James Bate

Of Lydd, Kent, and Dorchester. Came to New England in 1635 with his family. On 17 April 1635 “JAMES BATE 53”, with Alice 52, Lyddia 20, Marie 17, Margaret 12 and James 9, was embarked in the Elizabeth of London, William Stagg master, with a certificate “from the Ministers & Justices of the Peace of their Conformitie to the Church of England” (Hotten). Patience Foster and her son Hopestill were on the same list, and the Milletts sailed in the same ship. His brother Clement Bate came on the same ship and settled at Hingham (Watkins). He was made a freeman on 7 Dec 1636 (“James Bate,” Records of Mass. Bay 1:372), was a Dorchester selectman, ruling elder of the Dorchester church, and a deputy at the General Court of May 1640 (Records of Mass. Bay 1:288).

The Bates of Lydd were jurats and bailiffs. A brass in All Saints, Lydd, to Thomas Bate, jurat (d. 1578), reads “Full thre skore yeres and twelve … A Juratt of thys towne was I And Thomas Bate by name. Fower chyldren now my place supply” (NEHGR 51:268). In Watkins’s pedigree this Thomas was a brother of James’s grandfather John Bate. Mollie traces the Bates of Lydd back three more generations; that has not been checked.

His son Richard Bate stayed in Lydd. Richard’s will (19 June 1656) left “unto my mother Alice Bate in New England twelve pounds yearly,” and his Lydd stone reads “Here lieth the body of Richard Bate, gent, son of James and Alice Bate sometime of this towne,” adding that he had been “bayliff of this Corporation six times” (NEHGR 51:268).

Smallhope Bigg’s 1638 will left 20s each to “my kinsfolk Thomas Bate, of Lydd, James Bate, Clement Bate … all which are now resident in New England,” and John Bigg’s will names “My cousin James Bate of New England” (Waters, Gleanings 1:21-22).

His will of 22 Nov 1655 left his lands and goods to “sonne Richard Bate of Lid Towne in Kent in Old England,” £100 each to the three children of his son James, and his Dorchester house, orchard and planting land to his grandson James Foster, his wife Alice to have the use of the house (Bates Bulletin 1).

Open questions

• The Great Migration sketch of James Bate has not been read.
• His mother: the colonial tree marks Mary Martin(?) as unproven, since Watkins queries her surname; the page has the link as compiled, probable. The doubt Watkins raises is about her surname.