How do we know Mary, dau of Samuel Smith, married Zerubbabel Endicott?

Question

Anderson's Great Migration Begins p. 643 for Zerubbabel Endicott says "m. (1) about 1654 Mary [Smith]" and I can't find what the brackets mean, but I wonder if they're derived from...

Torrey's Marriages p. 252 says "1/wf Mary [SMITH] (1636-20 Jun 1677); ca 1654; Salem"; the Third Supplement of Torrey's p. 91 has it as "1/wf Mary SMITH?; m c1654 Salem [GMB 1:643]" so now we've come full circle. According to the intro to Torrey's on p. xiv, "a surname in brackets is one not derived from a marriage record".

NEHGR 1:335 calls her "Mary ___".

Mary, the daughter of Samuel Smith of Salem and Wenham, was called only "Mare" in her father's will in 1642; provisions made for her indicate she was a minor and unmarried (see Essex Probates vol. 1 pp. 18-21 at 19-20). Samuel Smith was a 1636 arrival so there isn't a full profile in Great Migration yet. Threlfall's 50 Great Migration Colonists profile of Samuel doesn't give any marriage for Mary Smith (p. 382, I have the book).

The only place I've found where Zerubbabel's wife and her parents are named — as "Mary Smith, dau. of Samuel and Sarah Smith of Great Yarmouth, Eng." — is McCloskey's Some Descendants of John Endicott, 1881 1943, p. 28. Shockingly (by which I mean not at all surprisingly), the author asserts this without citing a source (and is wrong about Samuel's origin, which per Anderson is unknown).

Zerubbabel is the only one of Governor John Endicott's sons who left descendants, and Mary is thought to be the mother of all his children, so the identification is notable-adjacent, I guess. :)

Any idea what evidence there might be for her name and parentage?

---

Editing to add: thanks commenters below who point out that first, I have the date totally wrong for McCloskey (corrected above); second, she was clearly summarizing an earlier work, W.C. Endicott's Memoir of Samuel Endicott, 1924, pp. 76-7: "Married, 1st, about 1654, Wenham, Mary Smith, daughter of Samuel Smith and Sarah his wife, of Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, England; born 1636, Wenham; died June 20, 1677, Salem. Place of burial — Endicott Burying Ground, Danvers." No sources cited for any of that; I looked at the other sources cited later in the Notes section and none of them have those details.

His Note about Mary's admission to First Church in 1666 is not sourced either, but I found published records of First Church and I think he's referencing this one on p. 109. Two related records on pp. 27 and 28 make it clear they all refer to our Mary, wife of Zerubbabel, but nothing in those records connects to Smith.

Answer 1

Mabel was not a professional researcher. Just a family researcher interested in documenting her family the best she could. Some of her research came from the Memoir of Samuel Endicott which includes the following passage "... of Wenham, Mary Smith, daughter of Samuel Smith and Sarah  ___ his wife, of Great Yarmouth, Norfolk, England; born ____ 1636, Wenham..."

In reference to your "shockingly" comment why are you not at all surprised?

 

 

Answer 2

Torrey got Smith from McCloskey. Knowing it was not from a church/town record AND that it was a FAMILY ASSERTION, so following his own rules Torrey put it in brackets as [Smith]. Why that clear WARNING SIGN was turned into "Mary Smith?" is an Anderson/GM decision which makes it LESS than the warning sign it was. I would suggest you follow Torrey + one step: make it "Unknown."

By the way, Torrey was not doing ORIGINAL research at all! He was just culling from printed sources and now some of his one-named sources can not themselves be identified. Only actual research into the Smit-Endicott families via FAN & deeds & probate, etc., may finally generate possible answers. Best.

Comments

Where does it state Torrey got Smith from McCloskey?

