1941 HANDBOOK—DIRECTORY

Here. Lydia S. 148/22 examines six deeds naming our Philip, found by James L. Chapman 282/1 in the Essex County Registry in Salem, for clues to his livelihood. However, there seem to be some errors in her association of dates and occupations, compared to the six deeds that we have. Note that the grantor is the seller and grantee, the buyer.

The 1698 Beverly Homestead Grantee deed, as recorded in 1705/6, doesn't mention Philip's occupation at all. That might mean it wasn't known to Thomas Edwards, or intentionally left out. In the 1723 Beverly Homestead Grantor deed, he called himself a Weaver.

In the 1706 Ipswich Salt Marsh Grantee deed, recorded in 1708, Benjamin Edwards describes Philip and his partner, John Stone, as Weavers. When he sold in 1723, Philip repeats that he is a Weaver. He is described by Daniel Dodge as a Sailor in the 1709 Wenham Woodlot Grantee deed, recorded 1710/11, and Philip says he is a Mariner in the 1720 Wenham Woodlot Grantor deed.

Both of Philip and Martha's next door neighbors in Beverly were seafarers, Peter Wooden was a sailor aboard the ketch, Benjamin, when it was ransomed from royal authorities off Portugal in 1702. Benjamin Dike, a cooper, was killed fishing off Cape Sable. Of interest is the deed executed December 10th, 1705, recorded January 12 1708/09, by Jonathan Rayment to Benjamin Dyke, where Phillip Lecoadie is mentioned as an abutter. Apparently, the neighbors were neglected in the search for clues.

The change from "Sailor" to "Mariner" in the Wenham Woodlot deeds, could be explained as simple protocol. Since the grantor makes the deed, he describes himself as he pleases and the grantee as he sees him. When grantee becomes grantor, turnabout becomes fair play as he makes his own descriptions.

Mostly, we think weaving involves a loom, hence the shuttle in the Family Seal. But all you need to knit yarn is a couple of sticks for needles. Knitting was so popular on Jersey, that in the 1600s, laws were passed forbidding the men from knitting during the fishing season because ships couldn't get crews!

Think of hose, socks, sweaters, gloves and hats, think of jerseys and pullovers. In those days Jersey exported 10,000 pairs of stockings each week, a high-tech revolution! Think of thousands of husbands, wives and children spinning and knitting around the fire through the long winter, when it was too windy or wet to go out. Think of the demand for warm, elastic garments by chilly Europeans! Philip and Martha would both know how to knit, probably kept sheep for their wool and taught their children this valuable skill.

Between the sheep and a team of oxen to haul wood from the Wenham woodlot, they would need all the salt marsh hay they could get from their Ipswich saltmarsh, animals need salt for a healthy diet. Their fruit trees would provide cider, just like back home in Jersey. A few chickens in the yard, a cow in the barn and a 2 mile walk to the cove for shellfish fills the bill. Up at dawn, milk the cow, feed the stock, then a farmer's seasonal round of duties; planting in the spring, haying in the summer, harvest in the fall and woodcutting through the winter. With a wagon, a spinning wheel, an axe and scythe, some iron cooking pots, andirons and a spit for the fireplace and a lantern, plus cash money from knitting and fishing for tithing and taxes, it could be a pretty good life.


