Earl's Rock

My Grandma had a brother.  He is my mom's uncle.  He was the youngest of the three children of Alfred and Martha Sullivan.  He was born Earl Eugene Sullivan in September of 1928.  When he was still a baby, he was adopted by his mom's sister and husband, Harry and Alma Allen.  They changed his name to Earl Eugene Allen.  Here he is around age 2.

When he grew a little bigger, he would run down to the end of his street and sit on top of a large rock waiting for his dad to come home from work.  He did this everyday. :)

One day when Earl was almost 6 years old, he was in the family's driveway.  The milkman came with his truck and didn't see little Earl.  Tragically, Earl passed away.  Two days later, Earl was buried in what came to be the family's plot in Wheaton Cemetery, Wheaton Illinois.  The family had Earl's favorite rock moved to the cemetery as a reminder.  Here it is.

Just this month I am writing this (Sept 2016), Earl would have been 88 years old.  My grandma and great-aunt were lovely people. I can't imagine that Earl would have been any less.  I think that my mom and aunts were robbed of having Uncle Earl in their lives, as my grandma was robbed of her brother.  I can't imagine the heartache of Harry and Alma.

Also, sometimes we may look around a cemetery and something may seem out of place.  Why is that large rose bush there?  Why is that lilac tree overgrown?  Why is there a huge rock instead of a headstone?  We don't know the stories behind these things.  They may be very meaningful to the family, just like Earl's rock.

Hate-evil

Tree branch: Pearson
Relation: My 7x, 8x and 10x great grandfathers

Good news:

1. I now have deep roots in New Hampshire.  Two of my ancestors were founding members of a town in 1640.  It's the town of Dover, which is right across the river from Kittery, ME.  However it was all part of Massachusetts to begin with, so that's even better news.  Phew!

2. I researched all the way back to my 10th great grandparents.  This is the same level as Myles Standish.  There are official town documents to back up the information all along the way.  We New Englanders never throw anything away.

3.  (I consider this next point good news.  This is debatable.) We have 3 generations of grandfathers with the first name of Hatevil.  Also written Hate-Evil.  Good Puritan men?  So you would think.

7th generation: Hatevil Hall, Jr.  (1707-1797)

8th generation: Hatevil Hall, Sr.  (1671-?)

10th generation: Elder Hatevil Nutter.  Can't beat that.  (1603-1674)

By the way, these Dover people are through Greenfield Pearson's line, the Maine part of the family. :)  My father's father's mother's father.

Bad news: 

Elder Hatevil Nutter did not like those who were not like him.  There is a documented story and poem about him instigating the whipping of 3 Quaker women.  Horrible.  I feel bad.

You can read this tragic event here:

https://www.dover.nh.gov/government/city-operations/library/history/the-whipping-of-the-quaker-women.html

Yet again, our family tree is full of surprises.

THE WHIPPING OF THE QUAKER WOMEN

In 1662 three young Quaker women from England came to Dover. True to their faith, they preached against professional ministers, restrictions on individual conscience, and the established customs of the church-ruled settlement. They openly argued with Dover's powerful Congregational minister John Reyner. For six weeks the Quaker women held meetings and services at various dwellings around Dover. Finally, one of the elders of the First Church, Hatevil Nutter, had had enough. A petition by the inhabitants of Dover was presented "humbly craving relief against the spreading  & the wicked errors of the Quakers among them". Captain Richard Walderne (Waldron), crown magistrate, issued the following order: "To the constables of Dover, Hampton, Salisbury, Newbury, Rowley, Ipswich, Wenham, Linn, Boston, Roxbury, Dedham, and until these vagabond Quakers are carried out of this jurisdiction, you, and every one of you are required in the name of the King's Majesty's name, to take these vagabond Quakers, Ann Coleman, Mary Tompkins, and Alice Ambrose, and make them fast to the cart's tail, and driving the cart through your several towns, to whip their naked backs, not exceeding ten stripes apiece on each of them, in each town; and so to convey them from constable to constable, till they are out of this jurisdiction". Walderne's punishment was severe, calling for whippings in at least eleven towns, and requiring travel over eighty miles in bitterly cold weather.On a frigid winter day, constables John and Thomas Roberts of Dover seized the three women. George Bishop recorded the follow account of events. "Deputy Waldron caused these women to be stripped naked from the middle upwards, and tied to a cart, and after awhile cruelly whipped them, whilst the priest stood  and looked and laughed at it." Sewall's History of the Quakers continues " The women thus being whipped at Dover, were carried to Hampton and there delivered to the constable...The constable the next morning would have whipped them before day, but they refused , saying they were not ashamed of their sufferings. Then he would have whipped them with their clothes on, when he had tied them to the cart. But they said, 'set us free, or do according to thine order. He then spoke to a woman to take off their clothes. But she said she would not for all the world. Why, said he, then I'll  do it myself. So he stripped them, and then stood trembling whip in hand, and so he did the execution. Then he carried them to Salisbury through the dirt and the snow half the leg deep; and here they were whipped again. Indeed their bodies were so torn, that if Providence had not watched over them, they might have been in danger of their lives." In Salisbury, Sergeant Major Robert Pike stopped the persecution of the Quaker women. Dr. Walter Barefoot, who was one of the company that went with the constable, dressed their wounds and brought them back to the Piscataqua, setting them up on the Maine side of the river at the home of Major Nicholas Shapleigh of Kittery.Eventually the Quaker women returned to Dover, and established a church. In time, over a third of Dover's citizens became Quaker.