Samuel Whiting Jr.

The Rev. Samuel Whiting Jr. graduated from Harvard in 1653. His father Rev. Samuel Whiting Snr. had written Oratio Quam Comitijs Cantabrigiensibus Americanis Peroravit reverendissimus D.D. Samuel Whiting Pastor Linnensis; in aula sci-licet Harvardina in 1649 as an opening address at Harvard University to celebrate its success.{{cite book |title=Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society 1895 - 1896: Vol 10 |date=1896 |publisher=John Wilson & Son, Cambridge |page=196 |url=https://archive.org/details/sim_massachusetts-historical-society-proceedings_1895-1896_10/page/196/mode/2up?q=whiting+ |access-date=3 May 2024}}{{Appletons|wstitle=Whiting, Samuel|year=1889|inline=1}} While some sources indicate Whiting Jr. had a brother, Nathaniel,{{cite book|last=Cutter|first=William Richard |title=Genealogical and Personal Memoirs Relating to the Families of the State of Massachusetts|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Bc8UAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA1876|accessdate=April 17, 2021|year=1910|publisher=Lewis historical Publishing Company|pages=1875–1876}} this is in error. In his father's memoir, it is clear he had no son named Nathaniel.{{Cite book |author=Whiting, William |url=https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=nJw-AAAAYAAJ&pg=GBS.PA194&hl=en |title=Memoir of Rev. Samuel Whiting, D.D., and of his wife, Elizabeth St. John: with references to some of their English ancestors and American descendants |date=1873 |publisher=Press of Rand, Avery, & Co |pages=195–204 |oclc=79027901}}

Samuel Whiting Jr.'s student/assistant for one year was Samuel Ruggles, who succeeded him as Billerica's next pastor. Ruggles married Whiting Jr.'s daughter, Elizabeth on 19 December 1710.{{cite web |title=Rev. Samuel Ruggles - Pane-Joyce Genealogy |url=http://aleph0.clarku.edu/~djoyce/gen/report/rr09/rr09_079.html |publisher=Clark University |access-date=3 May 2025 |quote=Samuel Ruggles “was teacher in Hadley a short time; chosen to assist Mr. Whiting for one year, 1707, July 7, and ordained his colleague - 1708, May 19. The Rev. Samuel Ruggles was born on 3 Dec 1681 in Roxbury, MA.152 Samuel died in Billerica, MA 8 Mar 1748/9. Education: 1702 Harvard...On 19 Dec 1710 when Samuel was 29, he first married Elizabeth Whiting, daughter of Samuel Whiting [Jr.]...}}

File:Coat of Arms of Samuel Whiting.svgFile:Boston Church, Lincolnshire by James Harrison.jpg where the Whiting and Skepper families worshipped]]File:GOVERNOR JOHN WINTHROP of the Massachusetts Bay Colony meeting with a Narragansett Native American warrior, c1631-1639. Wood engraving, c19th century.webp (foreground) who meets with a Narragansett Native American warrior, {{circa|1639}}. The Rev. Skipper is behind Winthrop to the left{{cite web |last1=Chase |first1=G. |title=The history of Haverhill, Massachusetts, from its first settlement, in 1640, to the year 1860 |url=https://archive.org/details/historyofhaverhi61chas/page/n7/mode/2up |publisher=Haverhill, Massachusetts |access-date=3 May 2024 |date=1861|pages=634,635|quote=September 8, 1680, Katherine, widow of John Maverick, and formerly Katherine Skipper, of Boston, who was killed by the Indians at the same time as was her husband.}}]]

