Richard Bushnell
Richard Bushnell was baptised at St Mary the Virgin, Horsham, in Sussex, on 20 April 1623. The parish register reads: "Richard, son of Frauncis and Ferris Bushnell." He was the ninth child baptised to the couple there. His mother was buried when he was not quite five, together with a newborn sister. His father married again the next year.
In 1635 his five surviving older brothers left for New England. The 1945 Bushnell genealogy believes Richard, about twelve, went with them. It says he probably lived with his brother Francis at Salem in Massachusetts. Family tradition, as the same book reports it, says the brothers came to Connecticut by way of Long Island, did not like the place, and came over to Guilford. Their father followed in 1639 with the Rev. Henry Whitfield's company and settled at Guilford. The book also repeats a statement that Richard served in John Winthrop's garrison at Saybrook Fort under Lion Gardiner during the Pequot War of 1637. No record of that service is cited.
On 11 October 1648, at Hartford, he married Mary Marvin. She was a daughter of Matthew Marvin, one of the first settlers of Hartford, and had crossed from Essex on the Increase in 1635. Their children were Joseph, born in May 1651, Richard in September 1652, Mary in January 1654 and Marcie in March 1657.
Matthew Marvin moved to Norwalk in 1650 as one of its first settlers, and Richard followed. By about 1655 he held a lot valued at two hundred pounds next to his father-in-law's. He made his will there on 1 December 1659, "being of perfect memory though weake in Body." He left half of what remained to "my dearly beloved wife" and half to his four children, "allowing my 2 sones each of them £5 more than to my 2 daughters." He named Matthew Marvin senior, Nathaniel Richards and Richard Olmsted of Norwalk as overseers. The witnesses were Alice Marvin, his father-in-law's second wife, and James Cornish.
He died within months. The same three overseers took his inventory on 17 July 1660, at 212 pounds 8 shillings and 8 pence. The will was proved on 6 March 1661/2, "ye Relict being again married to [Thomas] Adgate." His widow took the children to the new settlement at Norwich with her second husband. His home lot at Norwalk was sold to Robert Stewart on 22 January 1674.
His children did well at Norwich. Joseph farmed there until 1746. Richard became Capt. Richard Bushnell, Esquire, a magistrate. Mary married Ensign Thomas Leffingwell, and Marcie married Jonathan Rudd. His brother William settled at Saybrook, where he became a lieutenant of the train band. In 1672 Thomas Adgate, by then his widow's husband, sold William a tract at Saybrook and called him "brother William Bushnell."
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Cite: Heirology, "Richard Bushnell (b. 1623)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/richard-bushnell-1623-51fa05.