idehistory

                                        THE ANCESTRY OF
                       NEHEMIAH and EZRA IDE

     The early history fof the IDES before their arrival in America is still largely unknown. There is a reference, in Poole's description of Devon, England, to a certain NICHOLAS HIDE who was Cheif Justice of the King's Bench during the reign of KING HENRY VIII, early in the sixteenth century, and who owned land in Devon. We know that there still exists in England a small town by the name of IDE two miles southwest of Exter in the Shire of Devon in southwest England. It is on the road to Pennsylvvania Hill, has a post office, an area of 1435 acres amd a population of 658. The town itself dates further back than 1620, and we know that NICHOLAS IDE, who came to America as a boy of sixteen, was born there.
     The father, NICHOLAS, who died in Devonshire, England, about 1620, left a widow and a young son, NICHOLAS, presumably born the year his father died. The mother married again, taking for her husband THOMAS BLISS who had been married formrly to DOROTHY WHEATLIE. There were several children of this former marriage, on of which, MARTHA, later became the wife of NICHOLAS. THOMAS BLISS' will, dated JULY 8, 1649, names a son JONATHAn and a son NATHANIEL, as well as a daughter who married THOMAS WILLIAMS, and a daughter who married NATHANIEL HARMON. In the will he refers to his "son-in-law NICHOLAS IDE". Authorities disagree as to whether "the Widow IDE" and THOMAS BLISS were married in England or in New England. The HARMON genealogy puts the marriage in New England prior to 1647. Thus we do not know whether the widow came to this country with her son alone, or if she married again before she came. There may have been other children of the Widow IDE who came to America, or whose children came with her or later. This question arises when we find on the list of proprieters, in the first books of the records of Rehoboth, North Purchase, made in 1672, not only the name of NICHOLAS IDE but of JOANNA IDE of New Norwich. This name does not appear among the children of NICHOLAS, nor does it appear among any of his descendants. She was obviously an adult at the time since she received half a share in the original division.
     NICHOLAS IDE and his mother, and probably THOMAS BLISS, came to New England in 1636. They first went to the home of his Uncle in Braintree, near Boston, but in 1637 they went to Hartford, where they remained about two years, and from there to Weymouth. While they were at Weymouth they were members of the FIRST CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, of which SAMUEL NEWMAN was the pastor. Newman, a man of great learning and ability, was born in Banbury, England May 12, 1602; was graduated from Trinity College, Oxford, in 1620, and served as pastor of seven different churches in England before he came to America in1636. He spent a year and a half at Dorchester, and about 5 years at Weymouth before he moved with the majority of his congregation, about 30 families, to Rehoboth in 1643. He was an excellent minister and a writer of note, being the author of the first English Concordance of the Bible.
     The first purchase of land which was afterward included in the original town of Rehoboth was made of Massasoit in 1641. It was a tract ten miles square called by the Indians Seekonk, from "seeki", black, and "onk" goose, so named from the large number of wild geese seen on the river and cove near there in the mirgrating season. This purchase was made at the home of ROGER WILLIAMS, who acted as interpreter, for ten fathoms of wampum and a coat. The value of wampum was governed by the price of beaver skins in England, and the price paid for the land was in English money two pounds ten shillings, equal in our money to twelve dollars and seventeen cents. The purchase was made by JOHN BROWN and EDWARD WINSLOW, acting as agents for the colony. The land was a fine, level plain, very different from most of the New England country. In 1643 the Newman congregration of thirty families, including THOMAS BLISS, emigrated to their new homes. The pastor changed the name Seekonk to Rehoboth, because he said, "The Lord hath opened a way for us," probably having in mind Gen. 26:22, which reads, "And he called the name of it Rehoboth, and he said,'for now the Lord hath made room for us, and we shall be fruitful in the land',". The town was built in a semicircle with the opening toward the west, and the meeting house and parsonage were in the center. This circle was called "the Ring of the Town". Each house lot contained from six to twelve acres. The large space, called the "ox pasture", thus enclosed was used at first for pasturing the cattle and protecting them from wild animals and prowling Indians.
     Since at this period Rehoboth was not considered as belonging to either the Massachusetts or the Plymouth colony, but was an independent plantation, it was considered necessary to draw up a system of government. The pastor drew up a contract which was signed by the heads of the famulies, and this contract, although some of the words are not legible, is still in existence. This agreement, signed July 3, 1643, is as follows:

          "We, whose names are underwritten, being by the providence of God, inhabitants of Seekonk
           intending there to settle, do covenant and bind ourselves one to another to subject ourselves
           {torn off} to nine persons. Any five of the nine which shall be chosen by the major part of                               the inhabitants of this plantation, and we {torn off} by them, and to assist them, according
           to our ability and estate, and to give timely notice unto them of any such things as in our con-
           science may prove dangerous to the plantation, and this combination to continue until we shall                           subject ourselves to some other government."
