vital records sources

Nothing is known of John French's origins prior to moving to New England. He's often confused with the John French of Ipswich, Massachusetts Bay, who settled in Northampton, Massachusetts Bay, and baptized in Assington, England, in 1622. This accounts for John of Braintree acquiring the date and place of John of Northampton's baptism in Assington and replacing the year 1622 with one of the approximate years of John of Braintree's birth (1612). His gravestone says he was about 80 when he died in 1692, putting his birth about 1612, but a court deposition says he was about 44 in 1659. More about this will be covered below, but this puts his birth about 1615.
     Ages given in court depositions in 17th century New England are generally assumed to have been given by the deponents, but there are instances in which such ages for the same person differ significantly not only from one court case to the next, but between separate depositions given by the same person in the same court case. In general, though, when a comparison can be made to known birth dates, the court dates are often at least close. If the clerks taking the depositions had guessed at the ages they would be far less accurate, so it is reasonable to think the deponents gave their ages. Given how many errors there are, it makes them unreliable. Information given by the family for a gravestone is, theoretically, a better source, so this biography favors 1612.
     On 24 February 1639/40 John French of "Monoticott" at "Mount Woollystone" was granted forty acres, a "great lot" (twenty acres) based on his having five members of his household (four acres per "head"), and an additional twenty acres.1 There isn't clear evidence where this was. Monatiquot was probably at or near a Native American village in what is now Quincy, Massachusetts, and Mount Wolliston was a vague name for the Braintree area. No other deeds were recorded involving John, nor was a division of his estate that might have mentioned land. Waldo Sprague says he lived at the east end of what is now Elm Street where it meets Commercial Street in what is now East Braintree. This is plausible, since one of his descendants appears on the 1858 Walling map in this area. Vinton says he lived in North Braintree, which is now Quincy, probably based on the reference to Monatiquot.
     John was admitted to the Dorchester, Massachusetts Bay Colony, church on 27 January 1642/43, followed by the baptism of his and Grace's first two children: John, Jr., two weeks later in February and Thomas, shortly after he was born, in July 1643.2 John's and Thomas's births were recorded together, John being born early in 1641. The Dorchester town clerk at the time clearly didn't record births as they happened, so he surely entered the French births after Thomas was born. Therefore, there's no reason to think the family were necessarily members of a New England church or even in Dorchester before 1643. There was a congregation in Braintree supposedly as early as 1639, so it's apparent the reference to John being "of Monoticott" was either an error or it was temporary. Vinton says John was of Braintree when he was made a freeman on 29 May 1644,3 but no towns of residence are given.
     While we can't say certainly where the French's were living in 1644, John was among twenty freemen of Braintree who signed a petition for land for a new plantation on 1 October 1645.4 This settlement was to be in the Narragansett territory, now Rhode Island, but the idea of it dissolved within the protracted controversy over which Colony had legal jurisdiction.5
     Although the Braintree town records are very spotty for the mid 17th century and don't include meetings at which town officers were elected, the Essex County Quarterly Court mentions John as a Braintree constable on 12 October 1653.6 This apparently has been overlooked by previous French family researchers. This case crossed county lines since the plaintiff was the agent for the iron works in Saugus (now Lynn) in Essex County and Braintree (then in Suffolk County), and the property of the works in Braintree were "attached" by writ of the Essex County court. Constables were charged with serving writs.
     At a Dorchester town meeting on 9 April 1655, there was to be an agreement with John, William Ellis and George Aldridge of Braintree that they could rent a certain piece of meadow in Dorchester.7 It's very likely John was active in Braintree in other ways, including serving in town offices. One of the very few records of him is from the Suffolk County court. There was an incident involving John Frizzel of Braintree probably in the Winter of 1658-1659.8 He was working and was lured away, possibly on pretense, and induced to drink enough to make him pass out and suffer frostbite. The Town of Braintree brought suit against the two men who gave him the liquor, claiming high costs as a result. It's not obvious in the court record why, but it may be that Frizzell, an apparent Scottish prisoner-of-war, was either a town employee or was unable to work for himself and had to be supported by the town. John French was walking into town to meet his son "on a bitter cold day" and passed by two men sitting on a rock with Frizzell. Frizzell's testimony was that the two men, both of Boston, got him to drink, and at some point he couldn't remember anything. John French said Frizzell was "bare headed" and referred to his "condition," surely that he was drunk, and that the two men left him there and followed French into town.
     His wife Grace wasn't a Kingsley. This idea has gained traction on the internet due to someone confusing John French of Braintree with John French of Northampton, Massachusetts, who did marry a Kingsley. The Braintree town records and a gravestone say Grace died on 28 February 1680.8 This was most likely an Old Style or Julian calendar date, which was the prevailing calendar at the time. February was the twelfth month at the time and the numerical year didn't change until after late March, which was the Julian New Year. The Braintree records couch her death in a sequence of nine deaths between 23 November 1680 and 13 August 1682. Since the Julian style was the norm in New England, these deaths are surely chronological except for one instance of a November death preceding one in September. Preceding Grace were deaths on 2 February 1680 and 23 November 1680 and followed by 9 April 1681 and 16 June 1681 and so on until August 1682. Therefore, the date was very likely 28 February (twelfth month of) 1680 Julian Style and 28 February (second month of) 1681 in the New or Gregorian style, used in the British Colonies after 1752. Dual years started to be used in the late 17th century for clarity, and currently used in genealogy for the same reason. Given this, Grace's death was very likely on 28 February 1680/81. Her gravestone says she was aged 59. Since her death was so early in the year, she likely turned 60 some time in 1681, putting her approximate birth year to 1622.
John married secondly to Helen/Eleanor Thompson, widow of William Veazie. They had a prenuptial agreement made on 8 July 1683,9 which calls her Eleanor, but her signature on another document, mentioned below, appears to be "Helin." Fluidity between the names Ellen, Eleanor and Helen wasn't uncommon in the 17th century. John agreed he wouldn't try to involve himself in the estate of William Veazie, that Eleanor would be given £4 a year after his death in the form of firewood, pork, beef, malt or corn for the rest of her life, even if she remarried, that she would also have a proprietary right to the "new" end of the house where they live after John's death and while she remained his widow and finally, and cryptically, "she shall have apples what she pleases for spending and a place for a garden plot."      John died on 6 August 1692. He didn't leave a will, but there is an administration for his estate.10 His widow Helen declined the administration on 12 October 1692 "for as much as I am in years and not capable to manage that work," requesting one of his sons do it. The following is the inventory of the estate:

