Person Sheet


Name Rev. *Stephen BATCHILER , Sr., 12G Grandfather
Birth abt 1561, England. Earliest in this line.
Death 1656, London, England
Burial 31 Oct 1656, Allhallows Staining Church Cemetery, London, England79
Occupation CLICK NAME FOR NOTES - Puritan Minister
Education Matriculated abt 1581 at Oxford from St. John's College, and received his B.A. 3 Feb 1585/6
Spouses:
1 *Anne WIFE OF STEPHEN BACHILER, 12G Grandmother
Death 1611
Children: *Ann
2 2nd Wife of Stephen BATCHELOR
3 Mary, 3rd Wife of Stephen BATCHELOR
4 4th Wife of Stephen BATCHELOR
Marriage aft 1650, England
Notes for Rev. *Stephen BATCHILER , Sr.
460Founder of Hampton, New Hampshire in 1638. He sailed from London March 9, 1632 and arrived at Boston, MA. on the ship "William and Francis" on June 5, 1632.
For several links to pages about Stephen Batchiler, go to http://www.hampton.lib.nh.us/hampton/biog/bachilertoc.htm . For more information from "The History of Hampton, N.H." by Joseph Dow, go to http://www.hampton.lib.nh.us/hampton/distory/dow/chap19/dow19_1.htm .
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[The following words were read by his descendant, F. B. Sanborn, of Concord, Mass., at the reunion of the Bachelder family, Seabrook, N. H., August 9, 1900.] "Mr. Bachiler wished some freedom of conscience, -- some escape from the intolerance of England; but he was in the jurisdiction of Massachusetts and had to obey. In 1635, having continued to preach in Lynn, he was again taken in hand, and agreed to leave Lynn and he settled elsewhere. He received a call to Ipswich, but did not go, at least as minister; he was living there, however, when Rev. R. Stausby, a silenced Puritan in England, wrote to his friend Wilson in Boston, April 17, 1637, complaining, on the report of others, "that many of the ministers are much straited with you; others lay down the ministry and become private members, as Mr. Bachiler, Mr. Jenner, and Mr. Nathaniel Ward. You are so strict in admission of members to your church that, at more than one half are out of your church in all your congregations; this may do much hurt if one come among you of another mind and they should join with him." From Ipswich, in the winter of 1637_'38, Mr. Bachiler, still seeking to found a plantation, went on foot to what is now Barnstable, six miles beyond Sandwich on Cape Cod, -- 100 miles from his place in Ipswich. But, as Winthrop says, "He and his company, being all poor men, finding the difficulty, gave it over, and others undertook it." He then removed to Newbury, where he and Mr. Hussey owned land, and in October, 1638, having permission from the Massachusetts authorities to begin a plantation at Hampton, he went there with young John Winthrop and laid out the town, of which he at once became the pastor, receiving from the settlers a grant of 300 acres of land. A meeting-house was built, to which he gave a bell, and he built himself a good house and removed his library thereto. He was now seventy-eight years old, and his troubles seemed to be over; he might hope for rest at last under his own vine and figtree. ...

