Click here for All Fenno Gravestones in Norfolk Cty., Mass., eldest birth dates first
==========================================================
Daughter of John and Rebecca Fenno of Milton. Second wife of Dependence French of Braintree. Mother of all but one of his many children.
They married April 27, 1688, at nearby Milton, when he was about 40, she, only 26. Though he was the longest-lived among his own many siblings, she would survive him by a decade, due mainly to being that much younger.
==========================================================
FENNO BEGINNINGS--
LAND-OWNING MATRIARCH. Rebecca's first American ancestor, her grandmother, apparently arrived with young son, John. Her grandmother came to the colonies on the ship Truelove in 1635, listed among the passengers as "Rabecca Ffenner, age 25". Was she a widow? No husband is listed, and she had only the one child along, John.
As the Fenno family's matriarch, the first Rebecca began colonial life in Dorchester. Located below old Boston, but now part of modern Boston's south side, Dorchester was then a place where Puritans often waited for land, attending a mother church there, where future ministers might train, before starting churches elsewhere.
She was granted considerable land in Milton. Perhaps she purchased outright enough shares in the land company to merit a large grant? The other method would have been bringing a large count of servants or business employees into Milton, with "however many acres" then given per head ("headright" method). Either method required that she be a woman of means.
The heir to the matriarch Rebecca was John Fenno, this Rebecca's father. A few details are unusual:
(1) The will of John Fenno referred to land back in Lancashire. That would be northwestern England, a region extending from the shipping center at Liverpool, on the west coast, up to the Scottish border. The province to the east would be Yorkshire, a place referred to as within the Dane Law region, pre-William the Conqueror.
The Fennos thus may have come from Lancashire, maybe near the Yorkshire boundary. In contrast, most Puritans are difficult to track accurately back to their home places overseas, not having either English land mentioned in records here, nor a whole town or church "packing up" and following a specific minister here.
(2) The spelling of the surname back in the old country, may have been different. Old spellings would be needed to find the old land records.
Some think their name may have been "Fennow", misread as "Fenner". The cause for that guess might be the Milton militia listing John Fennow while they were warring against the native tribes, circa 1676, when this Rebecca was about fourteen. Fenn is another possibility. There had been a Benjamin Fenn who came in to Dorchester earlier, in 1630, but he would leave for the Connecticut colony within 2 years of these Fennos arriving. He was not followed there by them, as we'd expect if they were closely related.
Surviving gravestones found thus far do all spell her family's name as Fenno, not Fenner, not Fennow. (Nor is Ferno seen, based on a deciphering or mis-deciphering of Rev. Samuel Niles' handwritten journal. His journal was kept during his 50 years of service at the second of two town-authorized churches for old Braintree. Once congregations were declared, much later, it became First Congregational of Braintree. It's located across the road from today's Elm Street Cemetery, with the old Second Burying Ground at its front, closed to further burials after overcrowding, but few markers left.)
MEETING DEPENDENCE.
Her father made up for being an only child by having a large family of his own. Their names and families here in America are described, for example, at RalphInLA.rootsweb.ancestry.com/FENNOr5.htm.
Rebecca, as the eldest, may have served as a second mother to her siblings. Dependence French would have been a young widower when she married him. Rebecca's status as "eldest child" may have qualified her to be nursemaid to Dependence's daughter, Mary, so perhaps they met that way. Arguing against that would be the first wife's parents, the Marshes, taking charge of the little girl (a tiny baby?) after her mother died. Perhaps happy with their care, the little girl would not want to return to her own father's home, one she barely knew. The will of her grandfather, Alexander Marsh, treated Mary as if she were a daughter, cited her as living in his house. Her being apart was a sadness for Dependence, we must assume.
Also worth noting, certain Fenno in-laws intermarried with other early in-laws and neighbors of the Braintree Frenches. These included the Badcock family (changed to Babcock at some point), plus Belcher, Billings, Newcomb, and White families. Did some in-laws act as matchmakers? "Cupid has short wings", some sociologists tell us. You can't meet somebody if you are not near them. The closeness of old Milton (larger than it is now??) to the outer edges of Braintree mattered as much for courting, as did the in-law connections. Some of the Frenches' lands overlapped into Milton, as some paid property taxes in both places, with the Milton taxes relatively minor.
CHILDREN.
The first wife had been a Marsh. She gave Dependence French one daughter, who would later marry a Savil. For her own children, Rebecca must have been sentimental, treasuring her relationships. She started the passing of a dish down the generations, daughter-to-daughter, each generation marking their initials on the back.
