Edmund Gale Family Group

What We Know About This Family

An Overview of Their Lives

I'll start the information about this family group with early research done by a Gale descendant George Gale.

"Among the different families of Gales in the United States, with whom the writer has become acquainted,
he found extant almost uniformly, the tradition that their ancestors were four brothers, natives of England,
who landed at Boston in the early settlement of Massachusetts from whence they became settlers in different
parts of the country. That the Gales of this country were from England, there is no doubt at the present day, and that the tradition is further corroborated by the appearance of John Gale at Boston in 1634, Richard at Watertown in 1640. Edmund at Cambridge in 1642 and Hugh at Kittery or York in 1652 is also settled beyond a doubt by the records of Massachusetts; but that the Gales of this country descended from those four is as yet only established so far as relates to the descendants of Richard, and the further fact that John died young and probably unmarried.

"Whether either Edmund or Hugh had families we have no no records, but on tracing the family of Richard, the wri-
ter soon found Gales that he was satisfied did not belong to his descendants and must be accounted for on some
other hypothesis. If the tradition is true, then these person were evidently the children of Edmond and Hugh
or one of them, but as we do not find any of them as far north as York, or bearing the name of Hugh, the writer
is forced to assume the probability that they were the first generation of the children of Edmond of Cambridge, but wore born in England, as no record of their birth has yet been found in this country.

"But if we are totally in error, either in the tradition or the assumed probabilities, we nevertheless accomplish the purpose of this work, of giving historically all the facts we can gather relating to the persons named. If they
were not relatives as assumed, they nevertheless had an existence, and filled their appropriate niches in the great
temple of the world."

EDMOND GALE, of Cambridge, died in Boston, in 1642, Supposed children:

• Thomas b. and m. probably in England and settled in New Haven, Ct., where he had Martha bpt. March 18, 1660, and Abigail bpt. June 22,1660. Their births are mentioned as follows:Martha, b. May 6, 1655 and Abigail, b. May 5. 1660. We have no further mention of Thomas or his children.
• Robert b. — . The only mention of him were the facts that May 14, 1659, he receipted sugar of William Houisworth at Salem, and again in 1666, receipted 3700 lbs. of Muscovado Sugar at Salem.
• Ambrose b. — ; m. Deborrah — .
• Bartholomew b. — ; m. Mary.
• Edmond b — ; m. Sarah Dixey.
• Abell b. — ; m. Dinah — .
• Eliezer b. — ; m. Elizabeth Bishop. "

Edmund and the wife attributed to him buy most family trees, Constance Ireland, were our direct ancestors, the parents of Ambrose, who settled in Marblehead and married Mary Ward and later in life, Deborah, the widow of Francis Girdler. Francis and Deborah Girdler are also our direct ancestors. Their son, John, married Margaret Greenfield.

Edmund has a Find-A-Grave record that indicates his wife was a woman named Catherine. I could not determine if she was buried with him or if her name came from other records, nor could I discover who she was. I assume that if the name is legitimate that she was a second wife. Constance, if she was his first wife, of course, would have died in the Boston area at some time after her children were born.

Proof of Relationship

The genealogical records and vital records are our best proof of relationship for our direct ancestors in this family.

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 not complete in that records from this time are scant. More may be uncovered late, particularly about the children of Edmund and Constance and verification of Constance as his wife.