Early Settlers of Plymouth, New England
Bumpus Family
From Edouard Bumpus (1605-1683) to
Lydia Marie (Bumpus) Hathaway (1824-1916)

  1. EDOUARD BUMPUS was born about 1605 and died at Marshfield, Plymouth Colony, between 4 July 1679 and 5 March 1783/4. He married before 1631 HANNAH ________. She died at Marshfield on 12 February 1693/4.[1]

    Edward Bompasse, a teen-age boy, arrived at Plymouth on the Fortune on 10 November 1621. He and the other 36 passengers on the Fortune joined ther 45 survivors of the Mayflower who remained after being decimated by disease their first winter. Bumpass can be an English or French name, but circumstantial evidence points to a French origin. Robert Charles Anderson wrote in The Great Migration Begins:[2]

    In the land division of 1623 and in the tax lists of 1633 and 1634, EDWARD BUMPAS is adjacent to PHILIP DELANO. The two men at a later date held adjacent land. The last three sons of Bumpas were Philip, Thomas, and Samuel, names also used by Delano. These items suggest that Edward Bumpas came from Leiden with Delano in 1621, And that the two may have had some association there before that date.
    Several members of the French Reformed Church in Leiden, Netherlands, known as the Walloon Church, joined the English Separatist congregation before they embarked on their venture to America. Philip de la Noye [Delano] was a nephew of Francis Cooke of the Mayflower, who had also been a member of that church. Jeremy Bangs, in Strangers and Pilgrims, reported finding the surname Bonpas in the records of that church.[3] All of this suggests that Edward Bumpus was of French origin, from the community of religious refugees in the Netherlands.

    Little is know of Edward's wife, Hannah. They were probably married around 1631, as their first child was born on 9 March 1631/2. Edward sold his lot in Plymouth in 1628, and paid taxes in the adjoining new town of Duxbury in 1633. In 1643 he was listed on the census of men able to bear arms in the Town of Marshfield.[4] He may not have moved from Duxbury, as the border between the two towns had been adjusted, and his property was on that line.

    Edward and Hannah Bumpus had at least twelve children in the twenty-three years from 1632 to 1654. In his later years Edward Bumpus was poor. In 1656 the town granted him the loan of a cow, and in 1663 a collection was taken to provide him with corn.[5]

  2. JOHN BUMPUS was born at Marshfield on 2 June 1636 a son of Edouard Bumpus and his wife Hannah, and died at Rochester, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, on 7 March 1715/6. He married at Marshfield before 1671 SARAH ________.[6]

    John Bumpus was the third of twelve children of Edward and Hannah Bumpus, and the eldest son. He was not always well behaved. As a teen-ager, on 8 June 1651, the court ordered him to be whipped for idle and lascivious behavior.[7]

    I have no further information on his wife, except that her name was Sarah, and they probably married sometime before 1671, as their first child was baptized on 20 Augut 1671. John and Sarah settled in the town of Scituate, to the north of Marshfield, and their first six children were baptized at the Second [Congregational] Church of Scituate (now the Unitarian Church of Norwell). By 1685 the family moved to the new town of Rochester,[8] in the southern part of Plymouth County, where their last three children were born.

  3. JOHN BUMPUS was baptized at Scituate, Plymouth Colony, on 28 September 1673 a son of John and Sarah Bumpus, and died at Wareham, Plymouth County, on 22 June 1762. He married first at Rochester about 1694 HANNAH MOREY. She was born at Plymouth, Plymouth Colony, about 1674, a daughter of Jonathan Morey and his wife Mary Bartlett. She died before July 1729 . John married second (intentions published at Rochester on 12 July 1729) JANE (LOVELL) CLAGHORN, the widow of Shubel Claghorn. She was born at Weymouth, Suffolk County, Massachusetts, on 20 July 1670, a daughter of John Lovell and Jane Hatch. She died on 16 May 1758.[9]

    The second John Bumpus was the second of nine children and the eldest son of John and Sarah Bumpus. Before he was twelve years old his family had moved to Rochester. He married Hannah Morey probably about 1694, as their first child was born 15 September 1695. About this time the family began spelling their name Bump, which continued for a few generations.

