Re: John and Joan of Wales
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In reply to:
John and Joan of Wales
Barbara Lee Fitzsenry 11/29/01
John and Joan Eaton were members of the Church at Dolan, Radnorshire, Wales.Due to the severe persecution of Baptists, they left on 1 August 1683, along with John's brother George, George's wife Jane, and John's sister Sarah.They arrived in Philadelphia on 30 November 1683 and settled on the banks of Pennepek Creek.This group were among the 12 original members of the Pennepek (there are a number of spellings) Baptist Church, the first Baptist Church in the middle colonies.
Among John and Joan's children are two Baptist Ministers, Rev. George Eaton and Rev. Joseph Eaton.These Eatons conducted a ministry in the area, and traveled to various communities. The early records of the Welsh Tract Baptist Meeting have been published, and they show that John and Joan, Joseph and his wife Gwenllian, George and his wife Mary, joined in 1713 by letters from Pennepek.These records also show that John left the meeting through death in 3 month 1717, and that Joan left through death in 10 month of the same year.
I am unaware of any information regarding the parents of John Eaton, although there is a story in the Eaton Genealogy by Molyneaux that Commodore William Colgate Eaton, son of Rev. George Washington Eaton (who was president of Colgate University for many years), met a Dr. Price, a visiting Baptist minister from Wales, at a Colgate commencement ceremony.Dr. Price had seen an Eaton genealogy carved on a mantlepiece in Wales that went back 1000 years.He had copied the genealogy in his diary, the American Eatons who were descended from John found that it matched their family, but none of the American Eatons recorded the information, and it was lost to them.Some speculate that the mantle may still exist.
This Eaton family has a number of well known Baptist ministers, including Rev. Isaac Eaton, son of Rev. Joseph, who became minister of the Church at Hopewell, New Jersey;Rev. Joseph Heywood Eaton (brother of Rev. George Washington Eaton); and Joseph Heywood Eaton's son, Rev. Thomas Tredwell Eaton.I hope this is helpful to your research.
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Re: John and Joan of Wales
Rick Eaton 4/07/02