                    WALTER PALMER                               EPHRIAM HUNT
                    EDWARD SMITH                                 PETER HUNT
                    EDWARD BENNETT                            WILLIAM SMITH
                    ROBERT TITUS                                   JOHN PEREN
                    ABRAHAM MARTIN                             ZACHARY RHODES
                    JOHN MATTHEWS                              JOB LANE
                    EDWARD SALE                                   ALEX WINCHESTER
                    RALPH SHEPHERD                              HENRY SMITH
                    SAMUEL NEWMAN                             STEPHEN PAYNE
                    WILLIAM CHEESEBOROUGH              RALPH ALIN
                    RICHARD WRIGHT                             THOMAS BLISS
                    ROBERT MARTIN {or MORRIS}         GEORGE KENDRICK
                    RICHARD BOWEN                              JOHN ALLIN
                    JOSEPH TORREY                                WILLIAM SABIN
                    JAMES CLARK                                    THOMAS COOPER

     In 1645 the town was assinged to the jurisdiction of the Plymouth court, and was incorporated under the name of Rehoboth.
     The first meeting of the settlers which was recorded was October 24, 1643, for the purpose of laying out and apportioning lots, and during the same year the proprieters were required to value their estates. Listed in the first evaluation we find the name of THOMAS BLISS, whose property was valued at 153 pounds. It was ordered at this meeting that "those having lots granted shall fence the ends of their lots and their part in the common fence by the twentieth of April next or else forfeit their lots to the disposal of the plantation". At a meeting held January 11, 1644, the land of certain men was declared forfeited for not fencing. Among them was the land of JOHN HOLBROOK, which was afterward alloted to NICHOLAS IDE, then twenty-four years old, and was the first land owned by him. The recording of land in the town book was sufficient assurance of ownership, in place of a deed, since the land was purchased by the proprieters jointly.
     At a general meeting of the town on March 6, 1645, it was agreed that "all the fences in the general field shall be fenced by the twenty-third of this present month, and whosoever shall be negligent, and not repair or set up his fence by the day above written, shall pay sixpence for every rod deficient, and the damage that shall come to any man by the same". Eight men were chosen at this meeting to judge the fences, among whom was THOMAS BLISS. He was also among those drawing lots for the new meadow on February 18, 1646, as was also NICHOLAS IDE. After the death of ROBERT MORRIS, one of the original owners of the town, NICHOLAS IDE bought of ADEMIA MORRIS, executor of the MORRIS estate, his house lot. The purchase was made June 13, 1647, and it is probably there that he began housekeeping. His first son, NATHANIEL, was born on November11 of that same year. NICHOLAS had married a daughter of THOMAS BLISS, his step-father, and his first wife, DOROTHY WHEATLIE, of Belstone, England. In November, 1654, occured the birth of their third son, NICHOLAS, JR. known in later years as LIEUTENANT NICHOLAS, because of his service in King Philip's War. Thus LIEUTENANT NICHOLAS became the second link in the chain of our American ancestors.
     At the meeting held June 26, 1658, lots were drawn "for the meadow that lies north of the town", and in the list is found the name of NICHOLAS IDE. He also drew meadow-land in the North Purchase on May 26, 1668. This was a tract of land eight miles sqyare lying north of Rehoboth and was purchased of Wamsitta, son and successor of Massasoit, in 1661, by CAPTAIN THOMAS WILLETTS, who was empowered to make the purchase by the court of Plymouth. This land was granted by the Plymouth government to the inhabitants of Rehoboth April 10, 1666, and included what is now Attleborough, Massachusetts and Cumberland, Rhode Island. The town voted, April 10, 1668, that the selectmen settle upon a payment to Philip, the brother and successor to Wamsitta. The price agreed upon was eight pounds twelve shillings. At the same meeting the town chose a committee "to view the meadows that are in the North Purchase and divide them". The committee was as follows: ANTHONY PERRY, PHILIP WALKER, THOMAS WILMOT, NICHOLAS IDE.
