♀Rebecca Curtis

Rebecca Curtis (a compiled collection gives her birth as 28 April 1705) was the eldest child of Thomas Curtis and Mary Goodrich. She was the fifth great-grand-aunt of Frederic Roger Curtis (1928–2007), the sister of Zebulon Curtis (1710–1798), Roger’s fifth great-grandfather.

Early life

A compiled collection of Connecticut vital records gives her birth as 28 April 1705 at Wethersfield in the Connecticut Colony^W, a daughter of Thomas Curtis (1680–1752) and Mary Goodrich (born 1682), who had married there on 30 December 1703. A history of Wethersfield published in 1904 gives her baptism as the next day, 29 April. The same history records that her father bought land at Farmington in February 1703/4, less than two months after the wedding, and the Farmington town book enters her sister Sibbel there on 23 October 1708. Rebecca grew up at Farmington among the brothers and sisters born between 1708 and 1727, Zebulon among them.

A compiled genealogy, Goodwin’s Genealogical Notes of 1856, states that only one child of Thomas and Mary is recorded on the Wethersfield records: Rebecca. The family was at Farmington by 1710/11, when Zebulon was born there, so a move from Wethersfield to Farmington would account for the other children’s absence from the Wethersfield books.

Marriage

A compiled collection gives the marriage to Daniel Dewey as 27 January 1732 at Farmington, printed 1731/2. The compiled Farmington town records print the date as 27 January 1731/2 and call them both of Farmington; the 1904 history, which queries whether his name was Dewey or Deming, describes him as “of New Britain”. No children are on record for the couple.

Daniel Dewey appears once more in the family’s papers. In 1746 Rebecca’s father, then described as late of Farmington and now of Torrington, conveyed his home lot and dwelling lot to Robert Booth, and the 1904 history says the deed was witnessed by his son-in-law Daniel Dewey. No record of Rebecca’s death is known.

Notes

Her death

A family tree on Geneanet gives her death as 6 March 1781 at New Britain. The family tree here holds no death date for her.

The Dewey children

The Farmington town book lists births to a Daniel Dewey between 1736 and 1742, among them Rhede in November 1736 and Josiah in July 1737. Those two are only seven months apart, so more than one Daniel Dewey was raising a family at Farmington, and another Daniel Dewey had married there in 1706. The entries do not name the mothers, so none is assigned to Rebecca.