Three Immigrant Sons of William PARSONS and Margaret HOSKINS

Ancestral Chain: 12th great-grandfather William PARSONS b.1570, Thomas PARSONS b.1638, Bethia PARSONS b.1642, Elizabeth MASKELL b.1669, Thomas KELSEY b.1701, Thomas KELSEY b.1729, Marcy KELSEY b.1764, Thomas LUCAS b.1788, Marcy Jane LUCAS b.1814, Polly WILLIAMS b.1838, Elizabeth Ann DAVIS b.1859, Laura Elizabeth PARKER b.1889, Kirt DeMar WOOD b.1923, Lark, TR.

1. Thomas PARSONS, an early settler of Windsor, Connecticut, was probably the Thomas baptized in St. Mary's Church at Beaminster, Dorset, England, 8 Feb 1608/9, son of William PARSONS and Margaret HOSKINS. He cam to New England probably about 1635, and died at Windsor, Connecticut 23 Sep 1661. He married at Windsor 28 Jun 1641, Lydia BROWN who was born in England about 1616, and was still living at Windsor on 7 Nov 1671. She married second, at windsor 30 Nov 1664, as his third wife, Eltweed POMEROY, who was baptized at Beaminster, Dorset, 4 Jul 1585, and died at Northampton, Mar 1673, son of Richard POMEROY.

Thomas PARSONS was on of the earliest settlers and founders of Windsor; on of the first settlements made by the English in Connecticut. It would appear that he was settled there by 1636, for in the spring of 1637 he served in the Pequot War from Windsor. For this service he received 50 acres of land, which was given to his sons Ebenezer an Samuel by the General Court of Connecticut 13 Oct 1698.

Children of Thomas PARSONS and Lydia BROWN:
Bethia PARSONS b. 21 May 1642 Windsor, Hartford, Connecticut; d. 18 Apr 1681 Windsor, Hartford, Connecticut; Bethia m. 1) Thomas MASKELL 10 May 1660 Windsor, Hartford, Connecticut / m.2) John WILLIAMS 18 Aug 1672.
Abigail b. 21 Jan 1643 - bur. at Windsor, 5 Dec 1659.
Thomas b. 9 Aug 1645.
John b. 13 Nov 1647.
Mercy/Marcy b. 23 Jul 1652.
Ebenezer b. 14 May 1655.
Samuel b. 18 Jul 1657.
Joseph b. 1 May 1661 - d. Prob. young.

(a) Thomas Parsons, aged 30, sailed January 2, 1634, in the Bonaventura, bound from London to Virginia. (b) Thomas Parsons owned an estate in boston in 1639. Savage says he may have been the same as (c) Thomas Parsons married to Lydia Brown at Windsor, June 28, 1641. stiles says he may have been the same as Thomas (a) above. He was an owner in Palisado Plot, 1650; agreed to keep the Rivulet Ferry, 1652; served in the Pequot War and received fifty acres for services then rendered; and died September 23m 1661. according to the foregoing data, Thomas (a),(b),(c), and (d) may all be one and the same person. (Cornet Joseph Parsons one of the founders of Springfield and Northampton, By Henry Martyn Burt, Albert Ross.)

Ancestral Chain: 11th great-grandfather William PARSONS b.1570, (Cornet) Joseph PARSONS Immigrant b.1618, Jonathan PARSONS b.1657, Mary PARSONS b.1688, Jerusha GRAVES b.1717, Jerusha COOLEY b.1738, Sylvanus BRONSON b.1769, Mary BRONSON b.1806, Martin Luther ENSIGN b.1831, Harriett Camilla ENSIGN b.1859, George Ensign SMITH b.1898, Camilla SMITH b.1926, Lark, TR.

2. Cornet Jospeh PARSONS, one of the founders of Springfield and Northampton, Massachusetts, was baptized in St. Mary's Church at Beaminster, Dorset, England, 25 Jun 1620, son of William PARSONS and Margaret HOSKINS. He came to New England about 1635, and died at Springfield 9 Oct 1683. He married at Hartford, Connecticut, 26 Nov 1646, Mary BLISS, who was born in England about 1628 and died at springfield 29 Jan 1711/12, daughter of Thomas BLISS and Margaret HULINS of Gloucestershire, England, and later Hartford, Connecticut.

