About 1582:“The exact date of his birth or baptism and the names of his parents are unknown.”
11731639:“It...appears that Thomas Gilbert with his large family and a servant [Joel Jenkins] was engaged in farming upon a grant of new land within the limits of the present town of Quincy from 1639 to 1644 or a little later.”
11761644:“The exact date of his departure is not known, but it was probably in 1644 that he went to Windsor, Conn.”
1177 Thomas Gilbert bought five acres from a Francis Stiles on 24 Jan 1644/5.
1178 “Clearly Gilbert leased more of the land than the five-acre lot which he purchased.”
1178 He probably sold the land around 24 Nov 1648. “...it is probable that it [the tenure] terminated on or soon after Nov. 24, 1648.”
11781648-1649:“In the month of March or April, 1649, Thomas Gilbert associated himself with Henry Stiles...a man of mature age, being past fifty, without wife or family, and boarded in Gilbert’s house. Mrs. Gilbert performed many services for him in making and repairing his clothing, tending him in sickness and the like. There is not the slightest trace of any discord or ill feeling of either party to this arrangement.”
1178 “It is more probable that Thomas Gilbert, after the sale of Francis Stile’s land in 1648, went to live in the house of Henry Stiles, than that Stiles went to live with Gilbert, because he was a landowner and Gilbert seems not to have been at this particular time”
11791651-1654:On Nov. 3, 1651, Henry Stiles was accidentally shot in the back and died... on a training day. Indictment of Thomas Allyn: ...didst suddenly, negligently, carelessly cock thy piece, and carry the piece just behind thy neighbor, which piece being charged and going off in thine hand, slew thy neighbor...the said Thomas Allyn, being Indited for the fact, the Jury finds the same to be homicide by misadventure.”
1180 “After the death of Henry Stiles, Thomas Gilbert was obliged to find another home and farm. About this time he bought from Josiah Hull part of his home lot...This place was upon the ancient road from Windsor to Springfield, on which his former homes had been, but a half mile or more south of his first location. Here he established himself for three years or a little more...”
1181“The dismal roll of witch hangings in Connecticut begins with that of Alse Young who was hanged May 26, 1647. Mary Johnson of Wethersfield went the same way in 1648, and on Mar. 6, 1651/2, John Carrington and his wife Joan were convicted. There is a record showing that both were executed. The fifth victim was Lydia, wife of Thomas Gilbert of Windsor.”
1182“But witchcraft was abroad, and its tools and emissaries more than two years afterwards fastened suspicion of the death [Henry Stiles] by clear accident, on Lydia Gilbert, it being charged that ‘thou hast of late years, or still dost give entertainment to Sathan... and by his helpe hast killed the body of Henry Styles, besides other witchcrafts’.”
1126“Who Lydia Gilbert’s accusers were is unknown. That the charge of procuring the death of Henry Stiles could be brought against her seems incredible, when everyone of mature age in Windsor must have known that Henry Stiles met his death by the carelessness of Thomas Allyn, three years before. But this charge was brought against her. She was charged with other witchcrafts as well. The evidence ...and the names of the witnesses against her are unknown. The Court considered the case in a special session beginning Nov. 28, 1654.”
1182 All the authorities upon the witchcraft cases state that she suffered death. She may have suffered the penalty either in the jail yard at Hartford or more probably on the lot at the corner of Albany Avenue and Vine Street in Hartford, where the public gallows is known to have stood a little later.”
1183 1654-1659:“After the death of his wife, Thomas Gilbert sold his place in Windsor to Thomas Bissell and retired to Lieut. John Hollister’s farm at Nayaug, then in the limits of Wethersfield, but now in Glastonbury, east of the Connecticut River, in the district of South Glastonbury. This farm had been leased by Jonathan, John and Josiah Gilbert as early as 1651. Here Thomas Gilbert remained until his death in 1659.”
1183 This farmhouse [see image
1184] is still standing (2009) and is the oldest surviving house in Glastonbury and one of the five oldest houses in Connecticut. The back ell of the house was built in 1649 and stood closer to the Connecticut River. The ell was moved away from the often flooding river and attached to a new home built around 1675. So the back ell part of the current 14 Tryon Street home was where John Holliter and Thomas Gilbert lived.
1185,1186Lieut. Hollister was excommunicated by Rev. Mr. Russell, the minister of Wethersfield without knowledge of the charges. “Feeling ran high in regard to the matter. A petition, dated Aug. 17, 1658, was presented to the Governor and Magistrates of the Colony for Hollister’s relief. Among the signers were Thomas Gilbert and John Harrison [husband of Katherine Harrison who was convicted of witchcraft ten years after Lydia Gilbert and who fled to Westchester in New York].”
1187For complete details, see
The Gilbert Family; Descendants of Thomas Gilbert, 1582(?) - 1659 by Homer Worthington Brainard, Harold Simeon Gilbert and Clarence Almon Torrey, 1953.
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