The Peters Family of Bradford Township

Transcribed and Contributed by Nancy Piper

Gazetteer of Orange County, Vt., 1762-1888 Compiled and Published by Hamilton Child The Syracuse Journal Company, Printers and Binders, Syracuse NY June, 1888 , Page 170-173

William, Thomas, and Hugh Peters were brothers who emigrated from England to Boston, Mass., about the year 1634. Rev. Thomas, soon after their coming to this country, was settled in the ministry at Saybrook, Conn., where he patronized an academy which became Yale College, and was removed New Haven in 1716. Rev. Hugh Peters was settled in Salem, Mass, About five years; returned to England in 1640, or 1641, where he earnestly espoused the cause of Cromwell and the Parliament, in opposition to Charles I., became a man of influence and distinction, and was among those who heartily approved of the execution of that ill-fated king. After the elevation of Charles II., son of Charles I., to the throne, he was by royal authority arrested, tried on a charge of high treason, and beheaded October 16, 1660.

William, brother of the two clergymen above named, had six sons and four daughters. He lived to a great age and died at Andover, Mass. From him the race bearing the name of Peters, in New England, have mainly descended. William, Jr., his fourth son, had six sons and two daughters.

William, son of William Jr., was killed in a battle with the Indians, at Andover, leaving his widow Mary Russell, with an infant son named John, then but eleven days of age. This John Peters, when he became of age, in 1717 removed from Boston to Hebron, Conn., and by his wife, Mary, a granddaughter of the martyr Gen. Thomas Harrison, had a large family. Distinguished among these was the Rev. Samuel Andrew Peters, LL. D., an Episcopal clergyman, who was a man of ability, and during the Revolutionary war a decided loyalist. He became so offensive on this account that he found it expedient to leave his native state in haste and take a voyage to England. After the war was over he returned to this country and claimed to be, not only in title but in fact, “Bishop of Verdmont,” as he denominated this new state.

Margaret Peters, a sister of the Rev. Samuel, married John Mann, a farmer, February 17, 1765. On the 16th of the following October this enterprising young couple set out on a journey through the wilderness, to build up a home in Orford, N.H., where they arrived on the 24th of the same month. They were persons of honorable distinction among the early settlers of that town.

John Peters Jr., the eldest brother of Samuel and Margaret, was born in Hebron, Conn., in 1718. His wife, Lydia Phelps, was a direct descendant from John Phelps, secretary to Oliver Cromwell. They had a family of six sons and seven daughters.

Lydia, one of the daughters, married Benjamin Baldwin, subsequently one of the influential settlers of Moretown, now Bradford. Mary Peters, a sister of Mrs. Baldwin, married Joseph Hosford, Esq., of Thetford, and Susanna, another sister, married Col John House, of Norwich.

Their brother, General Absalom Peters, was born in Hebron, Conn., in 1754, and graduated at Dartmouth college in 1780. He married Mary Rogers, a sister of Mrs. Col. John Barron, of Bradford, and resided on a farm in Wentworth, N.H., for many years, where he took an active part in public affairs. He was, during the war of the Revolution and to the close of his life, decidedly loyal and patriotic. He died in the city of New York, in April, 1840, aged eighty-six years.

Col. John Peters, brother of General Absalom, and eldest son of John Peters, Jr., was born in Hebron, Conn., in 1740. He married Ann Barnet, and their children were one daughter and eight sons. He emigrated from Connecticut to Thetford, Vt., in 1765, and from Thetford to Bradford in 1771. In 1772 he built the first grist-mill in the town. In the troubles which soon after occurred between this country and England, and during the war of the Revolution, like his uncle, Dr. Samuel Peters, his sympathies were decidedly with the British government, while his brother, Gen. Absalom, and some or all of his sisters, were as decidedly in favor of the independence of the colonies. This set the two brothers in strong opposition to each other, and caused an unpleasant division in the family. Near the commencement of the war he emigrated to Nova Scotia, and received a commission as colonel of a regiment styled the “Queen’s Rangers,” After the war closed he left his family at Cape Breton and went to England to prosecute his claims on the government, and died there January 11, 1788.

Andrew B. Peters, the second son of Col. John, was born in Hebron, Conn., January 29, 1764, and by the course taken by his father he became a subject of the British government. From his seventeenth to twentieth year he was engaged in the king’s service in the inland naval department. Soon after the close of the war he settled in Bradford, and, January 18, 1787, united in marriage with Anna White, of Newbury, who died at Bradford a little over a year after their marriage. Mr. Peters married for his second wife Miss Lydia Bliss, then residing in Bradford, a native of Hebron, Conn., and daughter of Ellis Bliss, December 16, 1790. Mrs. Peters died in this town March 5, 1816, in the fiftieth year of her age, leaving a large family. In 1798 Mr. Peters was chosen town clerk, and held that office forty years of the ensuing forty-six years. He also represented his town in the state legislature in 1798, which position he held five years, was justice of the peace for many years, and served his town in various positions with general satisfaction for half a century. The children of Mr. Peters and his second wife (Lydia Bliss) were John, Anna, Samuel, Daniel, Hanah, William and Andrew B.

Mr. Peters married Keziah Howard, of Tamworth, N. H., his third wife, September 15, 1816. She was a native of Bridgewater, Mass., was born November 25, 1783, and resided in Bradford after her marriage for nearly fifty-six years. She died September 2, 1872, aged nearly eighty-nine years. Andrew B. had by this third marriage two sons, viz.: Joseph Howard, and Edmund Fanning. The former was born October 7, 1817, married Miss Clarissa Culver Washburn, of Lyme, N.H., November 25, 1841, and settled on the old homestead, where he still resides. He is giving his attention to the cultivation of his fine farm, the rearing of his blood cattle and sheep, with a specialty for full blood Morgan horses, of which he has as fine stock as are found in Vermont. Mr. Peters has been called by his townsmen to serve in various official capacities.

His children are Andrew Barnet, born March 10, 1843, married Miss Jennie S. Kessler, May 14, 1872, and settled in Fitchburg, Mass.; Mary Ann, born June 23, 1845, died August 20, 1846; Mary Ellen, born March 30, 1847, married Charles A. Leavitt, December 25, 1871, and resided in Bradford village; Clara Emma, born June 15, 1848, married Andrew G. Tarleton, December 20, 1870, and settled in Woburn, Mass.; Arthur W., born July 31, 1851, married Velma L. Jenkins, of Bradford, November 14, 1871, and remains of the home farm with his father; and Minnie S., born June 4, 1855, married Job Clement, of Bradford, March 17, 1872

Edmund Fanning, the youngest son of Andrew B. and Keziah (Howard) Peters, was born September 5, 1822. He married Mary Ann Slack, of Wilmington, Mass. And has had born to him a son and daughter, and resided in Charlestown, Mass.

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