5795, 5859. Williams

Outline

1. John Williams (d. 1668) m. Anna ____ (d. aft. 1667); Scituate, Mass.
2. Mary Williams (d. bef. 1696) m. 1651 Anthony Dodson (d. bef. 1692); Scituate, Mass.

Sources

The basic source for the composition of this family is the will of John Williams, summarized by George Ernest Bowman, Plymouth Colony Wills and Inventories, Mayflower Descendant 17 (1915): 109-17, at 109. It has been claimed that Lucy, the wife of Robert Barker of Plymouth and Duxbury, was another child of this family, but Eugene Aubrey Stratton regards it as doubtful: Plymouth Colony: Its History and People, 1620–1691 (n. p.: Ancestry Incorporated, 1986), 240. Neither John’s own will nor that of his son John implicates any member of that family. For the will of the younger John, see Abstracts of Plymouth Colony Probate Records, Genealogical Advertiser 4 (1901): 25-7. The Williams family also receives incidental coverage in James Atkins Noyes, Barker Pedigree, New England Historical and Genealogical Register 53 (1899): 426-31, and Ian Watson, The Great Migration, 1636–1638, vol. 1 (Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2024), 375-81, on John Barker. A sketch of John Williams is expected in an upcoming volume in the latter series, to be compiled by Nathan W. Murphy.

Related surnames

2897, 2929. Dodson