    John and Hannah had six children in the fourteen years from 1695 to 1709, and a seventh child at an unknown date. It is not known when Hannah died, but it was certainly before John's second marriage.

    In 1729 widower John Bumpus, 55, and widow Jane (Lovell) Claghorn, 58, married.

    In 1739 the eastern portion of Rochester and the southern portion of Plymouth were combined to create the new town of Wareham. The incorporation of a new town and the formation of a new church went hand in hand. On 25 December 1739 John Bumpus was enrolled as a charter member of the First [Congregational] Church of Wareham.[10]

  4. JONATHAN BUMPUS was born at Rochester on 15 September 1695 a son of John Bumpus and his first wife Hannah Morey, and died at Wareham on 15 November 1774. He married at Rochester on 24 July 1718 MARY HASKINS. She was born at Rochester on 31 October 1692, a daughter of John Haskins and Ruth Atkins. She died at Wareham on 12 November 1775.[11]

    Jonathan grew up in Rochester, the eldest of seven children. He lived his whole life in Rochester, and after the formation of the town of Wareham, in Wareham. Like his father, Jonathan was a charter member of the First Congregational Church of Wareham. However he was not always in good standing. The church records reported on 30 June 1752:[12]

    Voted that our brother Jonathan Bump (who has for a considerable time absented himself from the Lord's Table) should assign his reasons and give them unto the pastor under his hand in writing, why he has thus withdrawn, at or before our next Sacramental Lecture, to which this meeting is adjourned, that the Ch[ur]h may see whether they be sufficient, for his so doing, & to act thereupon accordingly.

    Jonathan and Mary had six children from 1719 to 1738. Their son Jonathan fought in the War of Austrian Succession, known in North America as King George's War. He participated in the capture of Louisbourg, in what is now Nova Scotia, but died there in 1746.[13]

  5. NOAH BUMPUS was born at Rochester on 27 March 1724, a son of Jonathan and Mary (Haskins) Bumpus, and died at Taunton, Bristol County, Massachusetts,on 5 December 1799. He married first at Wareham on 19 November 1747 HANNAH BUMPUS. She was born about 1727 , a daughter of John Bumpus and his wife Rebecca Hunter. She died between 1753 and 1760. Noah married second at Providence, Providence County, Rhode Island, on 24 August 1743 ELIZABETH PERRY. She was baptized at Scituate on 4 July 1736, a daughter of Samuel Perry anfd his wife Elizabeth Bryant. She died between 1765 and 1767. He married at Rochester on 10 March 1768 MARY HOSKINS. She was born about 1716-7, and died at Wareham on 27 February 1797.[14]

    Noah Bumpus had what appears to have been a chaotic life, with three wives and ten children, and died non compos mentis.[15]

    Noah Bump's first wife was his first cousin, Hannah Bump; they had three children in six years. It is not know when Hannah died. Noah began having children with Elizabeth Perry in 1756; They married in 1763, one month before the birth of their fourth child. Elizabeth died some time after the birth of their fifth child in 1765. Noah married his third wife, Mary Hoskins, in 1768, two months after the birth of their first child. They had a second child six years later.

  6. ASA BUMPUS was born at Wareham on 10 January 1761, a son of Noah Bumpus and his second wife Elizabeth Perry, and died at Wareham on 4 March 1837. He married at Wareham on 25 September 1788 ACHSAH CHUBBUCK. She was born at Wareham about 1769-70 and died at Wareham on 30 March 1845.[16]

    Born Asahel Bump, he gradually shifted his name to Asa Bumpus. He was born into a home with three half-siblings, ages 13, 11, and 6, and two siblings, ages 4 and 2. Two years after his birth he acquired a new sibling and his parents married. Some time after his fifth birthday his mother died, and before his eight birthday he acquired a step-mother.