Braintree 24th October 1692

Then an inventary taken of ye goods & estate of John ffrench Senr. late of aforsd Braintree deceased

to cash amounting to 1 l [£]-10 s [shillings]-4 d [pence] 10|10|04
to wearring apparill & cloathing 06|13|01
one bedd & beding 07|12|00
two iron potts & one kettle 01|03|00
hand irons & pewtter & a copper quart 01|13|00
one cubbard & a back for a chimney 00|17|00
three chests & a table 00|11|00
other smale peices of houshold stuff & a chaine 00|12|00
eighteen pounds of woole at 10 d pr pounde 00|15|00
five olde barills and olde churne a tubb & an olde whele 00|09|00
one trammill & a paire of tonges & two olde potts 00|06|00
one olde iron barr 4 s 00|04|00
five cows one bull 3 swine & fourteen sheep 15|15|00
one mare formerly Williams 2 l 10 s 02|10|00
the north ende of ye hows & out howsing together with eight acres of lnd adjoyning 60|00|00
eighteen acres of land at Peases Creeke 45|00|00
twelve acres of pasture land neere Dependences 30|00|00
ffive acres of land formerly Speeres 10|00|00
one hundred & twenty acres of land lying at a place comonly called Aldredges farme about twelve acres thear of meddoe at 40 s the whole amounting to ye summ of 132|00|00
---------------------------
totall 317|10|04

This inventory taken ye 24th October abovesd by us whose names are here unto subscribed

Nathaniell Wales
Jos: Allen

John and Dependance French admitted adms. made oath that the abovewritten containes a just and true inventory of the estate of John French deced. so far as hs come to their knowledge and that when more appeares they will cause it to be added

Boston Octo: 27th 1692

children of John French and Grace:6

i. John, b. 28 February 1640/41
ii. Thomas, b. 10 July 1643, d. 28 December 1656 637
iii. Dependence, b. 7 March 1647/48
iv. Temperance, b. 30 March 1651
v. William, b. 31 March 1653
vi. Elizabeth, b. 29 July 1655
vii. Thomas, supp. b. 10 March 1658, claimed as early as the 1890s, but no proof found or given in print. The Braintree town records list him in a group of siblings but with no birthdate (p. 634). It isn't in Memorial of the the Thayer Name, as has been suggested.
viii. Samuel, b. 22 February 1659/60

vital records sources: his death is in Records of the Town of Braintree, 1640-1793 (Randolph, MA: 1886), 659.

1. Second Report of the Record Commissioners of the City of Boston, 1877 (Boston:1877), 50.
2. Records of the First Church at Dorchester, in New England, 1636-1734 (Boston: George H. Ellis, 1880), 155-6.
3. Records of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England [hereafter RGCM], vol. 2 (Boston:1853), 293.
4. Ibid, 128.
5. Adams, James Truslow, The Founding of New England (Boston: 1901), 247-8.
6. Records and Files of the Quarterly Courts of Essex County, Massachusetts [hereafter ECQC], vol. 1 (Salem, MA: Essex Institute, 1911), 310.
7. Fourth Report of the Record Commissioners of the City of Boston, "Dorchester town records" (Boston: 1896), 70.
8. deposition taken 26 July 1659, Massachusetts Archives Collection, vol. 39, document 66.
9. Records of the Town of Braintree, 1640-1793 (Randolph, MA: 1886), 657.
The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, vol. 12 (Boston, MA: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1858), 353.
10. Suffolk Co., MA, probate case 1969.
11.

Births of John and Thomas in Dorchester, Births Marriages and Deaths in the Town of Dorchester from 1630 to 1683 (taken from the first book of Dorchester vital records), image 8 of original mss p. 5; births of Dependence to Elizabeth are in Records of the Town of Braintree, 1640-1793 (Randolph, MA: 1886), 634; Thomas's death, ibid, 637; Samuel, ibid, 642.