♂Nicholas Byram

Nicholas Byram (died about 1688) was a settler of Weymouth who in 1660 bought land rights in the town of Bridgewater, in Plymouth Colony^W, where he spent the rest of his life. He was the ninth great-grandfather of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006) by two separate lines of descent, both through his daughter Susanna Byram (died 1741/42).

Early life

By family tradition, he was the son of an English gentleman of Kent who moved to Ireland about the time Nicholas was born. At sixteen he was sent to visit friends in England in the charge of a man who robbed him of his money and sent him to the West Indies, where he was sold into service to pay for his passage. When his term was up he made his way to New England and settled at Weymouth, in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He is also said to have practised as a physician.

Weymouth and Bridgewater

He was probably married to Susanna by late 1638, and their six children, a son, Nicholas, and five daughters, Abigail, Deliverance, Experience, Susanna and Mary, were most likely all born at Weymouth. On 13 December 1660, still “of Weymouth”, he bought from two Duxbury men, Philip Delano and Moses Simmons, each man’s “whole right of lands” in Bridgewater, and he is said to have bought a third right, George Soule’s, and to have moved his family there soon after.

He became one of the town’s leading men. In 1666 the court reportedly named him, with Samuel Edson and John Willis, a counselor of war to serve with the town’s military officers. In 1672 he, William Brett and Samuel Edson, the father of his daughter Susanna’s husband, bought for the townsmen the land north of the Titicut River from Pomponoho, also called Peter, a Native man.

During King Philip’s War^W, when raiders burnt the outlying houses of Bridgewater in the spring of 1676, the one house said to have escaped, apart from the fortified garrison houses, was Nicholas Byram’s, which stood in the east of the town, far from the main settlement.

Death

He is said to have died at Bridgewater on 13 April 1688, and his estate came before the Plymouth County probate court that year. Susanna outlived him by at least ten years.

Lines of descent

Nicholas and Susanna are ancestors of Nancy Jane Blanchard twice over, both times through their daughter Susanna, who married Samuel Edson. One line runs through Susanna’s daughter Elisabeth Edson (1684–1716), who married Samuel Packard, down to Joseph Knapp (1763–1839); the other runs through her son Samuel Edson (1689–1771) down to Eunice Carver (1763–1845). Joseph Knapp and Eunice Carver married, and the two lines meet in their daughter Polly Knapp (1798–1863).

Notes

Family tradition and trade

The story of his youth comes from Nahum Mitchell’s History of the Early Settlement of Bridgewater (1840), which gives it “according to family tradition”, and the medical history in the History of Weymouth (1923) repeats it. Chamberlain’s genealogy volume calls him “a physician” who lived at Weymouth from 1638 to 1662 and at Bridgewater from 1662 to 1688. The medical history, though, ends its entry with “Dr. Byram died in 1727”, the year his son Nicholas died, so it may run the two men together.

Marriage and children

The year of the marriage is not known; Chamberlain places it before October 1638. The children’s names, and their births at Weymouth, come from Mitchell and Chamberlain; the medical history counts eight children, six of them born at Weymouth. His wife’s parentage is discussed on her own page.

The Bridgewater purchases

The two deeds of 13 December 1660 are abstracted from the Plymouth Colony land records in Robert Charles Anderson’s The Great Migration Begins: Philip Delano “of Duxburrow” sold to “Nicholas Byram of Weymouth” “my whole right of lands in the town of Bridgewater”, and Moses Simmons of Duxbury “my whole right of lands in Bridgewater town”. The third right, George Soule’s, the move soon after, the 1666 appointment and the 1672 purchase all come from Mitchell, who prints the 1672 deed of Pomponoho to “Nicholas Byram, sen., Samuel Edson, sen., and William Brett, sen.”. Chamberlain dates the move to 1662.

King Philip’s War

The spared house comes from Mitchell, who writes that “every house but one in town was burnt” apart from the garrison houses, and that the one excepted “is said to have been Nicholas Byram’s“. His son Nicholas, who married in 1676, also lived in Bridgewater, and Mitchell does not say which of the two men owned it. Mitchell also writes that “John Ames and Nicholas Byram are said to have distinguished themselves” in a skirmish with Philip’s men on 31 July 1676; which Nicholas is meant is not clear, so it is left out above.

Death

The day, 13 April 1688, comes from Chamberlain; Mitchell gives only the year. His estate file in the Plymouth County probate records is docketed “Nicholas Byram Bridgewater 1688”. His widow’s will of 1698 calls him “my deceased husband”, and a deed of 25 July 1698 sold a purchase right that “did belong formerly to Nicholas Byram now deceased”. His son Nicholas lived until 1727, so both papers refer to the father.