The Rev Samuel Whiting Jr. was born on 25 March 1633 in Skirbeck, Lincolnshire, England. He was the son of a Puritan, the Reverend Samuel Whiting Snr. (1597-1679) and his second wife, Elizabeth St. John.{{Cite book|title=A genealogical and heraldic history of the extinct and dormant baronetcies of England|author=John Burke|author2=John Bernard Burke|name-list-style=amp|year=1838|publisher=Scott, Webster and Geary|chapter=St. John of Longthorpe|page=462|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=K1kBAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA462}} Elizabeth belonged to the prominent landowning family of St. John of Lydiard Tregoze; she was the sister of Sir Oliver St. John, a man from a Puritan background{{cite book |last1=Brown |first1=John |title=The English Puritans |date=1910 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |page=125 |url=https://www.google.com.au/books/edition/The_English_Puritans/RTg8AAAAIAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Sir+Oliver+St.+John+a+puritan&pg=PA125&printsec=frontcover |quote=...puritan stock - his sister also being the mother of Oliver St John, who was after-wards Cromwell's Lord Chief Justice - ...}} and a leading lawyer and judge who was one of the foremost opponents of King Charles I of England during the English Civil War.{{cite web |title=Oliver Saint John |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Oliver-Saint-John |publisher=Brittanica |access-date=3 May 2024 |quote=Oliver Saint John (born c. 1598—died Dec. 31, 1673) was an English politician and one of the leaders of the Parliamentary opposition to King Charles I of England.}}

The Rev. Samuel Whiting (Samuel Whiting Snr.) was from Boston, Lincolnshire in England, himself the son of John Whiting, Mayor of Boston. The will of Mayor Whiting, father of Samuel Snr., recorded in the parish register of St. Botolph's Church, Boston, Lincolnshire in England, is dated 20 Oct 1617. The parents of the Rev. William Skepper – who would study at Cambridge University with Whiting Snr. and sail in 1638 to join the Boston settlement before moving to nearby Lynn – were married in England in the Whiting family church, St Botolph's, on 11 August 1592.{{cite web |title=Lincolnshire: Boston: St Botolph: Parish Register - |url=https://parish-of-boston.org.uk/church/st-botolphs/ |publisher=St Bodoph's Parish Church Lincolnshire |access-date=3 May 2024 |quote=Mary Robinson married Edward Skepper at Boston, Lincolnshire on 11 August 1592...children... William Skepper born 1597...}}{{cite book |last1=Richardson |first1=D. |editor1-last=Everington |editor1-first=K. |title=Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families |date=2011 |publisher=D. Richardson |isbn=978-1463561680 |edition=Volumes 1, 2, 3 ,4 and 5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kjme027UeagC&q=Royal+Ancestry:+A+Study+in+Colonial+and+Medieval+Families+d+richardson |access-date=4 May 2025}} From 1630 to 1638, Rev. Skepper was the Church of England rector at Thorpe St Peter, Lincolnshire (also known as "Thorpe in the Marsh"), when the Whiting family were still prevalent in this area: both John and Robert Whiting of Thorpe, near Wainfleet, are recorded as living in the parish in 1560 in William Whiting's publication: Memoir of Rev. Samuel Whiting, D.D., and of his wife, Elizabeth St. John, with references to some of their English ancestors and American descendants.{{cite book |last1=Whiting |first1=W. |title=Memoir of Rev. Samuel Whiting, D.D., and of his wife, Elizabeth St. John, with references to some of their English ancestors and American descendants |date=1873 |publisher=Boston : Press of Rand, Avery & Co. |page=10, 11 |url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924029780487/page/n13/mode/2up?q=first+church+boston+ |access-date=9 July 2024}}{{cite news |last1=Elliot |first1=C. |title=Revealed: How Meghan Markle's ancestry was shaped by Cambridge|url=https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/megham-markle-harry-cambridge-university-14196195|access-date=9 July 2023 |date=24 January 2018 |quote=Mr Reed, of Hallam College in Melbourne, Australia, said: “The Revd Skepper was at the college from 1612 and completed a bachelor of arts by 1618. “He was the esteemed Church of England rector at Thorpe-in-the Marsh [Thorpe St Peter (also known as "Thorpe in the Marsh")] until 1638 and then decided to go to America – New England – to preach.”}}

