Typed copy of John Conant's note, page 1: 'The grandfather of my mother was a cabin-boy'. Page 1 of the typed copy. It tells the cabin-boy account and names the cabin-boy's son, Captain Jonathan Oaks of Stow.

Word-for-word transcription (spellings kept; uncertain letters in brackets).

The grandfather of my mother was a cabin-boy on an English vessel bound to Boston. Nine miles from land the vessel foundered, all the ship's crew, except the boy whose name was Oaks, were lost. He, being a good swimmer, swam ashore. In his distress he solemnly promised the Lord if He would preserve him to get to land, he would never go onto the water again. This promise he sacredly kept. His wife,

The above account I have often heard my mother and my uncles relate.

The son of the cabin-boy was Captain Jonathan Oaks, who afterwards lived in Stow, Mass., where my mother and one other sister was born of his first wife. Captain Oaks was a stout, healthy man, a carpenter by trade. He lost three wives in Stow, married a fourth and removed to the Kenebeck country, now in Maine.

Three of my mother's brothers often visited at our house when I was a small boy. They often swung me in a swing. Their names were John, Jonathan and Daniel. Two sisters lived in Asburnham, my aunt Sampson and aunt Bigelow. The former died in Asburnham about 1793. The latter died in Crown Point, N. Y., something about 1814 [This may be 1804. The figures are blotted.].