"I see not how I can depart hence" (that is from Hampton, to accept one of two calls he had received, to Casco and to Exeter), "till I have, or God for use, cleared and vindicated the cause and wrongs I have suffered of the church I yet live in; that is, from the Teacher, who hath done all and been the cause of all the dishonor that hath accrued to God, shame to myself, and grief to all God's people, by his irregular proceedings and abuse of the power of the church in his hand, -- by the major part cleaving to him, being his countrymen and acquaintance in old England. My cause, though looked slightly into by diverse Elders and brethren, could never come to a judicial searching forth of things, and an impartial trial of his allegations and my defence; which, if yet they might, I am confident before God, upon certain knowledge and due proof before yourselves. The Teacher's act of his excommunicating me (such as I am, to say no more of myself), would prove the foulest matter, -- both for the cause alleged of that excommunication, and the impulsive cause, -- even wrath and revenge. Also, the manner of all his proceeding throughout, to the very end, and lastly his keeping me still under bonds, -- and much worse than here I may mention for divers causes, -- than ever was committed against any member of a church. Neglecting of the complaints of the afflicted in such a State, -- wherein Magistrates, Elders, and brethren all are in the sincerest manner set to find out sin, and search into the complaints of the poor, -- not knowing father nor mother, church nor Elder, -- in such a State, I say, -- in such a wine-cellar to find such a cockatrice, and not to kill him, -- to have such monstrous proceedings passed over, without due justice, -- this again stirs up my spirit to seek for a writ ad melius inquirendum. Towards which the enclosed letter tendeth, as you may perceive. Yet if your wisdoms shall judge it more safe and reasonable to refer all my wrongs (conceived) to God's own judgment, I can submit myself to be overruled by you. To conclude, -- if the Apostle's words be objected, that this is thanksworthy, if a man for conscience sake shall endure grief, suffering wrongfully, -- and therefore I ought to endure, without seeking any redress or justice against the offender, -- I profess it was more absolutely necessary so to suffer, when the Church had no civil power to seek unto, than in such a land of righteousness as our New England is."
This manly appeal ought to have reached Winthrop's heart, -- for he had occasion, a few years later, to stand up and clear himself in a Boston court, upon rather grave charges of partiality in office; and he did this, he said, that his posterity might not blush for him when he was no more. ... Said I to my wife, considering what a calling I had, some 14 years agone, by that Company of the Plough, there to sit down with them, not as a Planter only, but as a Pastor also; and considering how the Lord shoved me from New Town to Saugus (upon that disaster which happened to the goods of the Company, by the false dealing of those entrusted by us with the Plough Ship, and our goods therein) -- then from Saugus to Newbury, then front Newbury to Hampton; and now seems to do the like from Hampton to the very place itself (Casco), -- all the former shovings and removings being still directly towards that place, -- this, I thought in my mind, might have some resemblance to the Pharisees dealing with my Lord and Master."
This thought occurred to him, he says, from a sermon of Brother Cotton's, in which he argued that all the proceedings of the Scribes and Pharisees "did but thrust and shove at Christ, till they had thrust him into that very place to which the Father had appointed him." But then, he proceeds, he could not be sure that this was really God's purpose, -- "seeing the intervenient callings were also of God, and the last, to Hampton, not least certain to me to be of God; also the last two removals not being so properly from God, as from Satan and some unjust instruments. This now, from Hampton to Casco, may be, after a sort, forced by like unjust proceedings, as well as by an honorablecalling from Casco, and like honorable advice from you." He therefore desires the advice and good will of Cotton, Winthrop, and the other church members at Boston, and goes on to say:

"I have sent them of Casco this answer briefly, -- I purpose, God willing, to come and confer with them about the last week of the next month, our first (January, 1644), and that the will of God shall overrule use against all the difficulties of the case. And indeed the being of my dear brother Jenner and Mr. Wheelwright established in those parts is not a weak motive to drive, or a cord to draw me that way."
Source: "The Hard Case of the Founder of Old Hampton - Wrongs of Rev. Stephen Bachiler",
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According to "The Puritan Republic of the Massachusetts Bay" by Daniel Wait Howe, 1899, pg. 123 "Mention has been made of the causes for divorce. In at least one instance the General Court made the singular experiment of trying to compel a husband and wife to stick to each other. This was in the case of the Rev. Stephen Batchelor, of Lynn, who, when nearly ninety years old, married a third wife.
Matrimonial troubles followed, and in 1650 the General Court ordered 'that Mr. Batchelor and his wife shall lyve together as man and wife, as in this Court they have publiquely professed to do, and, if either desert one another, then hereby the Court doth order that ye Marshall shall apprehend both said Mr. Batchelor and Mary, his wife, and bring them forthwith to Boston, here to be kept till the next Quarter Court of Assistants.' But the tricky octogenarian got away, after all, went to England, married another wife, and persisted in living on. Six years later, the disconsolate Mary, having become convinced apparently that there was no other relief, presented her petition to the General Court for a divorce."
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