Summary of Our Heritage

Our Heritage Our Ancestors' Roles in the Founding of New England

The Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock in November, 1620. In the 1620's, small groups of explorers were already in other parts of Massachusetts, but the first real settlement of the area outside of Plymouth Rock was the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the beginnings of which were marked with the arrival of Winthrop's Fleet in 1630, ten years after the Pilgrims.

In the twenty years or so following, 1630-1650, approximately 20-25,000 Puritan immigrants (and a few exiled Scottish prisoners) migrated to the colonies. These 20-25,000 immigrants would form a closed society in the New England states of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, New Hampshire, and parts of what we now consider New York (primarily Long Island and Westchester County) and grow to a population of 1,000,000 by the time of the Revolution. This increase in population was almost entirely generated by propagation from the original settlers, with very little migration. These 1,000,000 New Englanders would form the springboard of a genetic pool that has now spread into all parts of America. More than half of all Americans presently have some degree of blood from these original 20-25,000 settlers, and within 200 years, that number will probably grow to 90% of all caucasian Americans.

I have identified approximately 80 immigrant ancestors of Arthur and Inez Evangeline (Hallock) Baldwin, but that number is not complete. It represents the ancestors of only six of their greatgrandparents.

For many of you, the identity of these ancestors only comprise from 1/2 to 1/16 of your ancestry, as great and great-great grandchildren of Arthur and Inez are being born every year.

I have not found any direct ancestral ties to nobility, but we are cousins to 12 presidents through 28 of our immigrant ancestors. This number is not likely to grow in the future, as it is about all of the presidents with New England ancestry (with maybe only one or two additional presidents with New England ancestry that we are not cousins to.)

As a result of your heritage from these ancestors alone, which comprise probably only 1/2 to 1/16 of your blood, you are probably related to half of all Americans you see on the street.

Certain benchmarks to take note of:

Stephen Tracy is the earliest of our ancestors I have found so far. He landed in Plymouth in 1623, three years after the Pilgrims. He is the ancestor of, making us cousins to, Winston Churchill and Ulysses S. Grant.

Phebe Richardson was the tenth child baptized in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, in 1632.

Winthrop's Fleet contained approximately 1,000 souls. Two hundred died in the first winter, and another two hundred went back to England the following spring. The European population of New England probably didn't exceed 500 before the fleet arrived. There probably weren't more than 2-3,000 Europeans in all of what would become the United States at that time. Within ten years, approximately 20-25,000 people, mostly Puritans from England, migrated to the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Included in Winthrop's Fleet were our ancestors:

Ezekiel Richardson and his wife, Susannah

John Warren and his wife Margaret

William and Goodith (Gilman) Learned

Our ancestors included three leading ministers of the day (Lathrop, Partridge and Youngs) and the founders of many of the early towns of Massachusetts.