Rebecca's own children with Dependence included two who married Vintons of the iron-working family. Daughter Elizabeth French married Samuel Vinton, who was a sufficiently harsh taskmaster, according to a family genealogist, the Rev. John Adams Vinton, that a son ran away to England. Son John's marriage to Mary Vinton produced happier results for other grandsons. The four grandsons included twins named John and Dependence, followed by this writer's spouse's assumed ancestor, Abiathar French the senior, in turn followed by Joshua. A granddaughter, Mary the junior, married a distant cousin named Josiah French.
Rebecca's twin grandsons would move to Stoughton Corner, with land in places later known as Avon and North Bridgewater, which put them closer to their grandmother Rebecca's family in Milton (the Fennos). Did Dependence possibly give them some of his land that spilled over into old Milton (uncertain, needs to be checked)? Grandson Abiathar, last on record locally around 1770, would need to move a long distance to find good land, given that his older brothers, the twins, and their friends had snapped up whatever was left close-by. Grandson Joshua was the baby, so stayed in Braintree. After Dependence finally retired, Joshua presumably took over Dependence's land, whatever had not already been divided out to the rest.
There were other daughters? Harder to track (married names?)
PLACE.
Milton was in the county of Suffolk for Rebecca's birth and marriage records, remained so until after her death. At some point, however, Braintree and neighbors petitioned to be in their own county. That caused the creation of a new Norfolk County in 1793. (It replaced the old British province called Norfolk County, which had been up by the Maine border. It mostly became Essex County, with the remainder given to NH and Maine after the American Revolution.)
The new county of Norfolk contained both Milton and Braintree, as well as, for example, Canton, Stoughton, Dedham, and Avon to the west, and Weymouth to the east. (Dorchester and Roxbury, to the north, were in the new county at first, but returned later on to Suffolk County, due to Boston annexing them. Hingham, even further east than Weymouth, also was put in to the new county, but then wanted out, petitioning to stay with Suffolk, but instead was put into Plymouth County.
============================================================
Copyright by JBrown, Austin, TX, 2015, last revised Jan. 1, 2016, revised April, 2017. Permission granted to FindAGrave for use at this page.
==========================================================
Daughter of John and Rebecca Fenno of Milton. Second wife of Dependence French of Braintree. Mother of all but one of his many children.
They married April 27, 1688, at nearby Milton, when he was about 40, she, only 26. Though he was the longest-lived among his own many siblings, she would survive him by a decade, due mainly to being that much younger.
==========================================================
FENNO BEGINNINGS--
LAND-OWNING MATRIARCH. Rebecca's first American ancestor, her grandmother, apparently arrived with young son, John. Her grandmother came to the colonies on the ship Truelove in 1635, listed among the passengers as "Rabecca Ffenner, age 25". Was she a widow? No husband is listed, and she had only the one child along, John.
As the Fenno family's matriarch, the first Rebecca began colonial life in Dorchester. Located below old Boston, but now part of modern Boston's south side, Dorchester was then a place where Puritans often waited for land, attending a mother church there, where future ministers might train, before starting churches elsewhere.
She was granted considerable land in Milton. Perhaps she purchased outright enough shares in the land company to merit a large grant? The other method would have been bringing a large count of servants or business employees into Milton, with "however many acres" then given per head ("headright" method). Either method required that she be a woman of means.
The heir to the matriarch Rebecca was John Fenno, this Rebecca's father. A few details are unusual:
(1) The will of John Fenno referred to land back in Lancashire. That would be northwestern England, a region extending from the shipping center at Liverpool, on the west coast, up to the Scottish border. The province to the east would be Yorkshire, a place referred to as within the Dane Law region, pre-William the Conqueror.
The Fennos thus may have come from Lancashire, maybe near the Yorkshire boundary. In contrast, most Puritans are difficult to track accurately back to their home places overseas, not having either English land mentioned in records here, nor a whole town or church "packing up" and following a specific minister here.
(2) The spelling of the surname back in the old country, may have been different. Old spellings would be needed to find the old land records.
Some think their name may have been "Fennow", misread as "Fenner". The cause for that guess might be the Milton militia listing John Fennow while they were warring against the native tribes, circa 1676, when this Rebecca was about fourteen. Fenn is another possibility. There had been a Benjamin Fenn who came in to Dorchester earlier, in 1630, but he would leave for the Connecticut colony within 2 years of these Fennos arriving. He was not followed there by them, as we'd expect if they were closely related.
