Memorial of the three hundredth anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth, 1620-1920; a record of the Pilgrim descendants who early in its history settled in Cape May County, and some of their children throughout the several states of the union at the present time (1921)
Copyright, 1921; ALBERT R. HAND, Publisher Cape May, N. J. May 7, 1921 Printed and Published by: ALBERT R. HAND, Cape May, N. J.
Extracted by: Laverne Tornow
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Colonel Gorham wrote out the history of his family, beginning with the ancestor who first came from England, and continuing the line down to the marriage of Hannah Gorham and Joseph Whilldin, and their removal to Cape May. The manuscript is entitled:
The Rise of the Family of Gorhams (Louisburg February 7, 1745-6) taken from Captain George Gorham,
My Great Great Grand Father and family came out of some part of England and lived at Marshfield and had one Son Nam'd after him John Gorum, alias Gorham - ^Which Son aftr Having Marryed With an Howland and had Severall Children Went home to England and Returnd Soone again to his family
His Father Lived & Died att Marshfield and whats Remarkable He was a Joiner and Made his Coffin himself for Severall Years before he Died and Used to Keep apples in It as a Chest Untill He died & used it.
The Son John that marrid Desire Howland and Went to England Moved from marshfield to Barnstable and Settled there In order to begin a Township afterward Called Barnstable. Built mills — tan fatts etc.
Children — Namly —Sons James — John — Joseph — Jabez and Shubell now Living.
Daughters - Elzebeth - maryd a Hallet att Sandwich. Temperance maryd Thomas Baxter an old England man. Lived at Yarmouth — — Desire Gorham — maryd Capt. Haws Yarmouth — having his Leg Cut off Died with it.
Lydia-Gorham Maryd Coll John Thacher, Hannah- - maryd a Wheelding boath movd to Cape-may.The last line in this extract from Colonel Gorham 's "Wast Book" is the connecting link between the Old Colony of Plymouth and Cape Mey.
Began in Louisburg August 28, 1745
The "Wast Book" was for many years among the papers of Eben Parsons of Byfield, Massachusetts, who married in May, 1767, Mary Gorham, and became the possession of his son, Gorham Parsons, upon whose death in 1844, the book was handed down through several generations of the family, until it came into the possession of Mr. John Gorham of Cleveland, Ohio. (See New England Historical and Genealogical Register for April, 1898).
The "Wast Book" contains one error- Captain John Gorham was the son of Ralph, not of John, as Colonel John states. This is proved by the record of Plymouth Colony.
The three facts upon which the Pilgrim ancestry of Cape May County rests are stated in this record.
(I.) Captain John Gorham married Desire Howland, daughter of John Howland of the Mayflower. From the records of Plymouth Colony and other sources we find that Desire Howland, daughter of the Pilgrim, was born at Plymouth in 1624, died at Barnstable, Plymouth Colony, 13 October 1683; married at Plymouth in 1643 to John Gorham. Desire came of a large family, the children of her parents, John and Elizabeth (Tilley) Howland, being ten in number. There are four John Gorhams named in the "Wast Book," which of course must be distinguished. (1) The Colonel John Gorham of the Louisburg expedition of 1745, the author of the "Wast Book." (2) His great-great-grandfather. Whose son was named for him. (3) The son, Captain John Gorham; but here we find a mistake. Captain John Gorham was as has been said the son of Ralph, not of John. (4) John Gorham, the son of Captain Gorham, brother of Hannah Whilldin, of Cape May.
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Colonel Gorham's mistake is not surprising. It is what we find everywhere when an attempt is made to record a family history from memory, or hearsay, which means relying upon the memory of some one else. The Rev. Dr. Daniel Lawrence Hughes makes a similar error when he says his great-grandfather was Jeremiah Eldredge instead of the actual ancestor, Aaron Eldredge, an error which has confused many, and will be referrel to later in this introduction. Through a similar error it was formerly supposed that John Howland married Elizabeth, daughter of Governor Carver. The venerable John Howland (descendant of John Howland the Pilgrim) president of the Rhode Island Historical Society, contributed to Thacher's History of Plymouth, published in 1835, an account of his family, beginning in the formal style of the time :
"Unaccountable as it may appear, it is unhappily true that very few of those men who first arrived from England, and commenced the settlement of the New England Colonies, left any memorials for the information of their descendants respecting the place of their birth or residence in the country they left, or any account of those branches of their respective families which they left behind." (Thacher's History of Plymouth, page 129.) The venerable head of the Rhode Island Historical Society then gives for the benefit of posterity the genealogy of his family, stating that his ancestor, the Pilgrim, married Elizabeth, daughter of Governor Carver. When Governor Bradford's manuscript was recovered in 1855, after its disappearance for eighty years and discovery in the Library of the Bishop of London, it was found that John Howland the Pilgrim married Elizabeth, daughter of John Tilley, and not Elizabeth, daughter of the first Pilgrim governor, and we have the interesting illustration of a president of a historical society who did not know his own ancestry. Furthermore, the supposed descendant of the first governor of Plymouth Colony placed a stone at the grave of the Pilgrim with the inscription:"
"Here ended the Pilgrimage of John Howland. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Governor Carver," and for a generation the stone stood, a monument to John Rowland the Pilgrim, and also a monument to the fact that tombstones do not always tell the truth. President Rowland died a year before Bradford's manuscript was recovered, believing himself to be a descendant of Governor John Carver.
Captain John Gorham was baptized at Benefield, Northamtonshire, England, 28 January, 1621, and died of a fever after taking part in King Philip's War, 5 February, 1675-6. A part of the "Wast Book," not included in the facsimile given, states that, "Captain John Gorham was a Captain of a Company of English and Indians and Went to the Fight of King Philip - or Swamp Narraganset fight and there Was Wounded by having his powder Rom Rit and Split against his Side and founded and Dyed att Swansey."
He married, as has been said, Desire Rowland, daughter of John of the Mayflower, in 1643, and had eleven children :
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