Ancestors

Dorothy Fletcher

b. 1715 · Westford MA
Born 1715, Chelmsford, Massachusetts
Father: Dea. Joshua Fletcher
Mother: Dorothy Hale
Children include Mary

Dorothy Fletcher was born at Chelmsford, Massachusetts, on 17 March 1715/16. The town clerk entered her as "Dorithy, d. Joshua and Dorithy." Her father was Joshua Fletcher, deacon of the church, and in 1729 the first town clerk of Westford, which was set off from Chelmsford that year. Her mother, Dorothy, was born about 1679, and the Fletcher genealogy of 1881 says she was born in Scotland.

Her father died in October 1732, when she was sixteen. On 20 April 1738 she married Aaron Parker junior at Westford. The town book enters it under her own name: "Dorothy, and Aaron Parker, jr., Apr. 20, 1738." The church book has the marriage as 17 March 1737/8. Aaron was twenty-four. He had married Marah Barrett of Chelmsford in December 1735, and she had died in February 1737 in her twenty-second year. Nine months later Dorothy's sister Sarah married Aaron's brother Samuel Parker.

Her children were born at Westford over nineteen years. Aaron was born in April 1739, Joshua in December 1740, Dorothy in October 1742 and Mary on 7 April 1744. Abigail followed in December 1745, Sarah in September 1747, Ebenezer in June 1749, Deborah in May 1751 and Isaiah in November 1752. Isaac was born in September 1755 and died the next summer, and David was born in November 1757.

Her husband "was a man of piety, belonging to what were called 'New Lights,'" says the Fletcher genealogy. The New Lights were the people who took up the revival of the Great Awakening in the 1740s.

He "d. of consumption, Sept. 30, 1762, ae. 49." Consumption was tuberculosis. The youngest of their children was not yet five.

"She m. 2d, ___ Reed," the genealogy adds, and nothing more. Her death is not recorded at Westford.

Her children scattered north. Dorothy married Salmon Dutton and settled at Cavendish, Vermont, where the village of Duttonsville took his name. Isaiah was a physician at Cavendish. Mary married Amos Boynton of Westford in 1770 and went to Plymouth, Vermont.

Parents

Dea. Joshua Fletcher 1677-1732Dorothy Hale 1679-1770

Children

Mary Parker (b. 1744)

Sources

Vital Records of Westford, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (1915), scan vitalrecordsofwe00westf at archive.org, births under Parker
Vital Records of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (1914), scan vitalrecordsofch00chel at archive.org, marriages under Parker
Vital Records of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (1914), archive.org vitalrecordsofch00chel, births, p. 63
Vital Records of Westford, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (1915), archive.org vitalrecordsofwe00westf, marriages, p. 164
Edward H. Fletcher, The Descendants of Robert Fletcher of Concord, Mass. (Boston, 1881), archive.org fletcherfamilyhi00flet, p. 35
Vital Records of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (1914), archive.org vitalrecordsofch00chel, births p. 63; Vital Records of Westford, Massachusetts, to the End of the Year 1849 (1915), archive.org vitalrecordsofwe00westf, marriages p. 164; Edward H. Fletcher, The Descendants of Robert Fletcher of Concord, Mass. (Boston, 1881), archive.org fletcherfamilyhi00flet, pp. 33, 35 and addenda p. 500; Edwin R. Hodgman, History of the Town of Westford (1883)

If Dorothy Fletcher is in your family, start your own tree.

Cite: Heirology, "Dorothy Fletcher (b. 1715)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/dorothy-fletcher-1715-2d54ec.