Sharing the same age, Whiting Snr. and the Rev William Skepper continued their friendship from their St Botolph's days through to university. The Rev. Skepper received holy orders after completing his B.A. degree at the Puritan-focused Sidney Sussex College (1618). Similarly, Whiting Snr. received his B.A. and Master of Arts degrees from Cambridge University's other Puritan college - Emmanuel (1618 and 1620) and proceeded to take holy orders.{{cite book |last1=Whiting |first1=W. |title=Memoir of Rev. Samuel Whiting, D.D., and of his wife, Elizabeth St. John, with references to some of their English ancestors and American descendants |date=1873 |publisher=Boston : Press of Rand, Avery & Co.|url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924029780487/page/n13/mode/2up?q=first+church+boston+ |access-date=9 July 2024}}{{cite news |last1=Elliot |first1=C. |title=Revealed: How Meghan Markle's ancestry was shaped by Cambridge|url=https://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/news/cambridge-news/megham-markle-harry-cambridge-university-14196195|access-date=9 July 2023 |date=24 January 2018 |quote=Mr Reed, of Hallam College in Melbourne, Australia, said: “The Revd Skepper was at the college from 1612 and completed a bachelor of arts by 1618. “He was the esteemed Church of England rector at Thorpe-in-the Marsh [Thorpe St Peter (also known as "Thorpe in the Marsh")] until 1638 and then decided to go to America – New England – to preach.”}}

Whiting Snr. was married at Boston, on 6 August 1629 at St Botolph's Church to his second wife, Elizabeth, sister of Rt. Hon. Sir Oliver St. John. St John was later chief justice of England and one of the leaders of the Parliamentary opposition to King Charles I of England.{{cite web |title=Oliver Saint John |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Oliver-Saint-John |publisher=Brittanica |access-date=3 May 2024 |quote=Oliver Saint John (born c. 1598—died Dec. 31, 1673) was an English politician and one of the leaders of the Parliamentary opposition to King Charles I of England.}}

The Rev. Samuel Whiting Snr. travelled from King's Lynn England to Boston, arriving there on May 26, 1636 where his presence was officially recorded by the colony's governor, John Winthrop.{{cite journal |title=Textual Variants in Samuel Whiting's A Discourse of the Last Judgement (1664) |date=2016 |publisher=The University of Chicago Press |edition=The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America Volume 110, Number 1 |doi=10.1086/685738 |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/685738?journalCode=pbsa |access-date=3 May 2025 |last1=Whiting |first1=Anthony |journal=The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America |volume=110 |pages=117–120 }} Whiting Snr. lived in Boston – the colony's "hub"{{cite web |title=Potters' American Monthly |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IYM_AQAAMAAJ&dq=boston+was+the+massachusetts+colony+bay+hub&pg=RA1-PA82 |publisher=John E. Potter & Company |access-date=3 May 2025 |page=52 |date=1877}} – for six months{{cite web |title=Elizabeth St John – Puritan pioneer |url=https://www.friendsoflydiardpark.org.uk/news/blog-post/elizabeth-st-john-puritan-pioneer/ |website=Friends of Lydiard Park - An independent charity to conserve and enhance Lydiard House and Park. |publisher=The Friends of Lydiard Park |access-date=3 May 2025 |date=2025}} before moving to Lynn, Massachusetts where the residents soon changed the name of their settlement in his honour. Whiting's assistants were his neighbour Rev. Thomas Cobbett{{cite web |title=Samuel Whiting |url=https://ne.ianwatson.org/sketches/whiting-samuel-1636-lynn.pdf |publisher=Ian Watson |access-date=3 May 2025 |quote=Samuel Whiting and Thomas Cobbett owned adjoining lots [of land] at Lynn [EQC 5:386]; they (or in one case their children) received parallel bequests ...}} and the Rev. William Skipper/Skepper of Lynn{{cite book |last1=Alonzo |first1=Lewis |title=History of Lynn, Essex County, Massachusetts: including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant. |date=1865 |publisher=J.L. Shorey, Boston |page=577 |url=https://www.loc.gov/item/12011195/ |access-date=4 May 2024 |quote=Lynn residents....Skipper}} who had been his contemporary at Cambridge University; Skepper studying at Sidney Sussex, the university's other Puritan college. As with Whiting, both Cobbett and Skepper had Lincolnshire connections - Cobbett had "first settled in the ministry at a small place in Lincolnshire".{{cite web |title=Thomas Cobbett (1608-1686) - A Prolific Puritan with a Heart for Prayer A student of Dr. Twisse and a powerful Reformed Preacher - Biography of Thomas Cobbet |url=https://www.apuritansmind.com/puritan-favorites/thomas-cobbet-1608-1686/ |publisher=A Puritan's Mind |access-date=3 May 2024 |date=1995 |quote=He first settled in the ministry at a small place in Lincolnshire; but here he felt the vengeance of the ecclesiastical governors}} Lincolnshire man Skepper also assisted Cobbett at the church in Lynn, Massachusetts.{{cite web |url=http://www.lynnma.gov/about/history.shtml |title=A BRIEF HISTORY OF LYNN |author= |website=About Lynn |publisher=City of Lynn |access-date=2021-12-01 |quote=When the first official minister, Samuel Whiting, arrived from King's Lynn, England, the new settlers were so excited that they changed the name of their community to Lynn in 1637 in honour of him. |archive-date=2019-10-05 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191005040951/http://www.lynnma.gov/about/history.shtml |url-status=dead }}{{cite web |title=Branch: Ray's Extended Family tree |url=https://www.ourfamtree.org/view.php?pid=526298&passed=1 |publisher=Ray Gurganus |access-date=3 May 2024 |date=2008}}{{cite book |last1=Allen |first1=W. |title=The American Biographical Dictionary - Rev. Samuel Whiting |date=1857 |publisher=Boston: Jewitt & Co. |page=851 |url=https://archive.org/details/ambiodictionary00allerich/page/850/mode/2up?view=theater |access-date=3 May 2024 }}

