Lydia Messer
Probably the daughter of Thomas Messer of Sheepscot, Maine, at whose house on the west side of the Sheepscot River she lived till she was seventeen and married, before the first Indian Wars. She married John Stanwood of Gloucester at Boston in 1680, as Lydia Butler, and was probably the mother of James Stanwood.
Life
- 1680Married John Stanwood9 Dec 1680, Boston, Massachusetts
"in Boston, by 'Capten John Hull.' The records of Gloucester, entered at Salem, give her name as 'Lidea Cuttler'" (Bolton p. 32).
- —LivedSheepscot River, Maine
Her 1742 deposition: she "lived at the house of her father Thos Messer on ye West Side of s[ai]d Sheepscut River... till she was seventeen years old and married."
documentedprobable
Family
- Father
- Thomas Messer of Sheepscot
Bolton's inference from her depositions of 1737 and 1742, which name "her father Thos Messer".
compiledprobable - Spouse
- John Stanwooddocumentedproven
1 child
Pedigree
Notes
Married John Stanwood of Gloucester at Boston, 9 Dec 1680, as Lydia Butler, a widow. Bolton makes her Lydia (Messer) Butler. Her 1742 deposition says she “lived at the house of her father Thos Messer on ye West Side of s[ai]d Sheepscut River… till she was seventeen years old and married, which time was before the first Indian Wars.” Mollie Pfeiffer’s typescript has no Messer chart, but it names Lydia “a widow, the daughter of Thomas Messer of Sheepscote” (p. 185).
Bolton found three depositions by Lydia Stanwood in the Boston Court-house and a fourth in the Wiscasset town hall. By the age she gave at Wiscasset, she married Butler at seventeen and had remarried before twenty. The Sheepscot settlement “was wiped out during the Indian wars”, so nothing is known of her first husband (Bolton pp. 32-34). Calling her a Messer is Bolton’s own conclusion: “It seems to be almost beyond dispute that this Lydia Butler, or Cutler, the wife of John, is the Lydia Stanwood who made the three depositions.”
Open questions
- Who was her Butler husband, and when did she marry him?
Mollie's typescript
Mollie gives her marriage to John Stanwood at Boston in 1680 as the widow Lydia Butler, daughter of Thomas Messer of Sheepscot, and their nine children.
He married Lydia Butler in 1680, in Boston, Capt. John Hull officiating. Lydia was a widow, the daughter of Thomas Messer of Sheepscote, wiped out during the Indian wars. John and Lydia had nine children.
p. 185 →
Checked against the records
- PossibleLydia Butler was a widow, daughter of Thomas Messer of Sheepscot
Probably right. In depositions of 1737 and 1742 Lydia Stanwood named "her father Thos Messer" and said she lived at his house on the west side of the Sheepscot River "till she was seventeen years old and married, which time was before the first Indian Wars" (Bolton). Her Butler husband is unknown.
Read it in the book, p. 185 →