---

Logical conclusion drawn from the introduction to NEM which outlines Torrey's "research" tactics. He wandered the shelves of the NEHGS library, noting on a separate piece of paper on any marriage he found in a book or document on a separate, then at home putting that note in with all other he had accumulated for that marriage. He then transferred those notes onto yet another card to which he appended the information and his sources. Torre y kept amending the main cards right up until his death.Your link goes to the "cleaned up" version as edited for publication, not to the photstated oversized copy that had a prominent place in the NEGHS' 4th floor reading room for decades. I have consulted it there. Some scribbles were as bad as Elizabeth handwriting. Dave Dearborn, who worked on the prep for publication, told me (& its in the intro) that there more than a number of short-titles that they could not find in the catalog. What you see with Melinde's Supplement is the NOW standard non-GM sourcing format: Printed Source only. The GM short-title sourcing is as you see it in GMD p. 312, SMITH Samuel: Unknown; Wenham ... [STR 1:24; EQC 1:16; etc.]. PLEASE WAIT. Checking something.

---

OK. Torrey's ORIGINAL manuscript pages are a semi-searchable DB at American Ancestors.  This link is for the Endicott page: Torrey NEM DB at AmAnc, Endicott page.

And here's the one for Zerubb & Mary: Torrey NEM manuscript page for Endicott p. 2

Are you an AA member?  Because I do not think this is up at Ancestry. It is truly a proprietary source for NEHGS.

I'd include a pic of the page but have no idea how to work that function.

2nd source listed, or perhaps it was the 1st, is Endicott 76, which I suspect is the McCloskey book. That can be checked against the reference listings, which is another DB at AA.

---

I had NO idea that manuscript was available! Thank you for that comment, Robert. Adding to my "favorites" on AmAnc.

Cheryl, if you need an image copy let me know.

---

That's incorrect. Torrey listed Endicott 77; That source is Memoirs of Samuel Endicott NOT Mabel McCloskey's book. The pdf American Ancestors provides about the sources clearly states Endicott is not McCloskey.

Memoirs of Samuel Endicott was publsihed in 1924.

The referenced sources given for the entry in question were far before Mabel ever started her research.

---

Thank you for correcting me on just what book Endicott-77 is. I see from Google that Mrs. McCloskey's 2nd edition dates to 1959. The original question then needs to be stated more narrowly: Where did McCloskey (1959) derive Mary = Smith from? The 1923 book? Any of the other sources Torrey lists? Correspondence with Torrey? It might even be from a genealogical column in a newspaper (popular 1900-1950 or so)!  So, in the end, all I've been able to do is provide Cheryl Hammond as the Endicott researcher and all us other researchers with how to access Torrey's notes. The next steps and the interpretation is up to her.

Do note that on that Zerubb page, Torrey put a bracket next to Mary and only later wrote just above it "Smith," so it may indeed not derive from the 1923 book, the 1st source listed. Perhaps from one of the later listed sources? I hope Cheryl will let us know.

---

Charles M. Endicott wrote an article in the New England and Genealogical Register, Vol 1, issue 1847. He wrote had name as Mary ____.

I've been building a sourced Endicott family tree for the John Endecott Family Association. Mary has been on the list to verify. A quick search in the past didn't result in any evidence for her LNAB.

Answer 3

The GMB entry is confusing with square brackets around the surname. Usually the square brackets indicate a source, but there is no source by Smith in the Key to Titles of the introduction to the volumes. Nor is there any statement there about how uncertainty in names is indicated. It is clear elsewhere in the volumes that when a name is unknown it is indicated by ______. We have to infer that Anderson is indicating some uncertainty about the name, but unusually there is no citation against the paragraph for Zerubbabel nor is anything there, including his wife, mentioned in the rest of the sketch.

Just as you have found, there seem to be multiple publications stating her surname as Smith, but none that cite original sources.

Comments

According to the description given for Torrey's records on American Ancestors:

When the bride's surname is within brackets, Torrey had found a reliable source that identified the bride's maiden surname with a good deal of confidence. These sources are often based on indirect evidence such as a deed or a will.

When the bride's surname is in brackets and preceded or followed by a question mark, Torrey was less than certain of the bride's identity, or had reason to doubt the credibility of the source. Example: "Benjamin BARNES & Abigail [?LINSLEY];

---

That is all true, but irrelevant. I was discussing Anderson's Great Migration Begins, not Torrey's New England Marriages.

---

Sorry, I meant to post that in response to another comment.