John Bartoll - Parnell Hodder Family Group

What We Know About This Family

Noteworthy

The Bartolls are mentioned fairly often in Marblehead's early records. John appeared in court several times as both a plaintiff and defendant, and Parnell was accused of adultery during her passage from England to join her husband. A suit for slander regarding this accusation was lost. John served as Constable and for several years as a Selectman. The couple lived together in Marblehead for twenty more years before John was found drowned by his own hand in the sea.

An Overview of Their Lives

John Bartoll was the son of John and Agnes Williams Bartoll in Crewkerne, Somerset, England. His siblings still living at the time of his father's death were Thomas, William, Peter, Magdalene, and Agnes, who all remained in England. John, Jr. married Parnell Hodder in England in 1628. At least the eldest of the first three known children, were born in England.

John was in Marblehead by 1639. His father had died in February of that year and left him the estate in England, which he then sold through a lawyer in Boston to a man in Bristol, England. During the next 25 years, he made his living as a planter and a fisherman, and it seems he lived his life in a way that was not untypical for the hardy Marbleheaders of those early times. In 1640, he appeared in court as a witness in the case of a neighbor charged with abusing members of the family. John Bartoll as plaintiff sued Allen Yew for debt in 1640 and was awarded the use of his boat until the debt was satisfied. Parnell and probably the children sailed on the Sampson to join him in 1641. Charges of gross misconduct with a boatswain were pressed against her after her arrival. This accusation was at first dismissed for lack of evidence, and various petty charges for retaliation occurred following. A record for the birth of their youngest known child, Mary, can be found in the town of Salem in 1642. In1644, John was again a plaintiff in a civil suit for debt, but the disposition of that case is unknown. In 1645, John brought charges against Alice Peach (another of our direct ancestors) for the defamation, John was the Constable of Marblehead, but in the following year, he was found guilty and fined for assault and battery. John served as a Marblehead Selectman in 1648, 1649, 1657-1661.

In October 1664, John's body was pulled from the water. A jury of inquest appointed by the coroner of Marblehead reported that they found he was the cause of his own death. He had been heard letting forth troubled and discontented words at the time he was lost, and he had a cape bound about his neck with his neck cloth. He died intestate. In the will of John Peach, Sr., which was written in 1682, we learn that he bequeathed the use of his house for the duration of her natural life. John Peach, Sr. was a cousin to John Peach who was married to Alice who had earlier accused Parnell of impropriety.

About the Children

• Mary - The only one of the children who has a birth record was Mary, the youngest, She was born in Salem in 1642. John and Parnell were married for a number of years before Parnell sailed to Massachusetts in 1641. I'm assuming the three eldest were born before their parents left England and accompanied her on the passage to the new world.


• John - In 1680, Parnell being "apprehensive of the helpless condition of her son" conveyed four acres of land to her son-in-law, William Lightfoot with the understanding that John Jr. would be provided a comfortable living with his sister, Mary, and her husband. John was employed in 1657 and perhaps later as the junior keeper of the town's cows.


• Joan had married shipwright Edmond Chapman about 1652, and her father built and gave her a house that was the subject of litigation after John's death, in 1672. William Charles testified that when the house was being built, he heard John Bartoll give it to his son-in-law. Moses Maverick and Parnell testified that their understanding was the house had been gifted to the Chapmans. Joan was widowed before her father died in 1664, and she married John Codner, who died about 1710. John Codner and Joan Bartoll are our direct ancestors and have their own family group page.


• Mary did not escape scandal. Her husband William Lightfoot accused her of engaging in improper intimacy with a man named Jeffrey Thistle.


• William, the eldest child, and his wife Mary had four sons and two daughters who were all baptized on the same day in 1669 in Salem, where they had lived for a few years. In 1684, they were "set off" from membership in their Salem church to the new one that opened in Marblehead. A mariner by trade, he lived to the age of 61.

What Else We Need to Learn

The goal of this project is to trace every line of ancestry to the arrival of its first immigrant to America. The basic information of each couple is considered complete when we know the dates of birth, marriage, and death for both spouses. their parents' names (or whether they were the immigrant), and the child or children in our ancestry line.

The research on this family is basically complete. Further research may reveal some of the missing vital records.