Surviving gravestones found thus far do all spell her family's name as Fenno, not Fenner, not Fennow. (Nor is Ferno seen, based on a deciphering or mis-deciphering of Rev. Samuel Niles' handwritten journal. His journal was kept during his 50 years of service at the second of two town-authorized churches for old Braintree. Once congregations were declared, much later, it became First Congregational of Braintree. It's located across the road from today's Elm Street Cemetery, with the old Second Burying Ground at its front, closed to further burials after overcrowding, but few markers left.)
MEETING DEPENDENCE.
Her father made up for being an only child by having a large family of his own. Their names and families here in America are described, for example, at RalphInLA.rootsweb.ancestry.com/FENNOr5.htm.
Rebecca, as the eldest, may have served as a second mother to her siblings. Dependence French would have been a young widower when she married him. Rebecca's status as "eldest child" may have qualified her to be nursemaid to Dependence's daughter, Mary, so perhaps they met that way. Arguing against that would be the first wife's parents, the Marshes, taking charge of the little girl (a tiny baby?) after her mother died. Perhaps happy with their care, the little girl would not want to return to her own father's home, one she barely knew. The will of her grandfather, Alexander Marsh, treated Mary as if she were a daughter, cited her as living in his house. Her being apart was a sadness for Dependence, we must assume.
Also worth noting, certain Fenno in-laws intermarried with other early in-laws and neighbors of the Braintree Frenches. These included the Badcock family (changed to Babcock at some point), plus Belcher, Billings, Newcomb, and White families. Did some in-laws act as matchmakers? "Cupid has short wings", some sociologists tell us. You can't meet somebody if you are not near them. The closeness of old Milton (larger than it is now??) to the outer edges of Braintree mattered as much for courting, as did the in-law connections. Some of the Frenches' lands overlapped into Milton, as some paid property taxes in both places, with the Milton taxes relatively minor.
CHILDREN.
The first wife had been a Marsh. She gave Dependence French one daughter, who would later marry a Savil. For her own children, Rebecca must have been sentimental, treasuring her relationships. She started the passing of a dish down the generations, daughter-to-daughter, each generation marking their initials on the back.
Rebecca's own children with Dependence included two who married Vintons of the iron-working family. Daughter Elizabeth French married Samuel Vinton, who was a sufficiently harsh taskmaster, according to a family genealogist, the Rev. John Adams Vinton, that a son ran away to England. Son John's marriage to Mary Vinton produced happier results for other grandsons. The four grandsons included twins named John and Dependence, followed by this writer's spouse's assumed ancestor, Abiathar French the senior, in turn followed by Joshua. A granddaughter, Mary the junior, married a distant cousin named Josiah French.
Rebecca's twin grandsons would move to Stoughton Corner, with land in places later known as Avon and North Bridgewater, which put them closer to their grandmother Rebecca's family in Milton (the Fennos). Did Dependence possibly give them some of his land that spilled over into old Milton (uncertain, needs to be checked)? Grandson Abiathar, last on record locally around 1770, would need to move a long distance to find good land, given that his older brothers, the twins, and their friends had snapped up whatever was left close-by. Grandson Joshua was the baby, so stayed in Braintree. After Dependence finally retired, Joshua presumably took over Dependence's land, whatever had not already been divided out to the rest.
There were other daughters? Harder to track (married names?)
PLACE.
Milton was in the county of Suffolk for Rebecca's birth and marriage records, remained so until after her death. At some point, however, Braintree and neighbors petitioned to be in their own county. That caused the creation of a new Norfolk County in 1793. (It replaced the old British province called Norfolk County, which had been up by the Maine border. It mostly became Essex County, with the remainder given to NH and Maine after the American Revolution.)
The new county of Norfolk contained both Milton and Braintree, as well as, for example, Canton, Stoughton, Dedham, and Avon to the west, and Weymouth to the east. (Dorchester and Roxbury, to the north, were in the new county at first, but returned later on to Suffolk County, due to Boston annexing them. Hingham, even further east than Weymouth, also was put in to the new county, but then wanted out, petitioning to stay with Suffolk, but instead was put into Plymouth County.
============================================================
Copyright by JBrown, Austin, TX, 2015, last revised Jan. 1, 2016, revised April, 2017. Permission granted to FindAGrave for use at this page.
