The Genealogy of Ellen G. White

Great-Great-Great-Grandparents

John Gould

born Hingham, Massachusetts Bay Colony, on or about 28 July 1646 GEGW 17.3

died 14 December 1711, Taunton, Massachusetts GEGW 17.4

married 21/24 August 1673, Taunton, Massachusetts Bay Colony GEGW 17.5

Mary Crossman

born Taunton, Plymouth Colony, 16 July 1655 GEGW 17.6

died between 11 April 1692 and 5 March 1711/12, [Taunton?] Massachusetts GEGW 17.7

Children, all born probably in Taunton:

Marcy/Mary Gould, born 19 June 1674 in Taunton; drowned 2 Aug. 1678.

John Gould; died 1731; married Lydia—.

Hannah Gould, born 9 Nov. 1677 in Taunton; living, unmarried, in Bridgewater, Mass., 1715.

Joseph Gould, born about 1685; married Bethia(h) Furbush.

Nathaniel Gould, born 1682; married Mary Makepeace.

Mary Gould; married Ebenezer Bishop.

Jabez Gould, born before 1690; married (1) Hannah—; (2) Mary—.

Benjamin Gould, born 1692 or later; died 1781; married in Kittery, 9 Feb. 1716, Rebecca Furbush. Like his brother Joseph, Benjamin went to Kittery, Maine, but evidently later.

Elizabeth Gould; perhaps living, unmarried, in Kittery in 1717.

The section on the Goold family in Old Kittery by Stackpole (page 461) shows John, son of Jarvice and Mary, was born 28 July 1646, went to Taunton, and married 21 August 1673, Mary, daughter of Robert Crossman. During King Philip’s War of 1675, he was a trooper, was a soldier again 1682, and died a widower in Taunton 14 December 1711. GEGW 17.8

The birth of John, son of Jarvis and Mary Gould, is calculated from his age of “about 33 days” when baptized in the First Church of Boston on the 30th day of the 6th month [August] 1646 (Enclosure 1-26). GEGW 17.9

That the John born to Jarvis and Mary Gould was the one who went to Taunton is established through land records. In the first land deed, dated 23 January 1656/57, the “joint administrators and executors in trust of the estate in lands and goods of Jarvis Gould late of Boston aforesaid cordwainer deceased…for the proper use and benefit of John Gould son & heir of the said Jarvis Gould deceased…[sold] all that piece or parcel of land, lying and being within the town of Boston aforesaid and lying next to the highway that leadeth from the waterside towards the new meetinghouse being in breadth sixteen foot.” Twenty years later, on 6 April 1677, Robert Crosman of Taunton, yeoman and “attorney to John Gold of Taunton aforesaid, cordwainer, and Mary Gould, wife of the said John Gould,” sold to Edward Goodin of Boston “all that piece or parcel of land situate, lying and being in Boston aforesaid near unto the Second Meeting house…measuring in breadth sixteen foot and in length from the said street to the said Green’s land sixty-four foot.” On 31 August of that year, John “Gold” quitclaimed to “the within mentioned Edward Goodin…all such title, interest and demand whatsoever as I the said John Gold had or ought to have had of, in and to the land within mentioned” (Enclosure 1-26a ²⁶). GEGW 17.10

Taunton vital records (first published in The New England Historical and Genealogical Register) include the 1673 marriage of John Gould to Mary Crossman/Crosman, her birth in 1655, and the births of two of their children—Marcy (or Mary) in 1674, and “Hana” in 1677. The Taunton town clerk at the time of the births of the Gould children was inconsistent in his recording of vital events, with many births that must have taken place not entered. ²⁷ The birth of son Joseph and other children of this couple, however, may have indeed been recorded, but these records could have been destroyed by fire with other town records in 1838 (Enclosures 1-27, 1-28, and 1-29). The paternity of Mary (Crossman) Gould is also established in the 1696 division of the estate of her father, Robert Crossman (Enclosure 1-30 ²⁸). GEGW 18.1

John Gold of Taunton left a will dated 11 April 1692, naming as executors his wife, Mary, and Robert Crossman, Jr. When John’s estate was brought before the Bristol County Probate Court, however, Mary had died and Crossman renounced, so administration was granted 5 March 1711 to eldest son, John Gold, who that same day presented an inventory of his late father’s taken 29 February 1711/12. On 26 June 1713, minor children Benjamin and Elizabeth chose their older brother Jabez Gold of Taunton to be their guardian. John Gold [Jr.] presented an account of the estate on 7 July of that same year, which included expenses for “Hannah Gold for her Tending her Parents in the time of their sickness,” and funeral expenses for his mother, Mary Gold, and for his father, John Gold, suggesting Mary had probably died not long before John. The final settlement of the estate was a division of the real property made by Samuel Williams, John White, and John Mason among John Gold’s children: John (eldest son), Joseph, Nathaniel, “Jabesh” [Jabez], Benjamin, and Hannah Gold, Ebenezer Bishop in right of his wife, Mary, and Elizabeth Gold (Enclosures 1-30, 1-33, and 1-34 ²⁹). GEGW 18.2