Created by Ann Lawthers, Genealogist

Published: October 2021

PDF Download, 12 pages

“Torrey’s New England Marriages” is an essential reference for any genealogist with New England ancestors. Owned by American Ancestors, Clarence Almon Torrey’s twelve-volume manuscript enumerates an estimated 99% of all pre-1700 marriages of New Englanders and is now published for the first time in a three-volume set. These records also include those individuals married in Europe before migrating, as well as those couples for whom no marriage record exists but whose marriage can be inferred from other evidence.

John Benson was born about 1608 in England. He married Mary Williams, daughter of Robert Williams and Agnes Atkins, 14 October 1633 in Caversham, Oxfordshire. The couple emigrated in 1638, settled in Hingham, Massachusetts, and had five children. Descendants lived mainly in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, and South Carolina.