♀Ruth Howland

Ruth Howland (born about 1646) was a daughter of the Mayflower passengers John Howland (1593–1673) and Elizabeth Tilley (1607–1687) and the first wife of Thomas Cushman, the eldest son of Thomas Cushman and Mary Allerton^W, who outlived every other passenger of the Mayflower. She was the eighth great-grand-aunt of Frederic Roger Curtis (1928–2007), the sister of Desire Howland (1625–1683), Roger’s eighth great-grandmother.

Early life

She was the ninth of the ten children of John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley, born about 1646 at Rocky Nook, then part of Plymouth, in the account of Elizabeth Pearson White’s volume on the family. Her father’s will of 29 May 1672, proved on 5 March 1672/73, left twenty shillings to each of six married daughters, among them “Ruth Cushman”. When his goods were appraised in March 1672/73, one of the three appraisers was Elder Thomas Cushman of the Plymouth church, whom a compiled account makes the father of her husband Thomas.

Marriage and children

Susan Roser’s Mayflower Increasings gives her marriage to Thomas Cushman at Plymouth on 17 November 1664. Two Mayflower genealogies, Roser’s and Robert Wakefield’s volume on the Allerton family, add a court record: on 7 March 1664/5 Thomas was fined for “carnal coppulation” with her before their marriage but after they had contracted to marry. Wakefield counts three children by Ruth, Robert, Desire and Thomas, and the rest of Thomas’s seven children as born to his second wife.

Death

Ruth was alive when her father made his will in 1672. She had died before Roser places Thomas’s marriage to Abigail Fuller at Rehoboth on 16 October 1679, and White’s family table gives her death as 1679. Her mother’s will of 17 December 1686 left four sheep to Ruth’s daughter Desire Cushman.

Notes

Wakefield gives the birth of Robert, the eldest child, as 4 October 1664, worked out from his age at death. He judges that date wrong and prefers 1665; set against the wedding date of 17 November 1664 it would fall a month before the marriage.