Once settled in Lynn, the Rev. Samuel Whiting Snr. established his home with his wife and two children across from the settlement's meetinghouse. Their garden was known by the community for its variety of fruit and vegetables, and for the apple cider produced by its trees. He also was given 200 acres of land in 1638. He was greatly respected by his community, and was “peculiarly amiable.” When among groups of people, he would “kiss all the maids” and “he felt all the better for it.” They were said to “hug their arms around his neck and kiss him right back.” Whiting Snr. was described as being “a man of middle size and straight fine hair". He attempted to communicate with - and likely convert - the Native Americans. In the 1640s, he took an Indian girl into his household given over by her mother. He gave her an education and she became a part of his family, but eight years later, she ran away back to her tribe. Whiting Snr. was said to be heartbroken when she left. He was a colleague of the Rev. John Cotten who was the pastor at the First Church in Boston from 1633 until 1652. Whiting Snr. had first lived with Cotten's friend Atherton Haugh/Hough (c.1593 - 1650) upon his arrival in Boston, Massachusetts in 1633. Haugh had travelled to Massachusetts Bay Colony on the same ship - the Griffin - as Cotton and had been Mayor of Boston, England, in 1628, so he was familiar with government affairs, as too was Whiting Snr., whose father had also been a Mayor of Boston in Lincolnshire, England.{{cite web |last1=Whiting |first1=William |title=Memoir of Rev. Samuel Whiting, D.D., and of his wife Elizabeth St. John, with reference to... |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nJw-AAAAYAAJ&dq=Memoir+of+Rev.+Samuel+Whiting,+D.D.,+and+of+his+wife+Elizabeth+St.+John,&pg=PA262|publisher=W. Whiting |access-date=4 May 2025 |date=1873 |quote=He [Whiting Snr.] arrived in Boston, Massachusetts on May 26, 1636, and spent the first month with a friend, Atherton Hough. Then later that year, he went to Saugus [later named "Lynn"] to become the first minister there...In about 1646, Samuel took an Indian girl into his household given over by her mother. He gave her an education and she became a part of his family for a time, but eight years later, she ran away back to her tribe. Samuel was said to be heartbroken when she left...Samuel was formally made pastor on November 8, 1636, and he established his home with his wife and two children across from the meetinghouse. Their garden was said to be known for its variety of fruit and vegetables, and for the apple cider produced by its trees. He also was given 200 acres of land in 1638. The first year he was settled there, a son named John was born. He would have two more children: Joseph in 1641 and Elizabeth in 1645. Samuel was said to be greatly respected by his community, and was “peculiarly amiable.” When among groups of people, he would “kiss all the maids” and “he felt all the better for it.” They were said to “hug their arms around his neck and kiss him right back.” Samuel was described as being “a man of middle size and straight fine hair.}}{{cite news |title=Great Migration Newsletter, V.1-20 - Ship Arrivals in 1633" Vol. 3, January-March 1992 No. 1, p. 2. |url=https://www.americanancestors.org/databases/great-migration-newsletter-v1-25/image?volumeId=21166&pageName=2&rId=426828050 |access-date=4 May 2025 |publisher=AmericanAncestors.org, New England Historic Genealogical Society |date=2015 |quote=Hough's marriage made him brother-in-law of Rev. Peter Bulkeley... The 1637 census Appendix III, Personnel in the Support Group, "Mr. Atherton Hough, age 40, from Lincoln, arrived 1633, residence Boston, churched 1633 [Boston's First Church], franchised 1633, gentleman, Ass't Deputy for Colony Office, married, court rejects as Deputy, Property R."...}}

