♂Wrestling Brewster

Wrestling Brewster (about 1644 – 1 January 1696/97) was a carpenter of Duxbury in Plymouth Colony and a grandson of Elder William Brewster of the Mayflower. He was the seventh great-grandfather of Frederic Roger Curtis (1928–2007), through his daughter Mary Brewster (1678–1761).

Early life

Wrestling was a son of Love Brewster (1612–1650) and Sarah Collier (1616–1691). His unusual given name came from his father’s family: Elder William Brewster had named his children Patience, Fear, Love and Wrestling, in the Puritan fashion for names drawn from virtues and the struggles of the soul, and Wrestling was named for his uncle. His father had come to Plymouth on the Mayflower in 1620 as a boy, with his parents William and Mary Brewster, and later settled at Duxbury. No record of Wrestling’s birth has been found; the year 1644 is an estimate, and he was probably born at Duxbury. He was still a small child when his father died in 1650. His father’s will, dated 6 October 1650, names him among “my Children” and calls him “my youngest sonn Wresteling Brewster”.

On 5 July 1669 the court at Plymouth answered a petition from Wrestling and William, most likely his brother, for land. The petitioners were “two grand children of the Reverend Mr Willam Brewster, deceased”, and the court granted them land at Swansea if they went to live there. No record shows that they went.

Marriage and family

He married a woman named Mary, born in November 1661, whose maiden name is not known. They were married before February 1678/79, when their eldest child, Mary, was born. Wrestling spent his working life at Duxbury as a carpenter. On 29 May 1678 he and John Rogers, both of Duxbury, sold to Thomas Durphey of Portsmouth half a freeman’s lot at Taunton River and half a freeman’s meadow share at Sippican, formerly of his late father, Love Brewster.

The colony court chose him surveyor of the highways in 1679 and named him constable in 1680, and he sat as a juror at the Plymouth courts in October 1682 and October 1684. The town chose him surveyor in 1687 and 1688, and in June 1689 he was admitted a freeman of the colony. On 24 February 1692/93 he bought seventy acres of upland and five acres of salt marsh at Duxbury from John Doty for sixty pounds. He was chosen surveyor again in 1695/96.

The couple had eight children, five daughters and three sons: Mary, Sarah, Abigail, Hannah, Elizabeth, Jonathan, Wrestling and John. The younger Wrestling was born in August 1695, less than a year and a half before his father died. The daughters married into neighboring families. Mary married Joseph Holmes of Plymouth, Sarah and Abigail married Caleb and Elisha Stetson, Hannah married Benjamin Alden and Elizabeth married Ephraim Bradford. Of the sons, Jonathan married Mary Partridge, Wrestling married Hannah Thomas, and John married Rebecca Bradford.

The town also turned to his household when it had people to keep. On 13 December 1689 the town promised Wrestling that, if he “in courtesy did take Nathaniel Cole into his house”, it would secure him from being burdened with keeping Cole. On 29 October 1695 (the year is not printed with the entry and may be 1694) the town agreed with him “for the feeding of Thurston Clark, a quarter of a year, for fifty shillings”, and to answer for the clothing he provided.

Death and estate

In November and December 1696, weeks before he died, he appraised the estate of John Rogers junior and signed the bond of its administrator, Samuel Bradford, apparently as a surety. Wrestling Brewster died at Duxbury on 1 January 1696/97, without a will. An inventory taken two weeks later valued his housing and lands at £150. On 2 February 1696/97 the Plymouth County court appointed his widow, described as the “Relict and widdow of Wrestling Brewster late of Duxborough … Carpenter Deceased Intestate”, to administer the estate. Edward Southworth and John Sprague stood surety for her £200 bond, and she signed with her mark.

The estate was settled among the children ten years later. By a deed of 3 October 1707, the five daughters, with Joseph Holmes and Caleb Stetson for their wives, released their father’s lands to “our Brethren ye Sons of the sd Deceased namely Jonathan Brewster Wrestling Brewster & John Brewster”. Jonathan received the house that had been John Rogers’s and marsh at Pine Point, and the younger Wrestling and John the land that had been John Dotey’s. This was probably the land he had bought from John Doty on 24 February 1692/93. In return the brothers released the household goods to their sisters. This deed is the only record that names all eight children together.

His widow Mary married John Partridge of Duxbury on 23 May 1700 and had two more sons, Benjamin and Isaac Partridge. John Partridge died on 5 April 1731. Mary outlived both husbands. She died at Kingston on 12 November 1742, and her gravestone there gives her age as 80 years, 11 months and 27 days.

Notes

Some online family trees name Wrestling’s wife as Mary Howland, a daughter of John Howland Jr. and Mary Lee, born in 1662 and married in 1681. Robert Roser’s Mayflower Increasings (1995) shows that the Howland daughter Mary was a different woman, born about 1652, who married John Allyn. It gives Wrestling’s wife’s maiden name as unknown and dates the marriage to before 1678. Her birth in November 1661 comes from the age on her gravestone, not from a birth record.

The deed of 24 February 1692/93 describes the buyer as “Wrestling Brewster of the Towne of Duxbury … Carpenter”.