Simon's son John was born and raised in Edgartown on Martha's Vineyard, MA, but in 1715, John, with his wife Alice, and their family of three, followed his father to Lebanon, CT where he was accepted into the First Congregational Church, settling about eight miles northwest of the young community.
He was one of 24 men who, in that same year, petitioned the church for permission to form their own Ecclesiastical Society to the north. Permission was given, and in 1720 he became First Deacon of that organization, a position he would hold for the next 40 years. Their church was first known as the Second Congregational Church of Lebanon, but in 1804, the community to the north was officially recognized as the town of Columbia. Today, the church is known as the Columbia Congregational Church.(pictured at the right).
Among the several pastors that Deacon John was instrumental in hiring was the church's third, Eleazar Wheelock. He became pastor in 1735 and was active in the religious movement of the day, known as the Great Awakening. He served as pastor of the Congregational Church for 35 years, and would then go on to become the founder and first President of Dartmouth College in Hanover, NH.
Deacon John's family grew to include eight children. Their third child was a boy named Eddy, born in 1713. He will be discussed at more length in my discussions about the Revolutionary War. Their sixth child, born at Labanon in 1720, was named John, after his father. This John is in my direct ancestral line.
The New England Planter's Migration
The really interesting part of Deacon John's story occurs late in his life - in about 1760. Several years earlier, the British governor of Nova Scotia at the time, Charles Lawrence, was dealing with the Acadian population in New France, portions of which were in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island. Lawrence was tasked by the British Crown to gain the allegiance of the Acadians to the King, with their further agreement to serve in the British military. The Acadians refused, and Lawrence had more than 11,000 of them forcibly removed from their lands in western Nova Scotia. Many of them later settled in Louisiana and are today known as Cajuns.
Governor Lawrence next made those lands available in 1,000 acre plats to those in New England who would take the loyalty oath to the king and serve in his military. Deacon John, his son John, and many others in his family took the deal.
Next: the Newcomb family on both sides in the Revolutionary War
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