Janet Hampton

Notes:

After her husband died, she became a Presbyterian, and was part of the community that founded the Old Tennant Church in Monmouth County.

Going Up to the House of the Lord, at the site of the Old Tennent Presbyterian Church:

By 1731, the hardy group of Scottish Covenanters who worshipped on Free Hill in present-day Marlboro had outgrown their small log cabin church. Because the congregation's growth was fed by new settlements in the Freehold-Manalapan area, an acre of land was purchased five miles to the south to build a new house of worship here on White Hill (said to be named for its white oak trees).

There is a tradition that the builders planned to locate the new church on a lower part of the property and had gathered there to begin work. Whereupon a woman from the congregation named Janet Rhea seized the small cornerstone in her apron and, toiling to the top of the hill, set it down there, saying to the astonished onlookers: "Wha ever heard o' ganging doon to the Hoose o' the Lord, an no o' ganging oop to the Hoose o' the Lord?" Janet's point was made and that church, as well as the present larger sanctuary which replaced it 20 years later, was built on top of the hill.

In Rev. Symmes' history of the church, he described Janet Rhea as a woman of strong mind and scriptural application and a devout worker in the Presbyterian community that built Old Tennent. The wife of Robert Rhea, a carpenter by profession, who came from Scotland in 1688, Janet was also newly arrived from Scotland when they were married in 1689 at Shrewsbury in the Quaker Meeting House.

The old Rhea farm, which Robert had purchased, is now the site of the Visitors Center at Monmouth Battleground State Park. Janet Rhea Road, named in Janet's honor, is just west of the intersection of Routes 9 and 33. There is reportedly a family burial ground on the farm's property and that is where Janet and members of her family were buried. She died in 1761 at the age of 93.

A wonderful piece of furniture from the Rhea family home is on display in Freehold. A chair crafted by Robert Rhea was donated to the Monmouth County Historical Society and is on display at the main museum. The massive chair with very detailed carving was fashioned after chairs Robert remembered in Scotland. It dates from 1695 and is thought to be one of the oldest documented chairs crafted in America.

Janet married Robert Rhea on 9 Jan 1690 in Shrewsbury, Monmouth, New Jersey. Robert was born in 1664 in East Lothian, Scotland; died on 18 Jan 1719 in Monmouth, New Jersey; was buried in Old Tennent Churchyard, Tennent, Monmouth, New Jersey. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: David Parker. David was born in 1704 in Monmouth, New Jersey. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Some sources, including his Find a Grave page, claim him as a veteran of the American Revolution. In the graveyard in which he is buried, a modern stone lists inhabitants of Tennant who fought in that war, and that list includes a "Thos. Parker." But our Thomas Parker would have been 39 when the Declaration was signed. Parker in America (citation details below), citing Salter's 1890 history of Monmouth County, says that the third son of this Thomas Parker and Amy James was another Thomas, and it seems to us likelier that he's the "Thos. Parker" referred to on the stone.

DNA testing by the Parker Family DNA Project suggests that this Thomas Parker was a descendant of Elisha Parker, born in England about 1630, who married Elizabeth Hinckley and died either in Barnstable, MA or Perth Amboy, NJ. Several unsourced family trees say that Thomas's father David was son of Thomas, son of another Thomas (wife, Mary Mott; he is said to have left the Plymouth colony and settled in or near Staten Island), son of Elisha Parker and Elizabeth Hinckley. Elizabeth Hinckley was a sister of Thomas Hinckley (1618-1706), the last governor of the Plymouth colony.

The DNA results also suggest that this Elisha Parker was closely related to Robert Parker, also born around 1630, who emigrated to the Plymouth colony and lived in Barnstable.

Family/Spouse: Sarah Stout. Sarah (daughter of Richard Stout and Hannah Wooley) was born on 3 Oct 1757; died on 20 Mar 1829; was buried in Old Tennent Churchyard, Tennent, Monmouth, New Jersey. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Thomas married Amy James on 31 Oct 1761. Amy (daughter of Robert James) was born on 14 Jun 1749 in Freehold, Monmouth, New Jersey; died in Mar 1778 in Freehold, Monmouth, New Jersey. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

"He was a member of the Legislature, sheriff of the county, and State Treasurer for many years." [Parker in America, citation details below.]

Parker in America also states that "He (Charles) lived at Toms River about 1810, and d. at Forked River about 1812-14, and then rem. to Freehold or vicinity," which seems unlikely.

Family/Spouse: Sarah Coward. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Arrived in Canada, 1796, where he took the Loyalist oath of allegiance. [Ontario People: 1796-1803 by E. Keith Fitzgerald. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1993.]

Family/Spouse: Providence Miller. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]