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> Your question, Dale, has prompted me to review various sources to
> look for Sarah Howard Packard's birthdate. Apparently I entered it
> in my computer database early on before I began to identify my
> source of each data item.
Dick -
That is also unfortunately the case with a number of early entries in my database.
The attempt to estimate birth order and years for siblings when there are no birth records is always a challenge. Such is the case with the children of John and Martha (Hayward) Howard.
I've been looking at some older sources for the birth date of Sarah (Howard) Packard. Heman Howard, in "The Howard Genealogy: Descendants of John Howard of Bridgewater, Massachusetts, from 1643 to 1903" (Brockton, MA: The Author, 1903; repr. Newburyport, MA: 1986) did not give a birth date for her. He did quote the 16-Oct-1701 division of her father's estate, which named John's daughters not with their given names, but as "Edward Fobes, his wife," "Zacheus Packard's wife" and "Henry Kingman's wife."
Savage did not give a date. Farmer, under "John Howard," said to see "Haward" but I find no Haward entry. Her birth is not found in the Plymouth Colony records.
> You probably have already looked at the Bridgewater VR's.
I have - both the alphabetized abstracts for all four Bridgewaters and the literal transcriptions in MD.
> I don't know which birth year, 1647 or 1648, is correct, but it
> appears clear that Sarah Howard was born in what was then
> politically part of Duxbury, became Bridgewater, and is now West
> Bridgewater. It has always been part of Plymouth Colony or
> Plymouth County, but never part of Plymouth Township.
I have always estimated Sarah's birth as about a decade later than that, since her first child was born in 1680. She was likely a few years younger than Zaccheus, and we know that he was baptized in 1651.
When estimating birth dates I generally use a set of assumptions which do not always hold, but which are still generally sound.
One is that the children in this era are usually named in wills and other probate documents in birth order, usually the sons as a group and then the daughters. If that is the case in the division of John Howard's estate then the birth order of his daughters is Elizabeth, Sarah and Bethia. Their first children were born respectively in 1677, 1680 and 1693, so that order appears likely.
Another assumption is that women first married at about the age of 20, and had their first child at about 21. This yields estimated birth years for the Howard sisters of about 1656, 1659 and 1672 respectively. Since their husbands were born or baptized in about 1643 (estimated birth), 1651 (baptism) and 1668 (birth) respectively the birth order for the sisters seems sound, and my estimated birth years for them are probably not too far off. If anything those estimates are probably a few years late for Elizabeth and Sarah, who may not have married until they were closer to 25.
Dale H. Cook, Member, NEHGS and MA Society of Mayflower Descendants;
Plymouth Co. MA Coordinator for the USGenWeb Project
http://members.cox.net/plymouthcolony/index.shtml
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