I hardly need to remind you, in mentioning this, that the spelling of the keepers of the colonial records was something atrocious. William Healy, to whom I referred a moment ago, had his name spelled in at least five different ways. James Carey was chosen town clerk of Charlestown in 1662. A great fire occurred in Boston in 1760. Among those whose homes were destroyed were Captain Killeran and Michael Carroll. They lived in the district which we used to know as Fort Hill. In 1659 Governor Endicott united in marriage John Morrell and Lysbell Morrell, both Irish, say the records. James Cochran, an Irish boy, was captured by Indians in those early days. He was a brave youth and managed to kill a couple of savages and make his escape. _The Boston News-Letter_ of April 29, 1725, said of him: “James Cochran, ye youth that came into Brunswick with two scalps, came into town on Monday last and on Tuesday produced ye same scalps before ye Honorable Lieutenant-Governor and Council, for which he received a reward of two hundred pounds. And for ye farther encouragement of young men and others to perform bold and hardy actions in ye Indian war, His Honor ye Lieutenant Governor has been pleased to make him sargeant in ye forces.” Verily, a good type of the Fighting Race! Now to come down to the second half of the period of time which I am considering. One of the most picturesque and interesting figures in the history of Boston was John Hancock, whom, some claim, had Irish blood in his veins. He was a staunch patriot, statesman, leader in public affairs, governor of the Commonwealth, orator and the first signer of the Declaration of Independence (which, by the way, with only his signature as president of the Continental Congress and that of Charles Thomson, a native of Maghera, Ire., as secretary, was sent forth to the world, the other names being added to it later). As a bit of evidence which may help to indicate Hancock’s ancestry, it may be worth mentioning that he presented a bell and vane to the Irish Presbyterian Church in Boston. A copy of _The Tyrone, Ireland, Constitution_, issued some time in or prior to 1876, contained these statements: “Those who are conversant with _Reid’s History of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland_ are aware that multitudes of Protestants left Ulster for the plantations of North America. John Hancock’s ancestor was among that number.”