Children of Joseph PARSONS and Mary BLISS:
Joseph, b. perhaps CT, abt 1647 - 21/29 Nov. 1729.
Benjamin b. - d. 22 Jun 1649 John b. 14 Aug. 1650 - d. 19 April 1728.
Samuel b.23 Jan. 1652/3 - d. 19 Nov. 1734.
Ebenezer b. 1 May 1655 - d. 2 Sept. 1675.
Jonathan b.6 June 1657 - d. fall of 1694; m. Mary CLARK 5 Apr 1682.
David b. 30 April 1659, d. young.
Mary b. 27 June 1661 - d. 23 Aug 1711.
Hannah b. 1 Aug. 1663 - d. 1 April 1739.
Abigail b. 3 Sept. 1666 - d. 27 June I689.
Esther (recorded as Hester) b.4 Dec. 1672 - d. 30 May 1760.

Joseph Parsons is believed to have been the first of the name in America. He was known as Cornet Joseph, from the military title which he, in later years, bore; the Cornet being the color-bearer and third in command in a British troop or regiment of cavalry...

[Parsons] came to America about 1635, possibly earlier. On July 15, 1636, he was witness to the deed of cession made by the Indians to William Pynchon and others of a large tract of land, then called Agawan but later Springfield... At that time he was about seventeen years of age... This deed was made but sixteen years after the landing of the Pilgrims, and but six years after the first settlement of Boston. Munsell's "American Ancestry" states that Joseph Parsons came over with William Pynchon, the leader of the Springfield colonists, who was one of the patentees of the grant by the Crown to the Massachusetts Bay Company, and a fellow passenger with Winthrop, who came over in 1630...

In 1651, he was elected a selectman, the highest town office in the gift of the people.

About 1655 he purchased of William Pynchon... a monopoly of the Connecticut River beaver or fur trade, in which... he was for many years successfully engaged.

From 1672 to 1678 he was a Cornet of the Hampshire Troop, commanded by Capt. John Pynchon, the first troop of horse formed in Western Massachusetts, and in 1679, he was a member of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of Boston, the first regularly organized military company in America...

In the spring of 1671 Joseph Parsons, with three others, went on an exploring expedition to what is now Northfield, Mass., and concluded a bargain with the Indians for a tract of over 10,000 acres of land on the "great river" (Connecticut). His intimate acquaintance with the Indians as a fur trader, taking him to their villages up and down the Connecticut Valley, made him invaluable in any transactions with them...

[Parsons] served in the French and Indian wars, Colony of Massachusetts Bay. He was a partner of William Pynchon in the fur trade of the Connecticut valley and was the chief founder of Northampton, Mass.

Cornet Joseph Parsons was preeminently a business man, with the courage and enterprise which peculiarly fitted him to take a leading part in the settlement of a new country. Savage says that he was "the most enterprising man in the Connecticut valley for a quarter of a century," and Burt, in his Monograph, says that "with perhaps a single exception he was the most prosperous and successful of any of the settlers and acquired a handsome property, the largest, unless it be that of John Pynchon, of any in Hampshire County, an evident indication of his foresight and enterprise." (The Parsons Family, by Henry Parsons, pp. 39-42.)

[Mary Bliss and Joseph Parsons married in Hartford in 1646. After several years in Springfield, the Parsons family, which now included three children, moved to Northampton, a brand new settlement some 20 miles up the Connecticut River. Joseph Parsons soon became one of Northampton's leading citizens. A successful merchant, he served as a selectman and on the committee to build the first meetinghouse. ...The Parsons also owned the first tavern in town...] (http://cinderspark.com/family/earlyparsons.html)

See: http://members.frys.com/~parsons/bio.html
See also: "Cornet Jospeh Parsons one of the founders of springfield and Northampton," by Henry Martyn Burt, Albert Ross.
Enjoy video: Tour of the Parsons House, http://www.historic-northampton.org/netshow/ParsonsHouse.html

Third immigrant son:
3. Deacon Benjamin PARSONS, an early settler of Springfield, was baptized 1 May 1625 at St Mary's Church in Beaminster, Dorset, England, son of William PARSONS and Margaret HOSKINS. He came to New England about 1650, and died at Springfield 24 Aug 1689. He married first at Windsor, 6 Oct 1653, Sarah VORE, who was probably born in Dorchester, MA, about 1635, and died at Springfield, 1 Jan 1675/76, daughter of Richard and Ann VORE (or VOARE) of Crewkerne, Somerset, and Windsor, Connecticut. He married second, in Springfield 21 Feb 1676/77, Sarah HEALD, who died there 23 Nov1711, widow of John LEONARD. She married third, at Springfield, 3 Nov 1690, Deacon Peter TILTON of Hadley, Massachusetts.