Click here for All Fenno Gravestones in Norfolk Cty., Mass., eldest birth dates first
==========================================================
Daughter of John and Rebecca Fenno of Milton. Second wife of Dependence French of Braintree. Mother of all but one of his many children.
They married April 27, 1688, at nearby Milton, when he was about 40, she, only 26. Though he was the longest-lived among his own many siblings, she would survive him by a decade, due mainly to being that much younger.
==========================================================
FENNO BEGINNINGS--
LAND-OWNING MATRIARCH. Rebecca's first American ancestor, her grandmother, apparently arrived with young son, John. Her grandmother came to the colonies on the ship Truelove in 1635, listed among the passengers as "Rabecca Ffenner, age 25". Was she a widow? No husband is listed, and she had only the one child along, John.
As the Fenno family's matriarch, the first Rebecca began colonial life in Dorchester. Located below old Boston, but now part of modern Boston's south side, Dorchester was then a place where Puritans often waited for land, attending a mother church there, where future ministers might train, before starting churches elsewhere.
She was granted considerable land in Milton. Perhaps she purchased outright enough shares in the land company to merit a large grant? The other method would have been bringing a large count of servants or business employees into Milton, with "however many acres" then given per head ("headright" method). Either method required that she be a woman of means.
The heir to the matriarch Rebecca was John Fenno, this Rebecca's father. A few details are unusual:
(1) The will of John Fenno referred to land back in Lancashire. That would be northwestern England, a region extending from the shipping center at Liverpool, on the west coast, up to the Scottish border. The province to the east would be Yorkshire, a place referred to as within the Dane Law region, pre-William the Conqueror.
The Fennos thus may have come from Lancashire, maybe near the Yorkshire boundary. In contrast, most Puritans are difficult to track accurately back to their home places overseas, not having either English land mentioned in records here, nor a whole town or church "packing up" and following a specific minister here.
(2) The spelling of the surname back in the old country, may have been different. Old spellings would be needed to find the old land records.
Some think their name may have been "Fennow", misread as "Fenner". The cause for that guess might be the Milton militia listing John Fennow while they were warring against the native tribes, circa 1676, when this Rebecca was about fourteen. Fenn is another possibility. There had been a Benjamin Fenn who came in to Dorchester earlier, in 1630, but he would leave for the Connecticut colony within 2 years of these Fennos arriving. He was not followed there by them, as we'd expect if they were closely related.
Surviving gravestones found thus far do all spell her family's name as Fenno, not Fenner, not Fennow. (Nor is Ferno seen, based on a deciphering or mis-deciphering of Rev. Samuel Niles' handwritten journal. His journal was kept during his 50 years of service at the second of two town-authorized churches for old Braintree. Once congregations were declared, much later, it became First Congregational of Braintree. It's located across the road from today's Elm Street Cemetery, with the old Second Burying Ground at its front, closed to further burials after overcrowding, but few markers left.)
MEETING DEPENDENCE.
Her father made up for being an only child by having a large family of his own. Their names and families here in America are described, for example, at RalphInLA.rootsweb.ancestry.com/FENNOr5.htm.
Rebecca, as the eldest, may have served as a second mother to her siblings. Dependence French would have been a young widower when she married him. Rebecca's status as "eldest child" may have qualified her to be nursemaid to Dependence's daughter, Mary, so perhaps they met that way. Arguing against that would be the first wife's parents, the Marshes, taking charge of the little girl (a tiny baby?) after her mother died. Perhaps happy with their care, the little girl would not want to return to her own father's home, one she barely knew. The will of her grandfather, Alexander Marsh, treated Mary as if she were a daughter, cited her as living in his house. Her being apart was a sadness for Dependence, we must assume.
Also worth noting, certain Fenno in-laws intermarried with other early in-laws and neighbors of the Braintree Frenches. These included the Badcock family (changed to Babcock at some point), plus Belcher, Billings, Newcomb, and White families. Did some in-laws act as matchmakers? "Cupid has short wings", some sociologists tell us. You can't meet somebody if you are not near them. The closeness of old Milton (larger than it is now??) to the outer edges of Braintree mattered as much for courting, as did the in-law connections. Some of the Frenches' lands overlapped into Milton, as some paid property taxes in both places, with the Milton taxes relatively minor.
CHILDREN.
The first wife had been a Marsh. She gave Dependence French one daughter, who would later marry a Savil. For her own children, Rebecca must have been sentimental, treasuring her relationships. She started the passing of a dish down the generations, daughter-to-daughter, each generation marking their initials on the back.