     The pastor of Rehoboth, SAMUEL NEWMAN, died July 5, 1663. For twenty years he had been pastor, leader and teacher and was much beloved by the people. His body lies in the old burying ground at Seekonk, where after 1860 a monument was erected to his memory. He was succeeded in 1668 by his son, NOAH NEWMA
     Rehoboth was in the center of King Philip's War which began in 1675. Swansea, where the first blood was shed, was within the bounds of the town, and the capture of Anawan, which practically ended the war, was also in Rehoboth. The trouble began when King Philip resolved to drive out the white invaders who by their increasing numbers and strength would soon overpower the Indians. While professing friendship for the English, he was secretly making preparations for war. He bought firearrms and ammunition with the money paid him for the quit-claim deed on the land sold by Massasoit and Wamsitta to the colonists. He made friends with former enemy tribes, thus forgetting lesser grievances in an effort to secure help aganist the invader. He even went as far as western New York to try to get the help of the Mohawks. When asked, during a con-
ference with him at Taunton in 1671, concerning the marked hostility, he claimed it was preparation for defense
aganist the Narragansetts. On being told that he was on unusually friendly terms with that tribe, and on being confronted with the evidence of an intended attack on Taunton, Seekonk, and other places, he finally confessed the truth of the charges, signed an agreement of submission to the English, delivered to them all the firearms that he and his men had with them, and agreed to send the rest. From this time the preparations for war were carried out with more secrecy, but by the spring of 1675 the signs of war were so evident that the people of the settlement gathered together in fortified houses.
     The first loss of life occured in late June of that same year, either June twenty-second or twenty-fourth, when several men were killed while attempting to move corn into a garrisoned house. An attack was made that same day on a group of men coming from a special meeting at the church, in which five or six men were killed. In the early summer troops were sent into the Narragansett country where King Philip was camped, but when attacked, he fled into the swamp where he could not be followed. They beseiged him there, but he made his escape across Seekonk plain and in doing so was discovered by the people of Rehoboth, who gave chase, led by Reverend NOAH NEWMAN. Philip himself escaped, but twelve of his followers were killed.
     Pierce's Fight, on of the most disastrous engagements of the war, occured within the boundary of Rehobothn on March 26, 1676. In thisfight CAPTAIN PIERCE with a party of settlers was ambushed and practically all were wiped out. Two days later the Indians burned the Ring of the Town destroying forty houses and thirty barns. Only two dwellings and the meeting house remained. King Philip was killed August the twelth, and on the twenty-eighth of that same month Anawan, his greatest general, was captured in the south eastern part of Rehoboth, at a rock known as Anawan's Rock. He was later executed. His capture practically ended the war.
     Among the men of Rehoboth listed as taking part in the war was NICHOLAS IDE, JR., who served under MAJOR BRADFORD, and JOHN IDE, his brother, who served in the Narragansett expedition. LIEUTENANT NICHOLAS married MARY ORMSBY after the war was over, December 27, 1677, and their second son, JACOB, the third link in the chain, was born Julu 4, 1681. NICHOLAS JR., according to the record of deeds of Rehoboth, owned land to the amount of 195 acres. He, along with NICHOLAS SR., and TIMOTHY IDE, was on the list of proprieters and inhabitants of Rehoboth in 1689. His name also appears in volume 1, page 5 of the proprietary records, in a list of nine men appointed April24, 1691, to settle a dispute on the boundary line north of the meadow.
     JACOB, the second of the seven children of NICHOLAS JR., married SARAH PERRY on January1, 1708. His land, forth-three acres and 106 rods, is recorded in the records of Rehoboth, North Purchase, now Attleborough. He divided his homestead between his two sons, NATHANIEL and JACOB, several years before his death. Of these two sons, NATHANIEL, born September 13, 1712, became the fourth ancestor of NEHEMIAH IDE. NATHANIEL owned a great deak od land in spite of his seventeen children, for he received a land legacy from his grandfather, LIEUTENANT NICHOLAS, also half of his father's homestead, and in addition he bought other parcels. He was married twice, first to DEBORAH BARROWS, by whom he had eleven children, and second to LYDIA WELLINGTON, who had six more. In his will he bequeathed five pounds of money to his son EZRA after his widow should die and to NEHEMIAH he gave half his clothes and sixty pounds of money after his widow's death. The younger son, NATHANIEL, who remained at home, had the home place and what was left after paying off the legacies to the other children
     NEHEMIAH IDE, born in Attleborough November 23, 2746, was the seventh od the eleven children born to DEBORAH BARROWS and NATHANIEL IDE. EZRA, the older brother, was born July 4, 1743. These two, not being tied to the land in Attleborough, were free to move away. We next find NEHEMIAH in Stockbridge, in western Massachusetts, where he bought of ASA BENNETT, in 1773, twenty-five acres of land for which he paid eighty-five pounds, equal to $413.65. He served in the Revolutionary War in CAPTIAN THOMAS WILLIAM'S company of Minute Men, COLONEL JOHN PATTERSON'S regiment, which marched April 22, 1775, as soon as the news of the battle of Lexington reached them. He served thirteen days, then re-enlisted May 5, under the same officers and served three months and fourteen days. The reigment matrched from Stockbridge to Cambridge and he served around Boston, was in the Battle of Bunker Hill, was a sergeant in CAPTAIN DAVID TRIXLEY'S company, COLONEL JOHN BROWN'S regiment. According to the record, he was given an order for a bounty coat, also a sergeant cap or it's equilvalent in money. This order was dated Fort Number Three, Charlestown, October 27, 1775. He was one of the men who after the battle of Trenton were left to keep the camp-fires burning that the British might not learn ofmthe escape of the American army. The story is told that when a friend of his, an officer, lay dying during a battle, he asked as a last request that NICHOLAS marry the girl to whom he himself was engaged, MARY BENNETT. After the war he returned to Stockbridge, marrying her, and all their children were born there.