File:Oliver Cromwell by Robert Walker.jpg (pictured) asked Whiting to go to Ireland to convert the Catholics to Puritanism]]The Rev Samuel Whiting Snr. came over to Boston Massachusetts on the same ship as his Cambridge contemporary John Wheelwright who, like Whiting Snr. was also a Puritan minister. Wheelwright was banished form the Massachusetts General Court on 3 November 1637. Wheelwright knew Whiting Snr. from Cambridge as well as the Rev William Skipper and Oliver Cromwell, both of whom he had been in residence with at Cambridge's Sidney Sussex College. Wheelwright returned to England where, by the 1650s, he was received by Oliver Cromwell, by this time known as His Highness Lord Protector of the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland. Whiting Snr. and Cromwell were distantly related: Whiting's second wife, Elizabeth, was the sister of Sir Oliver St. John whose second wife, Elizabeth Cromwell, was the first cousin of Cromwell.{{cite web |title=Oliver Saint John |url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/Oliver-Saint-John |publisher=Brittanica |access-date=3 May 2024 |quote=Oliver Saint John (born c. 1598—died Dec. 31, 1673) was an English politician and one of the leaders of the Parliamentary opposition to King Charles I of England.}}{{sfn|Bell|1876|p=2}}{{cite web |title=Elizabeth St John – Puritan pioneer |url=https://www.friendsoflydiardpark.org.uk/news/blog-post/elizabeth-st-john-puritan-pioneer/ |website=Friends of Lydiard Park - An independent charity to conserve and enhance Lydiard House and Park. |publisher=The Friends of Lydiard Park |access-date=3 May 2025 |date=2025}}

In 1650, Cromwell wrote to Whiting Snr. and his Lynn friend, the Rev. Thomas Cobbett, asking them to go to Ireland to encourage the Protestants to embrace Puritanism. Whiting Snr. wrote back to Cromwell in January 1651, humbly thanking him for his "offers" and "promising to embrace the same". However, nothing came of their plans.{{cite book |last1=Seymour |first1=St John |title=The Puritans in Ireland |date=1917 |publisher=Clarendon Press |page=62 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ldHGDwAAQBAJ&dq=whiting+samuel+and+oliver+cromwell+letter+ireland&pg=PA62 |access-date=3 May 2024}}

The Rev. Samuel Whiting Jr. married Dorcas Chester on 12 November 1656, in Salem, Essex, Massachusetts. They were the parents of at least 8 sons and 4 daughters, including Elizabeth. He lived in Hartford, Connecticut Colony in 1656 and Massachusetts Bay Colony, in 1656. In 1663, at the age of 30, he was an ordained minister in Billerica and died on 28 February 1713, in Billerica, at the age of 79. He was buried in Billerica.{{cite web |title=Early Vital Records of Massachusetts from 1600-1850 – |url=https://billericalibrary.org/local-history/collections/vital-records/ |publisher=Billerica Public Library |access-date=2 July 2025}}

{{reflist}}

• "Elegy on the Rev. Samuel Whiting,[ Sr.,] of Lynn," by Benjamin Tompson, "ye renowned poet of New England," printed in Cotton Mather's Magnalia
• William Whiting, LL. D., Memoirs of Rev. Samuel Whiting and of his Wife, Elizabeth St. John, with Reference to some of their English Ancestors and American Descendants (printed privately, Boston, 1871)
• {{cite book|last=Bell|first=Charles H.|author-link=Charles H. Bell (politician)|title=John Wheelwright |year=1876 |place=Boston |publisher=printed for the Prince Society |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M65ZzjDKBmYC&q=antinomian}}

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{{succession box | before=First Pastor | title=Minister | years=1663 – 1713 | after=Samuel Ruggles}}

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Category:People from Billerica, Massachusetts

Category:1633 births

Category:1713 deaths

Category:Harvard University alumni