personal property.
     John didn't marry until he was about 30-31. His wife was from a Marlborough family. He bought land in Marlborough on 22 April 1680 from the co-heirs of Thomas Barrett of Marlborough. case 1271 This was a ten-acre house lot given to Thomas Barrett by the Town of Marlborough. Thomas's inventory includes separate parcels of homestead and meadow land, as well as twenty acres of upland in the Second Division. The land John bought was bordered by Second Division upland, "an extention of the house lot," so this may have been half the twenty acre parcel shown in the inventory. If so, the person said to be occupying this other half, John Barnes, doesn't have a recorded deed of purchase from the Barretts.
     John's will grants half the use of his house and homestead to his wife Mary, but no other provision about who would get the homestead when she died or the use of the other half of it while she was still alive. There is no estate inventory, which is abnormal. None of his heirs are on record as having received or sold the homestead. Asa, the oldest son, moved from Marlborough to Shrewsbury, but there isn't a deed of sale for his home when he moved that might show he ended up with his father's house.
A transcription of his will to come...      

children of John Bowker and Mary How:

John, b. September 1679
child?, b. abt. 1681
child?, b. abt. 1683
Mary, b. 6 March 1685/86
Martha, b. 6 March 1685/86
child?, b. abt. 1688 Asa, b. 22 November 1691
Ezekiel, b. 5 November 1693
child?, b. abt. 1696 child, "6th" son, b. 25 March 1698, stillborn
Hannah , b. 21 September 1699
Rachel, b. 9 September 1702




vital records sources: He was married in Marlborough "Jno Buuker & Mary How marryed 8 11 78." Births, marriages, deaths 1651-1793, 52/190

1.
case 2327

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