SECTION VI
Philip’s Occupational Interests
       That for a number of years our ancestor Philip was seafaring we know by the evidence of two deeds(1) to which he was party, of dates respectively 1708 and 1710. In the first of these he is named a “sailor,” in the second a “mariner.” For how long his occupation was seafaring we have no direct means of knowing. But since at 1708 he must have been around thirty years of age, (judging by the date, 1695, of the birth of his eldest child), it seems a reason-
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able surmise that at that date he would scarcely be just entering upon a calling so strenuous as was the seafaring of those days. Moreover, by the fact that in addition to having a growing family(2) to care for, he had acquired by that time the wherewithal to add to his home acreage some several acres more, he during the preceding years must have been engaged in a fairly remunerative occupation, and scarcely then would he be exchanging this for the hazards of seafaring. Accordingly it seems entirely reasonable to assume that seafaring had been his calling for some years before this 1708 deed in which he was named a sailor, as, by the evidence of the 1710 deed, (wherein he is named a mariner) it was his calling for some years thereafter.
       Since, as we learn from historical accounts of the Huguenot exodus(3) from France at that time many of the young men sought escape by giving service on ships bound for foreign lands, and that many of these continued this seafaring for a longer time, it seems a justifiable surmise that our ancestor Philip must have been one of these, and that accordingly this was his occupation at the first of his coming to Beverly, and the one followed by him until some time after the 1710 deed at which time his occupation was still given as seafaring (“mariner”).
       It seems quite likely, too, that our Philip may have been seafaring for a couple of years before purchasing a home in Beverly, for in the light of history(4) scarcely would a young Huguenot refugee just arrived from France have had the wherewithal to purchase this home with its partly developed six acres of land. We may, if this assumption be correct, explain Philip’s not being English-speaking at the time of this purchase, as the record above quoted seems to indicate, by the further assumption that these earlier years of his seafaring were spent on ships where only French was spoken. But in the meantime what of his wife, Martha, and their eldest child born 1695? Perhaps as was the case for many Huguenot refugees, Martha found shelter on the English owned but French-speaking island of Jersey or Guernsey(s) until Philip could provide a home for her in the new world.
       That seafaring was not this ancestor’s inherited occupational interest seems plainly evidenced by several indications from the records. Quite decidedly indicating that his ancestry was not seafaring is the fact that in purchasing a home in the new world, to which he evidently came in early manhood, he chose this in Beverly, which, while not far from the sea was not a seaport town. Moreover, that his ancestry was land-owning seems indicated by the fact that this purchase of a home included six acres of land(6); and further by the fact that he later added to this acreage by the purchase of other acres in Beverly and nearby, as evidenced by the deeds of 1708 and 1710.
       Moreover that husbandry and not seafaring was our Philip’s inherited occupational interest seems entirely evidenced by the fact(7) that while still in the health and strength of middle life he removed from Beverly to the entirely farming district of Hopkinton where for some twenty years he devoted himself to the development of one hundred acres of land into the worth-while farm described in his will(8). And there is further evidence in the fact that none of his sons were seafaring; all who grew up eventually established themselves at Hopkinton where they too engaged in farming.
       By the fact that Philip was named a “weaver” in the deed for the sale of his Beverly home, 1723, it might seem at first thought that in giving up sea-faring he had intended to make weaving his occupation. But upon reflective

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consideration of the records, this seems scarcely to have been the case. For since, by the evidence of the 1710 deed, he was seafaring at that date, and quite likely for some time thereafter, and since by 1720 he had acquired the land at Hopkinton which he soon began to farm, his having turned to weav- ing seems more likely to have been by way of supplementing his income while attempting the husbanding of his Beverly land to which he had probably given some time even while seafaring.
       It is indeed a matter of interest to us, his descendants, to know that our immigrant ancestor Philip, a Huguenot refugee with probably a wife and child at the time of his coming to the new world was able while meeting the needs of a growing family, to accumulate sufficient property during the years of his seafaring to enable him to turn to an occupational interest of his choice, which he so far successfully followed during the remaining more than twenty years of his life that he left to his family a worthy farm-in- heritance, as we know by his will(9), probated in 1743.
    TEXTUAL NOTES TO SECTION VI
  1. See Essex County registry of deeds at Salem.
  2. The youngest of his six children was born in 1710.
  3. See Baird’s History of Huguenot Immigration to America.
  4. See Baird’s History of Huguenot Immigration to America.
  5. See reference to Huguenot refugees on these islands in the Baird History above mentioned.
  6. See description of this property in the deed for this (1698).
  7. See above concerning this.
  8. A copy of this following Section VIII.
  9. A copy of this following Section VIII.
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