    Asa fought in the Revolutionary War, from 1777 to 1783. He enetered a boy of 16, and left a grown man of 23. Most of his service was at West Point. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors in the Revolutionary War lists the following service records:[17]

    Bumpass, Asa, Private, Capt. William Tupper's co., Col. Titcomb's regt.; service 65 days at Rhode Island in April, May and June 1777.
    Bumpus, Asa, Private, Capt. Samuel Brigg's co., Col. Theophilus Cotten's regt., Gen. Palmer's brigade; marched to Tiverton, RI Sept. 29, 1777 on a secret expidition; service 32 days.
    Bumpus, Asa, List of men mustered in Plymouth Co. by James Hatch, Muster Master, dated Nov. 4, 1777; Capt. Sparrow's co., Col. Cyes's (also given as Col. Robinson's) regt.
    Bump, Asa, Private, Capt. Edward Sparrow's co., Col. Danforth Keyes' regt.; muster roll for Nov., 1777 dated North Kingston;
    also: same co. and regt.; muster roll dated Providence, Dec. 22, 1777; enlisted on Oct. 15, 1777 (service not given); enlistment, 6 months from July 1, 1777;
    also: same co. and regt.; service from Dec. 1, 1777 to date of discharge Jan. 2, 1778, 1 mo., 2 days; roll dated Providence.
    Bumpus, Asa, Certificate of service sworn at Wareham, Sept. 29, 1778, signed by Capt. David Nye, stating that said Bumpus was raised agreeable to resolve of Apr. 20, 1778, and marched to destination; certificate endorsed, "men raised for the 9 months service."
    Bumpus, Asa, Wareham. Private, Capt. Benson's co., Col. Rufus Putnam's regt.; Continental Army pay accounts for service from Aug. 6, 1778 to Dec. 1, 1779;
    also: Light Infantry co., Col. Putnam's regt.; Continental Army pay accounts for service from Jan. 1, 1780 to Dec. 31, 1780;
    also: descriptive list of enlisted men dated West Point, Jan. 10, 1781; Light Infantry co., Col. Putnam's (5th) regt.; age 19 yrs.; stature 5' 11"; complexion dark; hair, dark; eyes, light; residence, Wareham, enlisted July 6, 1778 by Capt. Benson; enlistment, during war;
    also: Capt. Joshua Benson's (light Infantry) co., Col. Putnam's regt.; muster roll for Jan., 1781, dated Garrison at West Point.
    Bumpes, Asa, Private, Capt. Sylvanus Smith's (1st) co., Lt. Col. David Cobb's (5th) regt.; muster roll for Feb., 1783; enlistment, during war; reported serving in place of Zaccheus Haisting.
    Bump, Asa, 5th regt.; list of men who served 3 years (no dates given).

    Back in Wareham, this war veteran at the age of 27 married 19-year-old Achsah Chubbuck, at First Church, Wareham. They had eight children.

  7. HIRAM SMITH BUMPUS was born at Warehem on 9 December 1806, a son of Asa and Achsah (Chubbuck) Bumpus, and died at Wareham on 5 June 1881. He married first at Rochester on 27 December 1827 LYDIA CURTIS SHURTLEFF. She was born at Middleboro, Plymouth County, on 26 May 1797, a daughter of David Shurtleff and his wife Mercy Atwood. She died at Wareham on 22 May 1869. Hiram married second at Wareham on 10 January 1870 MARY A. (DOAN) HOPKINS, widow of Edward Hopkins. She was born at Chatham, Barnstable County, Massachusetts about July-August 1811, a daughter of Isaiah and Mary Doan. She died at Orleans, Barnstable County, on 25 January 1891.[18]

    Hiram Bumpus grew up, and lived all his life, a farmer in Wareham. At the age of 21, he married 30-year-old Lydia Shurtleff of Middleboro. They had five children.

    Daughter Lucy married in 1848, but died in 1850 in childbirth. Two months later, daughter Harriet died from typhoid fever. Children Lydia and Hiram both married in 1851, Achsa in 1853.[19]

    Lydia (Shurtleff) Bumpus died at the age of seventy-one from chronic cystitis and old age. Within the year, sixty-three year old widower Hiram S. Bumpus married fifty-eight year old widow Mary (Doan) Claghorn. Hiram died in 1881 from senile gangrene.[20]

  8. LYDIA MARIE BUMPUS was born at Wareham on 27 October 1834, a daughter of Hiram Smith Bumpus and his first wife Lydia Curtis Shurtleff, and died at Rochester on 14 December 1916. She married at Wareham on 1 January 1851 JOHN PHINEAS KING HATHAWAY. He was born at Wareham on 11 October 1828, a son of David Hathaway and his wife Sarah S. King. He died at Wareham on 3 September 1892.[21]


