Sarah King Hewett (1754 - 1837)

Wife of William Hewett (1749-1826)

From The Biography Of William Hewett (1749-1826) and His Descendants
A Genealogy Compiled by Evelyn Hewett, 407 pages
East Canton, OH, 1992

(Note: to keep the three generations of Sarahs straight, each will be given a number, Sarah (1) ? - 1767, Sarah (2) 1726/7 - 1819, and Sarah (3) 1754 - 1837, wife of William Hewett. Sarah's ancestors have been traced back to the 1600's but William Hewett's have not been found as yet.)

Sarah (1) and Benjamin Taylor had a daughter Sarah (2) on 17th January 1727/28 in Concord, Massachusetts. She was under 5 years of age when her parents moved the family to Townsend, Massachusetts (along with a second daughter, Lydia). Townsend was in the process of becoming an incorporated town and Benjamin became one of its proprietors. Two more children, Benjamin and Anne, were born there.

Sarah (2) grew to womanhood in Townsend and met a young man, Benjamin King, born @ 1722. (From Edward True's grandmother's personal papers: "The family of King resided in the Parish of Ugborough, Devonshire, England for centuries. They have a Coat of Arms.) They were married 3 September 1745. Their first child, Elizabeth, was born 2 April 1746. Two years later their second child, Samuel, was born but he died in May 1748. On the anniversary of his death their third baby, Benjamin, was born 12 May 1749.

The town of New Ipswich in New Hampshire was being created in 1749 which meant that Sarah (2) and Benjamin King now had the sane opportunity of which her parents had had in settling Townsend, Massachusetts. So the King family moved to lot 34 ND in New Ipswich about 1752 where a baby girl was born. But death came to this child in December as well as their firstborn, Elizabeth, who died 25 December 1752. Theirs was a bleak Christmas.

Fortunately, tine helps to heal wounds and in the spring of 1754 Sarah's (2) arms were again filled with a new baby. Little Sarah (3), who later married William Hewett, was born 7 April 1754. Through the years Sarah (2) and Benjamin were blessed with five more children: Elizabeth 4 September 1757; Silence 10 May 1759; Mary 18 December 1760; Samuel 1 March 1763; Ebenezer 22 Feb. 1768.

Benjamin and Sarah (1) Taylor had remained in Townsend, Massachusetts where Sarah (1) died sometime before 1767. Benjamin remarried soon after. As their son, Benjamin Jr. grew, it became apparent that something was wrong. In 1771 he was declared to be non compos mentis and given a guardian to protect his parents from him. Sarah's (2) father died intestate in February 1776 and the unhappy task of administration fell upon Sarah (2) because she was the eldest child, her only brother was incompetent, and her husband was away in the Continental Army (apparently her stepmother was deceased as there is no mention of her in the probate proceedings).

It was in 1777 when Sarah (2) knew her husband would never return from the war. (He had enlisted in Capt. Ezra Towne's Co. 13 May 1775; 5'6", blue eyes.) The historians state that he was either killed in battle or died as a prisoner of war. The date 2 November 1777 for Benjamin King's death is given on town records, but no details are known. (see "history of New Ipswich, NH" 1852, pp 77 and 504.) However, where and how he died remains unknown.

After a few years Sarah (2), now a widow, moved her family to Winthrop, Maine (then Massachusetts) settling near her sister, Lydia Chandler, and not too far from where her daughter Sarah (3) would eventually live with William Hewett. They made the trip to Maine on horseback. Sarah (2) remained in Winthrop and died 6 January 1819 at age 92. For many years she was the nurse and "doctress" of the neighborhood for miles around. In her lifetime she had many sorrows--losing 3 of her children as infants and 2 later in life. Son Benjamin Jr. died in July 1802 when a beam fell on him while raising a mill, and son Samuel died in June 1816 from an accidental injury received while unloading lumber. Also, her mother had died while her children were yet young, her father had died a little more than a year prior to her husband's death, and her only brother had been declared insane. In spite of all this, she spent many years in the service of others. (Documentation for this article was published in the June 1990 Thomas Tolman Family Magazine, Bountiful, Utah.)

Note: All the Sarahs and their husbands are great- great ?-?-? grandparents to everyone who descends from William and Sarah Hewett.