Benjamin Edwin Drew

Benjamin married Laura Adele Currier on 6 Jan 1910 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts. Laura (daughter of Norris Wiggin Currier and Margaret A. Carmichael) was born on 22 Aug 1889 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts; died on 24 Aug 1959. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

1. Edith Estelle Drew was born on 22 Mar 1911 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts; died on 12 Sep 2008 in Washington, Washington, Iowa.

Notes:

He was a machinist.

Edwin married Sarah Adelaide George on 27 Oct 1864 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts. Sarah (daughter of Benjamin Franklin George and Catherine Clark) was born about 1847 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts; died on 10 Dec 1909 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

He was a master mariner.

William married Caroline Cleapor. Caroline (daughter of Charles Cleapor) was born about 1794 in of Charleston, Charleston, South Carolina; died on 1 Jul 1854 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: Abt 1803, Charleston, Charleston, South Carolina

Notes:

Said to have been born 24 Sep 1816. He was a blacksmith. His Boston address at death was 6 Oliver Place.

The latter-day typed copy of his Boston marriage record gives the date as 5 July, an earlier handwritten register (obviously copied from earlier records, as the entries are not in chronological order) says 15 July, and what appears to be the original handwritten record says 15 May.

Benjamin married Catherine Clark on 15 May 1839 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts. Catherine was born in Feb 1814 in Dedham, Norfolk, Massachusetts; died on 11 Jul 1907 in New York, New York. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Possibly the Catherine Clark baptized 20 Feb 1813 in Medfield (near Dedham), daughter of James Clark and Polly Smith.

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: 2 Nov 1835, Duxbury, Plymouth, Massachusetts

Notes:

According to his wife's 1838 pension application, he first joined the army at Cambridge during the siege of Boston in August 1775, serving about a month "in a company commanded by one Captain Pearley." Upon being discharged "he enlisted with Capt Coit in the continental schooner, called as he thinks the Harrison, fitted out by orders of Gen Washington. He was carpenter of the vessel at ten dollars per month and two shares of prize money. While cruising they had a fight with an enemy's brig off Plymouth. The vessel was dismasted and towed into Cape Ann where she remained all winter undergoing repairs under said Drew's directions as carpenter of the vessel. Before he was discharged Capt Dyer took command of the vessel and had a short cruise. This whole service was about seven months, during which time he had a furlough and served a few days as a volunteer in the erection of the forts on Dorchester heights."

Not long afterwards he spent a week as a carpenter assisting the construction of the brig Independence under the command of Captain Simeon Sampson. Re-enlisting in July 1776, in Captain James Harlow's company, Colonel Carey's Massachusetts regiment, he marched to New York, was transferred to Captain Ayers's Company, Colonel Brewer's Regiment of Mechanics, and was discharged in Jan 1777.

On 4 Feb 1778 he received sailing orders from the Board of War (Colonel David, agent), giving him command of a galley, the Lady Washington, an armed public vessel. He commanded this vessel for five months, then the public sloop Defiance for another five months.

Isaac married Welthea Bradford on 1 Oct 1781 in Duxbury, Plymouth, Massachusetts. Welthea (daughter of Samuel Bradford and Grace Ring) was born on 15 Nov 1757 in Duxbury, Plymouth, Massachusetts; died on 8 Jun 1846. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate death: Mar 1841, Poughkeepsie, Dutchess, New York

Notes:

If she died in Poughkeepsie as asserted in the Stephen Hopkins Mayflower Families through Five Generations book (citation details below), she must have removed there very late in life, as the records of her pension application state that she personally appeared before the Plymouth probate judge, calling herself "a resident of Duxbury" (and "aged Eighty years") in Aug 1838.

A typewritten letter from one Winfield Scott, Commissioner of the "Rev. & 1812 Wars Section" of the Federal pension office, to Mary C. Fraprie of Beacon Street, Brookline, Massachusetts, dated 16 Oct 1928, narrates Isaac Drew's service in the Revolution in some detail, and ends with the note that Isaac Drew's wife Welthea Bradford — who, the letter notes, he married "October 1, 1781", agreeing with the other genealogical sources cited here — was "allowed pension on her application executed August 16, 1838, while a resident of Duxbury, Massachusetts, aged eighty years. She died June 8, 1846." Which is entirely different from the information given in the Hopkins Mayflower Families book.

The Mayflower Families books use the much-complained-about "giant block of citations" model, in which it can be very difficult to determine which cited source or authority attaches to which stated fact. Failing a specific reason to believe that Welthea Bradford died in Poughkeepsie — or in 1841, as asserted by Ruth Gardiner Hall (citation details below) — we're inclined to believe Commissioner Scott's report that she died 8 June 1846, even if he was writing over eighty years later. For the simple reason that pension offices are strongly motivated to accurately know when their beneficiaries have died and no longer require further applications of public funds.

Notes:

Slaveowner and sail-maker. His will, dated 12 Feb 1822 and proved on the 25th of the same month, names his "negro Workmen Viz. Jim, Joe Alonzo, Daniel, Jack, and Kelly," directing that they be "left under the particular direction and management of my Copartner Nathaniel Fields, the proceeds of their copartnership to be divided between Fields and Charles Cleapor's wife. Unfortunately neither his will nor the record of his probate give his wife's actual name. The probate document does, however, confirm that his primary business was sail-making.

The 1822 city directory for Charleston (included in Charleston, South Carolina City Directories: For the Years 1816, 1819, 1822, 1825, and 1829 ed. James William Hagy, Baltimore, Genealogical Publishing Company, 1996) lists him as "Cleapor, Charles, Sail Maker, Lothrop's Whf."

"The Friends and Acquaintances of Mr. Charles Cleapor, are invited to attend his Funeral This Afternoon, at 3 o'clock, from his former residence, No. 22 Ellery-street. (Tuesday, February 26, 1822)" [Marriage and Death Notices from the City Gazette of Charleston, citation details below.]

Notes:

He was a blacksmith. He was in the war of 1812: "Capt. J. Edward's Comp., Lieut. Col. J. White's Reg. Stationed at Salem, MA, July 20, 1814-Aug. 5, 1814 for instruction purposes; Oct. 10, 1814-Dec. 19, 1814 for regular service." [George Genealogy, citation details below.]

Benjamin married Abigail Montgomery on 15 Oct 1811 in Newburyport, Essex, Massachusetts. Abigail (daughter of Nathaniel Montgomery and Catherine Harris) was born on 3 Jul 1787 in Newburyport, Essex, Massachusetts; died in Jan 1836 in Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]