NOTES

1Robert Charles Anderson, The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England, 1620-1633 (Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1995), p. 274-75. Robert M. Sherman and Ruth Wilder Sherman, Vital Records of Marshfield, Massachusetts: to the end of the year 1849. (Ann Arbor, Michigan: Society of Mayflower Descendants in the, 1970), p. 19.
2Anderson, The Great Migration Begins, p. 275.
3Jeremy Dupertuis Bangs, Strangers and Pilgrims, Travellers and Sojourners: Leiden and the Foundations of Plymouth Plantation (Plymouth, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, 2009), p. 300.
4Mrs. John E. Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," The American Genealogist, 43 (1967): 66. Anderson, The Great Migration Begins, p. 274.
5Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 67.
6Sherman, Vital Records of Marshfield, Massachusetts, p. 2. Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 69. Anderson, The Great Migration Begins, p. 275.
7Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 69.
8David Hamblen, "First Settlers of Rochester, Mass., and Their Families," New England Historical and Genealogical Register, 5 (1851): 85.
9Vital Records of Scituate, Massachusetts: to the Year 1850 (Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historical and Genealogical Society, 1909), v. 1, p. 62 (church record, Second Church of Scituate). Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 153. Vital Records of Rochester, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850 (Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1914), v. 2, p. 62. Vital Records of Weymouth, Massachusetts: to the Year 1850 (Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1910), v. 1, p. 180.
10Leonard H. Smith Jr., and Norma H. Smith, Records of the First Church of Wareham, Massachusetts, 1739-1891 (Baltimore, Maryland: Genealopgical Publishing Company, 1993), p. 4.
11Vital Records of Rochester, Massachusetts, v. 1, pp. 63,185; v. 2, p. 62. Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 153.
12Smith, Records of the First Church of Wareham, Massachusetts, p. 21.
13Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 154.
14Vital Records of Rochester, Massachusetts, v. 1, p. 64; v. 2, p. 61. Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 154. Smith, Records of the First Church of Wareham, Massachusetts, pp. 57, 73. Vital Records of Scituate, Massachusetts, v. 1, p. 293 (church record, Second Church of Scituate).
15Barclay, "The Bumpuss Family of New England," 154.
16Richard W. Griffith, "Wareham Vital Records from Town Books 1 and 2," database, RootsWeb (http://www.warehamhistory.com/WarehamGenWeb/WrhmVR.htm : accessed 9 September 2020), Asahel Bump 1:288. Centre Cemetery (Wareham, Plymouth County, Massachusetts). Smith, Records of the First Church of Wareham, Massachusetts, p. 51, e. 27. Massachusetts Archives, "Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1841-1910," digital images, American Ancestors (americanancestors.org : accessed 20 September 2017), vol. 15, p. 98, 23, Wareham Deaths, 1844-5, Achsah Bumpus.
17Commonwealth of Massachusetts Office of the Secretary, Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors in the Revolutionary War (Boston: Wright L. Potter, 1902), v. 2, pp. 799,802,803.
18George Ernest Bowman, transcriber, Wareham, Mass., Vital Records, first published in the Mayflower Descendant, v. 31-32 (1933–34), p. 10 [154]; digital images, New England Historical and Genealogical Society, American Ancestors (americanancestors.org : accessed 9 September 2020. "Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1841-1910," vol. 329, p. 342, e. 21, Wareham Deaths, 1881, Hiram S. Bumpus; vol. 221, p. 343, e. 30, Wareham Deaths, 1869, Lydia C. Bumpus; v. 227, p. 409, e. 1; Wareham Marriages, 1870: Bumpus-Hopkins; v. 418, p. 21, e. 1; Orleans Deaths, 1891: Mary Bumpus. Vital Records of Rochester, Massachusetts, v. 2, p. 62. Vital Records of Carver, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850 (Boston: New England Historical and Genealogical Society, 1911), 66.
19"Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1841-1910," vol. 38, p. 204, e. 1, Middleboro Marriages, 1848-9, Bolton-Bumpus vol. 49, p. 172, e. 12, Wareham Deaths, 1850, Lucy C. Bolton; vol. 49, p. 172, e. 17, Wareham Deaths, 1850, Harriet Bumpus; vol. 55, p. 254, e. 1, Wareham Marriages, 1851, Hathaway-Bumpus; vol. 55, p. 225, e. 3, Carver Marriages, 1851, Bumpus-Dunham; vol. 88, p. 255, e. 7, Wareham Marriages, 1855, Staples-Bumpus.
20"Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1841-1910," vol. 221, p. 343, e. 30, Wareham Deaths, 1869, Lydia C. Bumpus; vol. 329, p. 342, e. 21, Wareham Deaths, 1881, Hiram S. Bumpus.
21National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution, "DAR Genealogical Research System," database, Daughters of the American Revolution (dar.org, accessed 10 August 2019), no. 446540; member, Harriett Marie Krumholtz; ancestor: Savory Hathaway. Massachusetts Archives, "Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1916-1920," digital images, American Ancestors (american ancestors.org : accessed 13 September 2020), Deaths 1916, certificate 376, Rochester, Lydia M. Hathaway. "Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1841-1910," vol. 55, p. 254, e. 1, Wareham Marriages, 1851, Hathaway-Bumpus; . 428, p. 608, e. 67, Wareham Deaths, 1892, John P. K. Hathaway. Wareham, Massachusetts, Town Clerk, Holbrook Research Institute (Jay and Delene Holbrook), "Massachusetts Vital and Town Records: Wareham", births, 45, Children of David Hathaway and wife Sarah, 1826–39; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 11 August 2019).


