vital records sources

Samuel was in Salem, Massachusetts Bay Colony, by 1638. On 23 April of that year he was granted an acre of land next to Mr. Hawthorne and five acres near the water mill, the latter exchanged for his five acres "on the Forest River side."1 The water mill was probably on the west side of Bass River on a site used for those purposes for centuries to come. This later became known as "Ryal Side." The is area of Salem was known as Bass River or Bass River side. Samuel and his wife had certainly moved there by 5 April 1639/40, when they were later admitted to the church there.2 Samuel is on the Salem freemen list of 2 June 1641.3 He was granted an acre of land in 1641 for growing hemp.4 He was given five acres of land at "Darbey's Fort" side, and on 11 December 1643, the town seems to have confirmed the grant.5 122 This area is now called Naugus Head and became a part of the town of Marblehead when it was set off from Salem in 1649. By 1 May 1652 he had ten acres by the river on Cape Ann side, which very likely refers to what was also called the Bass River area bordered on the west by that river and later became the town of Beverly.6 171
     20 June 1656, on the Jury of Trials for Essex Co. 7 192, Calling him Samuel "Cornish" on 24 February 1657, the town forgot to record a grant to Samuel of twenty acres of upland near John Hardy.8 196 He was involved in a dispute over a "drift way" from the head of Bass River onto Royal's (Ryall's) Neck, and the concerned parties were to meet on 16 June 1657.9 201 He was selected for the Essex County Quarterly Court grand jury for the next year on 22 August 1657.10 203 The town selected him, among others, to lay out some lots on Cape Ann side (Bass River, now Beverly) on 8 March 1657/811 213, for which he was probably paid by bill on 14 December of that year12 222 On 8 March 1658/9, Samuel was one of the three Salem constables fined two shillings and six pence for not showing up at a town meeting and not making "a return of their warrants."13 223 It may be this warrant that's referred to at the 4 April 1659 town meeting, which was the "country" (county) and town taxes they collected on 30 August 1658.14 225 At the same meeting, he seems to have been paid nine shillings and four pence for something he did in 1657.5 657 Another financial entry is an account from 14 December 1657 giving Samuel nine shillings due to a mistake.16 227 On 7 November 1659, he was selected for the county's jury of trials.17 229
     Samuel, Elizabeth and Samuel Jr. were among the members of the Salem church living in Bass Side to petition for a new parish on 23 June 1667.18 The Records of the First Church in Salem, Massachusetts, 1629-1736 (Salem, MA: Essex Institute, 1974), 116. Samuel, who was 16, was considered a member but not in full, surely because of his minority. Rev. Hale, the minister for the Bass Side parish, noted later that some of the children of members who went to Beverly were left off the original list of dismissals, so Samuel's daughters Remember and Elizabeth were likely among them. On 11 November 1667, "Ensign Corning" was to oversee the cutting of wood, presumably on common land, "between his house and Mr. Conant's ferry." This likely was the area west of what is now Cabot Street, where Samuel and Samuel Jr. lived. Samuel was one of two men charged with collecting a rate from the townspeople in 1668 to pay Rev. Hale his £70 salary.19 He was chosen a selectman on 18 December 1669, but was replaced the following February.20 395 In April of that year, he agreed to be on a committee to formalize the bounds between Beverly and Wenham.21 The following June he was chosen to "keep an ordinary."22 At a meeting on 21 August he was chosen an "assistant" with other selectmen.23 He is listed among the selectmen as "Ensigne Corning" when it was decreed that all men legally notified should be at the laying of the sill for the new meeting house, called "graunseled" (groundsel, ground sell, ground sill).24 On 17 March 1671, Samuel and Richard Brackenbury were given the right to build pews in the new meeting house "at the north end of the pulpitt."25 He agreed to exchange a piece of land near the meeting house and a highway "lyinge on the backside of the 20 acres of land which he bought of Osmund Trask which was Jonathan Porter's."26 He was given land between Capt. Thomas Lothrop's meadow and Samuel's farm. Following a dispute over the border line between Beverly and Wenham, Samuel and his neighbors signed an agreement with their neighbors on the Wenham side about where to draw it.27 MDCB, 251-2.
Samuel died without a will. His estate papers, probated on 3 December 1694, call him an ensign and yoeman.28 His estate inventory was taken on 6 February 1694/5:

a dwelling house & barn, orchard and about 30 acres of land at £180
wearing apparel linen & woolen - £5, 17 s, 6 p
a feather bed, bolster, pillows, bedding, curtains, valnces & bedstead thereunto appertaining - £4, 12 s
sheets & other bedding £4, 12 s, coverlet 12 s - £5, 4 s
2 chests, tables & bedstead - £1, 10 s
a cupboard & cloth & a box & form - £1
a table, 4 chairs & cushions - 16 s
pewterware £1, 3 s, brassware, £1, 14 s - £2, 17 s
ironware 28 s, chain, axes & wedges 18 s, 6 d - £2, 6 s, 6 d
5 cows at £8, a mare £1 & 12 sheep £3 - £12
27 bushels of oats - £1, 16 s
8 bushels of Indian corn - 16 s
small books 4 s & lumber 10 s - 14 s
--------------------
£219, 9 s, 8 d

4 1/2 acres of meadow at Longham - £24, 15 s

Andrew Eliott
John Lovett

Children of Samuel and Elizabeth Corning:29 The Records of the First Church in Salem, Massachusetts, 1629-1736 (Salem, MA: Essex Institute, 1974), 17, 18, 19.

i. Remember, bap. 3 May 1640 ("Cornish")
ii. Samuel, bap. 14 March 1640/41 ("Cornish")
iii. Elizabeth bap. 4 June 1643 ("Corning")

vital records sources:

1. Essex Institute Historical Collections, vol. 9, "Town Records of Salem, Massachusetts" (Salem, MA: 1868), 69.
2.
3.
4.
5. Municipal Documents of the City of Beverly, Massachusetts (Beverly: 1896), 401.
6. Ibid, 395, 399 (Beverly town meeting records of 18 December 1669 and 22 February 1670).
7. Ibid, 29 Apr, 396.
8. Ibid, 2 June.
9. Ibid, 397.
10. Ibid, 19 Sep, 397.
11. Ibid, 402.
12. Ibid, 403.
13. Essex Co., MA, probate file 6381.
14.