Samuel Lincoln - Life and Family in Massachusetts

Life and Family in Massachusetts

Samuel Lincoln helped to build the Old Ship Church in Hingham. He married Martha Lyford of Ireland around 1649, possibly the daughter of the Rev. John Lyford, and the couple had eleven children, three of whom died in their infancy, but another three of whom lived into their eighties. Lincoln's eldest son, born August 25, 1650, was also named Samuel. The emigrant Samuel Lincoln's fourth son was Mordecai Lincoln, who became a blacksmith, and who was the ancestor of Abraham Lincoln. Genealogists have noted the common and repeated use of certain Biblical names in the Lincoln family, particularly Abraham, Samuel, Isaac, Jacob, and Mordecai, a common practice among early Puritan settlers in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Many later Lincoln descendants, including the original emigrant's son, were named Samuel in succeeding generations.

Interestingly, Samuel's mother also belonged to a family long associated with American government: the Gilmans of Exeter, New Hampshire. Samuel's mother Bridget Gilman was the daughter of Edward Gilman of Hingham, Norfolk, England, whose son Edward Gilman Jr. emigrated to Hingham, Massachusetts, later to Ipswich, Massachusetts and finally to Exeter, where he and his family became prominent businessmen, elected officials and, later, ardent Revolutionary War patriots. Nicholas Gilman, a signer of the U.S. Constitution, was a member of this family.