Capt. John Gorham
John Gorham was baptized at Benefield, in Northamptonshire, on 28 January 1621. A Gorham family genealogy names his parents as Ralph Gorham and Margaret Stephenson and says he came to New England in 1635 on the Philip, Richard Morgan master.
He married Desire Howland, the eldest daughter of John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley, who had both come on the Mayflower. Desire was one of the first children born at Plymouth. Their eldest child, also Desire, was born on 2 April 1644.
In 1646 the family moved from Plymouth to Marshfield. There John was chosen constable in 1648 and made a freeman in 1650. He sat on the grand inquest, the colony's grand jury, in 1651. In 1652 the family moved again, to Yarmouth on Cape Cod. He was Yarmouth's deputy to the Plymouth Colony court in 1653 and its surveyor of roads in 1654. He was a farmer and a tanner and owned a mill. Later he served as a selectman of Barnstable. In 1669 the colony granted him a hundred acres at Papasquash Neck. In 1673 he was made a lieutenant of the Plymouth forces raised for the Dutch war.
On 4 October 1675 he was appointed captain of the second company of Plymouth forces in King Philip's War. The war was fought against the Wampanoag leader Metacom, called Philip by the English, and his allies. The genealogy says he died "from the effects of exposure in the Swamp Fight." That was the attack on the Narragansett fort in the Great Swamp in December 1675. He died at Swansea. The town recorded his burial: "Cap : John Goram was buryed the 5th day of february 1675." By the modern calendar that was 15 February 1676.
He was then a resident of Yarmouth. His widow and his sons James and John took out administration of the estate on 7 March 1676. The inventory, taken on 29 February by William Crocker, Barnabas Lothrop, John Thacher and John Miller, began with beds and their furniture. The estate held a tannery with a mill, two dwelling houses and wide lands. In 1677 the court confirmed the Papasquash Neck grant to his heirs forever, "in consideration of the good services he had performed." His heirs also shared in the land later granted at Gorham, Maine. Desire lived on at Yarmouth and died at her son's house in Barnstable on 13 October 1683.
The inventory ran to 710 pounds, 4 shillings and 3 pence. The farm, with the house, barn, upland, meadow and common-field land, was 450 pounds. Among the goods were a gold ring, plate and a watch, two cards of cloak buttons, a cart and plow tackling, and "1 Negro man," an enslaved African whose name the inventory does not give. The colony still owed the estate money "for service Done in the warr by Capt: Gorum."
The court divided the estate in 1676 according to "the Declared minde of the said Captaine Gorum in his life time." James, the eldest son, had the house he already lived in, the barn and half the upland. John, who was a tanner, had "the tan vaults barke mill" and the tools, and the use of half the land between the house and the tanyard "During all the time hee shall keep tailing in that place." Joseph had forty acres and a piece of meadow between "wells his Creeke" and "Bacons brooke." The younger children, Jabez, Mercy, Lydia, Hannah and Shubael, shared the rest equally.
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Cite: Heirology, "Capt. John Gorham (b. 1621)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/capt-john-gorham-1621-6d0f57.