Rebecca's own children with Dependence included two who married Vintons of the iron-working family. Daughter Elizabeth French married Samuel Vinton, who was a sufficiently harsh taskmaster, according to a family genealogist, the Rev. John Adams Vinton, that a son ran away to England. Son John's marriage to Mary Vinton produced happier results for other grandsons. The four grandsons included twins named John and Dependence, followed by this writer's spouse's assumed ancestor, Abiathar French the senior, in turn followed by Joshua. A granddaughter, Mary the junior, married a distant cousin named Josiah French.
Rebecca's twin grandsons would move to Stoughton Corner, with land in places later known as Avon and North Bridgewater, which put them closer to their grandmother Rebecca's family in Milton (the Fennos). Did Dependence possibly give them some of his land that spilled over into old Milton (uncertain, needs to be checked)? Grandson Abiathar, last on record locally around 1770, would need to move a long distance to find good land, given that his older brothers, the twins, and their friends had snapped up whatever was left close-by. Grandson Joshua was the baby, so stayed in Braintree. After Dependence finally retired, Joshua presumably took over Dependence's land, whatever had not already been divided out to the rest.
There were other daughters? Harder to track (married names?)
PLACE.
Milton was in the county of Suffolk for Rebecca's birth and marriage records, remained so until after her death. At some point, however, Braintree and neighbors petitioned to be in their own county. That caused the creation of a new Norfolk County in 1793. (It replaced the old British province called Norfolk County, which had been up by the Maine border. It mostly became Essex County, with the remainder given to NH and Maine after the American Revolution.)
The new county of Norfolk contained both Milton and Braintree, as well as, for example, Canton, Stoughton, Dedham, and Avon to the west, and Weymouth to the east. (Dorchester and Roxbury, to the north, were in the new county at first, but returned later on to Suffolk County, due to Boston annexing them. Hingham, even further east than Weymouth, also was put in to the new county, but then wanted out, petitioning to stay with Suffolk, but instead was put into Plymouth County.
============================================================
Copyright by JBrown, Austin, TX, 2015, last revised Jan. 1, 2016, revised April, 2017. Permission granted to FindAGrave for use at this page.
==========================================================
Daughter of John and Rebecca Fenno of Milton. Second wife of Dependence French of Braintree. Mother of all but one of his many children.
They married April 27, 1688, at nearby Milton, when he was about 40, she, only 26. Though he was the longest-lived among his own many siblings, she would survive him by a decade, due mainly to being that much younger.
==========================================================
FENNO BEGINNINGS--
LAND-OWNING MATRIARCH. Rebecca's first American ancestor, her grandmother, apparently arrived with young son, John. Her grandmother came to the colonies on the ship Truelove in 1635, listed among the passengers as "Rabecca Ffenner, age 25". Was she a widow? No husband is listed, and she had only the one child along, John.
As the Fenno family's matriarch, the first Rebecca began colonial life in Dorchester. Located below old Boston, but now part of modern Boston's south side, Dorchester was then a place where Puritans often waited for land, attending a mother church there, where future ministers might train, before starting churches elsewhere.
She was granted considerable land in Milton. Perhaps she purchased outright enough shares in the land company to merit a large grant? The other method would have been bringing a large count of servants or business employees into Milton, with "however many acres" then given per head ("headright" method). Either method required that she be a woman of means.
The heir to the matriarch Rebecca was John Fenno, this Rebecca's father. A few details are unusual:
(1) The will of John Fenno referred to land back in Lancashire. That would be northwestern England, a region extending from the shipping center at Liverpool, on the west coast, up to the Scottish border. The province to the east would be Yorkshire, a place referred to as within the Dane Law region, pre-William the Conqueror.
The Fennos thus may have come from Lancashire, maybe near the Yorkshire boundary. In contrast, most Puritans are difficult to track accurately back to their home places overseas, not having either English land mentioned in records here, nor a whole town or church "packing up" and following a specific minister here.
(2) The spelling of the surname back in the old country, may have been different. Old spellings would be needed to find the old land records.
Some think their name may have been "Fennow", misread as "Fenner". The cause for that guess might be the Milton militia listing John Fennow while they were warring against the native tribes, circa 1676, when this Rebecca was about fourteen. Fenn is another possibility. There had been a Benjamin Fenn who came in to Dorchester earlier, in 1630, but he would leave for the Connecticut colony within 2 years of these Fennos arriving. He was not followed there by them, as we'd expect if they were closely related.