BIBLIOGRAPHY

Anderson, Robert Charles. The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England, 1620-1633. Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1995.

Bangs, Jeremy Dupertuis. Strangers and Pilgrims, Travellers and Sojourners: Leiden and the Foundations of Plymouth Plantation. Plymouth, MA: General Society of Mayflower Descendants, 2009.

Barclay, Mrs. John E. "The Bumpuss Family of New England." The American Genealogist 43 (1967): 65-75,150-55, 211-16.

Bowman, George Ernest, transcriber. Wareham, Mass., Vital Records. First published in the Mayflower Descendant, v. 31-32. 1933–34. Digital images. New England Historical and Genealogical Society. American Ancestors. americanancestors.org : 2020.

Centre Cemetery (Wareham, Plymouth County, Massachusetts). Grave markers.

Daughters of the American Revolution, National Society of the. "DAR Genealogical Research System." Database. Daughters of the American Revolution. dar.org, 2019.

Griffith, Richard W." Wareham Vital Records from Town Books 1 and 2." Database. RootsWeb. http://www.warehamhistory.com/WarehamGenWeb/WrhmVR.htm : 2020.

Hamblen, David. "First Settlers of Rochester, Mass., and Their Families." New England Historical and Genealogical Register 5 (1851): 85-88.

Massachusetts Archives. "Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1841-1910." Digital images. American Ancestors. americanancestors.org : 2017.

________. "Vital Records of Massachusetts, 1916-1920." Digital images. American Ancestors. american ancestors.org : 2020.

Massachusetts, Commonwealth of, Office of the Secretary. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors in the Revolutionary War. Boston: Wright L. Potter, 1902.

Sherman, Robert M., and Ruth Wilder Sherman . Vital Records of Marshfield, Massachusetts: to the end of the year 1849. Ann Arbor, Michigan: Society of Mayflower Descendants in the, 1970.

Smith, Leonard H. Jr., and Norma H. Smith. Records of the First Church of Wareham, Massachusetts, 1739-1891. Baltimore, Maryland: Genealopgical Publishing Company, 1993.

Vital Records of Carver, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850. Boston: New England Historical and Genealogical Society, 1911.

Vital Records of Rochester, Massachusetts, to the Year 1850. Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1914.

Vital Records of Scituate, Massachusetts: to the Year 1850. Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historical and Genealogical Society, 1909.

Vital Records of Weymouth, Massachusetts: to the Year 1850. Boston, Massachusetts: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1910.

Wareham Town Clerk. Holbrook Research Institute (Jay and Delene Holbrook), "Massachusetts Vital and Town Records: Wareham". Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2019.


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