The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne — John Shaqi
The Life and Genius of Nathaniel HawthorneStearns, Frank Preston
General
The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne
Stearns, Frank Preston
Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 1804-1864; Novelists, American -- 19th century -- Biography
From this it appears that Major William Hathorne not only had a brother
John, who established himself in Lynn, but a sister Elizabeth, who
married Richard Davenport, of Salem. Concerning Robert Hathorne we
only know further that he died in 1689; but in the probate records
of Berkshire, England, there is a will proved May 2, 1651, of William
Hathorne, of Binfield, who left all his lands, buildings and tenements
in that county to his son Robert, on condition that Robert should pay
to his father’s eldest son, William, one hundred pounds, and to his son
John twenty pounds sterling. He also left to another son, Edmund, thirty
acres of land in Bray, and there are other legacies; but it cannot be
doubted that the hundred pounds mentioned in this will is the same that
Major William Hathorne drew for five months later, and that we have
identified here the last English ancestor of Nathaniel Hawthorne. His
wife’s given name was Sarah, but her maiden name still remains unknown.
The family resided chiefly at Binfield, on the borders of Windsor Park,
and evidently were in comfortable circumstances at that time. From
William Hathorne, senior, their genealogy has been traced back to John
Hathorne (spelled at that time Hothorne), who died in 1520, but little
is known of their affairs, or how they sustained themselves during
the strenuous vicissitudes of the Reformation. [Footnote: “Hawthorne
Centenary at Salem,” 81.]
Emmerton and Waters [Footnote: “English Records about New England
Families.”] state that William Hathorne came to Massachusetts Bay in
1630, and this is probable enough, though by no means certain, for
they give no authority for it. We first hear of him definitely as a
freeholder in the settlement of Dorchester in 1634, but his name is not
on the list of the first twenty-four Dorchester citizens, dated October
19, 1630. All accounts agree that he moved to Salem in 1636, or the year
following, and Nathaniel Hawthorne believed that he came to America at
that time. Upham, the historian of Salem witchcraft, who has made the
most thorough researches in the archives of old Salem families, says of
William Hathorne:
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