♂Andrew Spaulding

Andrew Spaulding (25 March 1678 – 7 November 1753) was a deacon of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, and the father of twelve children. He was the sixth great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006), through his son Andrew Spaulding (1701–1768).

Early life and marriage

The Chelmsford birth register records Andrew, son of Andrew and Hannah, born on 25 March 1678. His parents were Andrew Spaulding and Hannah Jefts. On 5 February 1701 he married Abigail Warren at Chelmsford; the register writes her name “Abbigall Waring”. She was most likely the daughter of Jacob Warren of Chelmsford and his wife Mary Hildreth, born there in January 1682/3.

Family

Andrew and Abigail had twelve children, born between 1701 and 1723: Andrew, the eldest, on 8 December 1701, then Jacob and Henry, twins, in 1703, Josiah, Ephraim, Isaac, the twins Abigail and Johanna in 1712, James, David, Benjamin and Sarah. The Chelmsford register enters eleven of the births; Ephraim, who is missing from it, is named in his father’s will. According to a Spalding family genealogy published in 1897, Benjamin died on 18 December 1737, and the will does not name him.

The Chelmsford church record shows one of his granddaughters in his care. Abigail, a daughter of his son Andrew of Westford, died “at Old Dea. Spaulding he having taken her to live with him”, and was buried on 20 November 1749.

Deacon and landholder

The Chelmsford death register calls him Deacon Andrew Spaulding, and the 1897 genealogy says that he lived at Chelmsford and was a deacon of the church. The same genealogy records that he and his wife Abigail conveyed land in Londonderry, New Hampshire, to John Goffe of Londonderry by a deed dated at Dunstable on 2 September 1726.

The genealogy also prints his will, dated 19 February 1741/2, in which he called himself a yeoman of Chelmsford in the Province of Massachusetts Bay. In the will as printed, he left his wife Abigail the use of all his lands, buildings, stock and household goods for her lifetime. The printed will makes the lands already given to each of his eight sons, Andrew, Jacob, Henry, Josiah, Ephraim, Isaac, James and David, by deed of gift, with what it added, their full portions, and the fifty pounds given to each of his daughters Abigail, Johanna and Sarah at her marriage her portion; it names a granddaughter, Mary Harwood, to share in the household goods and his son David as sole executor.

Death

He died on 7 November 1753, and his death is entered in the Chelmsford register. The church record gives his age as 75, and his gravestone in the Forefathers’ Cemetery at Chelmsford Centre says he was in his 75th year; the 1897 genealogy’s age of 73 does not fit his recorded birth. His widow Abigail died on 12 May 1768.