Dorothy Harbottle

The Roxbury church record calls her "a godly maid, a sister of our church" (quoted by Pane-Joyce). On 16 July 1640 she became the second wife of Thomas Lamb of Roxbury. Their son Joshua was born on 27 Nov 1642 ("Josuah, s. Thomas"). Thomas Lamb was buried on 28 Mar 1646, and four and a half months later, on 15 Aug 1646, Dorothy very probably bore his posthumous son Abiel ("Abiell, s. Thomas"), a full brother of Caleb (Roxbury VR 1:208-209).

About 1649/50, while she was a widow, the Roxbury burials record that "an infant of a sojourner at sister Lamb's dyed of the small pox"; sister Lamb was very probably Dorothy.

On 2 Feb 1651/2 she married Thomas Hawley, a widower whose first wife, "Emm," had been buried only two months before, on 29 Nov 1651. Roxbury baptisms include Joseph (1654), Elizabeth and Dorothy Hawley, children of Thomas Hawley; an earlier son Joseph was buried 23 Nov 1653. About 1674 the church recorded that "Elizabeth Hawley, Dorothy Hawley, daughters of our Sister Hawley" took hold of the covenant together, and later "Joseph Hawly dismissed to the church at Northampton" (Roxbury church records). At Northampton, Savage says, Joseph Hawley "taught a sch[ool] soon after gr[aduating], then preach[ed] a brief period, and again was sch[ool]-master, last a trader," and served as deputy (2:384). His grandson Joseph Hawley (b. 1723) was, in Savage's words, "one of the master spirits of the Amer[ican] Revo[lution]," and so, it seems, Dorothy's great-grandson.

Her own name lived on in her children's children. Roxbury church baptisms of 1674/5 include "Harbottle, s. Abiel, bp. 28: 12m: 1674-5," her son Abiel's boy, and Edward and Elizabeth Dorr, her daughter and son-in-law, named a son Harbottle at Roxbury on 11 May 1696 (Roxbury VR 1, under Dorr).

King Philip's War. Her sons served. Abiel Lamb was Capt. Daniel Henchman's corporal in the November march to Hassanamesit, where in the fight of 9 Nov 1675, Bodge writes from Henchman's letter, he "outran himself in the attack" (Soldiers in King Philip's War, p. 55). On 10 Dec he marched from Dedham among the Roxbury men of Capt. Isaac Johnson's company for the Narragansett campaign (p. 162), and he was credited £4 10s (p. 277). Joshua Lamb served under Capt. Thomas Brattle (p. 265) and was credited £2 2s 10d in the Roxbury town credits (p. 369).

Her husband was killed on 21 Apr 1676: "HAWLEY, Thomas, sr., under the command of Capt. Sam[ue]ll Wadsworth, slain by the Indians at Sudbury, Apr. 21, 1676" (Roxbury VR 2:547). He was riding with Edward Cowell's party of mounted men on the Marlborough road, and fell, it seems, at the opening of the Sudbury fight. Cowell told it to the Council: "Upon our Returning from Mallberough to Boston; and About three Milles From Sudbeury Wee ware surprised with divers Hundred of Indians; Wheere of this Indian Tom was one ... at which tyme fower of my Company was killed and one Wounded ... I wentt Backe and Beuryed the fower men which were killed whereof ... Thomas Haw[le]y, and Hopkinsies son both of Roxbeury" (sworn 19 June 1676; Bodge pp. 225-226).

"This Indian Tom" was Capt. Tom, Wuttasacomponom, ruler of the Christian Indians of Hassanamesit, whom Daniel Gookin had known as "a prudent, and I believe, a pious man"; he went with the Nipmuc when they carried off his people in November 1675. He was "taken 9th June, and after lying in prison in Boston until the 22d following, was hanged" (Gookin, pp. 476-477 and n.). The Christian Indian soldiers Andrew Pittimee, James Quannapohit, Job, John Magus and James Speen petitioned for his life; the Council answered that he "was actually present and an actor in the devastation of some of our plantations" (p. 528). Cowell's deposition, sworn three days before the hanging, was very probably part of the case against him.

Thomas Hawley may have been a Narragansett soldier too: in 1733 his right in Narragansett township No. 5 went to "Thomas Hawley — Edward Dorr, son-in-law" (Bodge p. 432). Abiel Lamb drew his own right at No. 4 ("Abiell Lamb — Abiell, son," p. 426). Of Hawley's daughters, Savage has "Eliz. m. Edward Dorr; and Dorothy m. John Booth" (2:385).

Dorothy outlived him by more than twenty years, and died a widow at Roxbury on 28 Jan 1697/8.

Open questions

• Thomas Hawley's estate (Suffolk Probate, 1676).
• Edward Dorr's proofs for the Narragansett claim (Mass. Archives), to show what service was counted.