Surviving gravestones found thus far do all spell her family's name as Fenno, not Fenner, not Fennow. (Nor is Ferno seen, based on a deciphering or mis-deciphering of Rev. Samuel Niles' handwritten journal. His journal was kept during his 50 years of service at the second of two town-authorized churches for old Braintree. Once congregations were declared, much later, it became First Congregational of Braintree. It's located across the road from today's Elm Street Cemetery, with the old Second Burying Ground at its front, closed to further burials after overcrowding, but few markers left.)
MEETING DEPENDENCE.
Her father made up for being an only child by having a large family of his own. Their names and families here in America are described, for example, at RalphInLA.rootsweb.ancestry.com/FENNOr5.htm.
Rebecca, as the eldest, may have served as a second mother to her siblings. Dependence French would have been a young widower when she married him. Rebecca's status as "eldest child" may have qualified her to be nursemaid to Dependence's daughter, Mary, so perhaps they met that way. Arguing against that would be the first wife's parents, the Marshes, taking charge of the little girl (a tiny baby?) after her mother died. Perhaps happy with their care, the little girl would not want to return to her own father's home, one she barely knew. The will of her grandfather, Alexander Marsh, treated Mary as if she were a daughter, cited her as living in his house. Her being apart was a sadness for Dependence, we must assume.
Also worth noting, certain Fenno in-laws intermarried with other early in-laws and neighbors of the Braintree Frenches. These included the Badcock family (changed to Babcock at some point), plus Belcher, Billings, Newcomb, and White families. Did some in-laws act as matchmakers? "Cupid has short wings", some sociologists tell us. You can't meet somebody if you are not near them. The closeness of old Milton (larger than it is now??) to the outer edges of Braintree mattered as much for courting, as did the in-law connections. Some of the Frenches' lands overlapped into Milton, as some paid property taxes in both places, with the Milton taxes relatively minor.
CHILDREN.
The first wife had been a Marsh. She gave Dependence French one daughter, who would later marry a Savil. For her own children, Rebecca must have been sentimental, treasuring her relationships. She started the passing of a dish down the generations, daughter-to-daughter, each generation marking their initials on the back.
Rebecca's own children with Dependence included two who married Vintons of the iron-working family. Daughter Elizabeth French married Samuel Vinton, who was a sufficiently harsh taskmaster, according to a family genealogist, the Rev. John Adams Vinton, that a son ran away to England. Son John's marriage to Mary Vinton produced happier results for other grandsons. The four grandsons included twins named John and Dependence, followed by this writer's spouse's assumed ancestor, Abiathar French the senior, in turn followed by Joshua. A granddaughter, Mary the junior, married a distant cousin named Josiah French.
Rebecca's twin grandsons would move to Stoughton Corner, with land in places later known as Avon and North Bridgewater, which put them closer to their grandmother Rebecca's family in Milton (the Fennos). Did Dependence possibly give them some of his land that spilled over into old Milton (uncertain, needs to be checked)? Grandson Abiathar, last on record locally around 1770, would need to move a long distance to find good land, given that his older brothers, the twins, and their friends had snapped up whatever was left close-by. Grandson Joshua was the baby, so stayed in Braintree. After Dependence finally retired, Joshua presumably took over Dependence's land, whatever had not already been divided out to the rest.
There were other daughters? Harder to track (married names?)
PLACE.
Milton was in the county of Suffolk for Rebecca's birth and marriage records, remained so until after her death. At some point, however, Braintree and neighbors petitioned to be in their own county. That caused the creation of a new Norfolk County in 1793. (It replaced the old British province called Norfolk County, which had been up by the Maine border. It mostly became Essex County, with the remainder given to NH and Maine after the American Revolution.)
The new county of Norfolk contained both Milton and Braintree, as well as, for example, Canton, Stoughton, Dedham, and Avon to the west, and Weymouth to the east. (Dorchester and Roxbury, to the north, were in the new county at first, but returned later on to Suffolk County, due to Boston annexing them. Hingham, even further east than Weymouth, also was put in to the new county, but then wanted out, petitioning to stay with Suffolk, but instead was put into Plymouth County.
============================================================
Copyright by JBrown, Austin, TX, 2015, last revised Jan. 1, 2016, revised April, 2017. Permission granted to FindAGrave for use at this page.
