Mary Green

Also Mary Kneeland

Wife of John Kneeland of Boston, bearing children from 1692, and probably the mother of Rachel Kneeland, who married Samuel Foster. Her parentage is uncertain: she may have been a daughter of Samuel Green Jr. or of Samuel Green Sr., the printer at Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Family tree →
01

Family

Father
Samuel Green Jr.

Kneeland 1897. Savage has Samuel Green Jr. marrying Elizabeth Sill in Nov 1685, too late for a daughter married by 1692, and a Vita Brevis article (2016) says he "is not credited with any children" in most accounts.

compiledpossible
Sources· 1 found

Other claim · Savage (a Mary born 6 Nov 1669)Samuel Green Sr., the Cambridge printer, by Sarah ClarkpossibleFits the dates better. Unproven.

Spouse
John Kneeland 1668–1740

Their children 1692-1698 are in RC 9. Her surname is from Kneeland 1897.

documentedproven
Sources· 1 found

1 child

02

Pedigree

documentedcompiledinferred
03

Notes

Wife of John Kneeland of Boston, bearing children from 1692.

Kneeland 1897 (p. 51) makes her a daughter of Samuel Green Jr. and granddaughter of Samuel Green, the Cambridge printer. Savage (2:306) lists among the children of Samuel Green of Cambridge, the printer, by his second wife Sarah Clark, “Mary, b. 6 Nov. 1669.” That Mary is the right age for John Kneeland (b. Nov 1668), who married by 1692. If she is the bride, she was the printer’s daughter, not his granddaughter, and Bartholomew Green, printer of the Boston News-Letter, with whom her son Samuel Kneeland “served an apprenticeship” (Isaiah Thomas), would have been her brother [inferred; unproven].

Mollie says Samuel Green “published in England the famous Cambridge Bible.” He printed at Cambridge, Massachusetts; his greatest work was the Indian Bible, with Marmaduke Johnson (Savage). Mollie’s “brother” Timothy Green, Samuel Kneeland’s printing partner, was the second Timothy Green, son of Timothy of New London, and so Mary’s nephew if her parentage is right.

Open questions

  • Her parentage: Torrey and a Green genealogy.
Mollie's typescript· 1 passage · 2 claims checked

What Mollie wrote about her in The Holbrook and Low Families, and her claims about her checked against the records.

  1. Mollie makes her a daughter of Samuel Green Jr. and granddaughter of Samuel Green, the Cambridge printer, and calls Timothy Green, partner of her son Samuel Kneeland the Boston publisher, her brother (he was her nephew, if her parentage is right).

    John Kneeland (14) married Mary Green a daughter of Samuel Green Jr. , and granddaughter of Samuel Green the old Cambridge printer ... Mary's brother, Timothy Green was a partner of her son, Samuel Kneeland, a Boston publisher.
    p. 130 →

Checked against the records

  • Unlikely
    Mary Green was a daughter of Samuel Green Jr., the printer's son

    Unproven, and the dates are against it: Samuel Green Jr. married in Nov 1685, too late for a daughter who married by 1692. Savage's Mary, born 1669 to the printer Samuel Green Sr., fits better. The printer worked at Cambridge, Massachusetts, not in England, and his great work was the Indian Bible.

    Read it in the book, p. 130 →
  • Disproven
    Mary's brother Timothy Green was her son Samuel Kneeland's partner

    The partner was the second Timothy Green, son of Timothy of New London, and so Mary's nephew if she was a Green of Cambridge. Kneeland and Green printed "the first Bible printed, in America, in the English language", under a false London imprint (Isaiah Thomas).

    Read it in the book, p. 130 →
04

Connections

Famous kin
  • Samuel Kneeland 1697-1769
    Boston printer
    Samuel Kneeland is the 6x great-granduncle of the centre of this tree: the brother of her 6x great-grandmother, Rachel Kneeland.
BeginEnd