     We do not know whom EZRA married, but we know that he had 5 children: EZRA, STEPHEN, JAMES, NATHAN, and LUCY. EZRA, STEPHEN and LUCY came to Pennsylvania with NEHEMIAH in 1800. EZRA"S descendants, as far as possible, have been included in this book, as well as the descendants of LUCY, who married OTIS ALLEN, and is the ancestor of many of the ALLENS of Pennsylvania.   STEPHEN was married twice and had six children: TIMOTHY, EZRA, JOHN, BENJAMIN, MARIE and PHOEBE by his first wife, BETSY LOUDENBURG : and GEORGE, CHARLES, BETSY, HARRIET, MATILDA and SIBYL by his second wife, whose name we do not know. He bulit, in 1807, a frame house which was among the first in what is now Lehman Township..
     There is a tradition that NEHEMIAH at one time made a purchase of land in what is now Lake Township, including Lee Pond. This land was supposed to have been purchased of the Connecticut-Susquehanna Company who held the land under the state of Connecticut, and when the rival claims between Connecticut and Pennsylvania were finally settled in favor of Pennsylvania, he lost his land, which was nearly paid for. We have not been able to learn the date of this purchase, but as the rival claims were settled in 1782, it must have been sometime before that date.
     The second attempt to settle in Pennsylvania was more successful. NEHEMIAH, with his eldest son, ELIJAH, came to LEHMAN TOWNSHIP in the spring of 1799 and remained until autumn building a log cabin and returning before winter to Stockbridge.   The next spring he brought his family to the new home, making the trip with oxen. Besides his wife and children, he brought the three previously-mentioned children of his brother EZRA, as well as his nephew NATHAN IDE, a minor of fourteen years, over whom he had been appointed guardian May 1, 1792. He was under three hundred pounds with EBENEZER TOLMAN as surety. Before he left Stockbridge he began selling his proprety there. In February, 1800, he sold to AGRIPPA HILL, for $34.37, thirty-four acres of land, also one acre, five rods for $10.64.
The following February he sold to JUSTICE DICKERSON, for $1,333.33, twenty-five acres, all in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. In September 16, 1800, he bought of LEMUEL WALKER, of Hanover Township, Luzerne County, 160 acres of land situated in Bedford Township, now Lehman, for which he paid $187.00. This became the original IDE settlement in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania
     At he time NEHEMIAH IDE made this move he was fifty-fouur years of age. He attended the First Presbyterian Church of Kingston, later called the Church of Wilkes-Barre and Kingston, traveling the nine miles on horseback. He was made deacon of the church in 1803. In 1810, during the pastorate of REVEREND ARD HOYT, his name appeared on a subscription list for twelve dollars for support of the pastor, and is the largest amount on the list. In 1814, he was one of the signers of a petition setting off the township of Dallas from Kingston Township. The petition was confirmed in 1817and the new township named in honor of ALEXANDER JAMES DALLAS of Trenton, New Jersey.
     NEHEMIAH died at the age of seventy-seven, and his wife, MARY, lived untilafter her ninety-seventh year. Their remains lie in the old buryin -ground at Idetown. He was the first to be buried there. Their six children grew to man-
hood, married, and settled in Lehman Township. NEHEMIAH's farm was divided between WILLIAM, NATHANIEL AND ELIJAH, WILLIAM remaining on the old homestead. JOHN and NEHEMIAH, JR., had adjoining farms on the Meeker-Lehman Road.wheretheir descendants still live. The farm of OLIVER IDE, the youngest son, near Lehman Center, is the only one which has passed out of the family.
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This book was copied with the permission of DAVID OLIVER IDE, the grandson of SILAS CALLENDER IDE, who wrote in in June, 1940. I have copied this as carefully as I could, just as Silas wrote it. Karen Ellen Wood 26 February 2001.