Nathaniel Oak's seven living children, 1729

On April 7, 1729, the judge of probate for Middlesex County sent five men to Nathaniel Oak's farm at Westborough with an order that began, "Pursuant to the Power and Authority to me given in and by the Laws of s^d Province I do Authorize and appoint you the abovenamed five Persons a Comittee to apprize the Real Estate of Nathaniel Oak late of s^d Westborough deceased Intestate." Nathaniel had died more than eight years before, apparently about February 17, 1720/21, though the inventory's day digit is unclear. The order is copied into the county's probate register under the heading "Nath^ll Oake's Real Estate Settled," and it, with the committee's return, names the surviving children and records what each received. Two earlier probate cases, opened within a year of his death, had already settled his personal estate and the children's guardianship.

Settling the personal estate, 1721 to 1722

Nathaniel's goods were settled under a separate case, numbered 16185. On May 23, 1721, three neighbors, John Banister, Thomas Ward and Joseph Wheeler, appeared before Justice Thomas How and swore "to ayprise the Estate of Nathaniel oak Deceased as the law derects."

Their inventory lists his clothes, arms, four oxen, nine cows and two calves, steers, heifers, a bull, yearlings, sheep, swine, three horses, books, beds, pewter, brass and iron, household and husbandry utensils, horse furniture, wool and tow, and money, heading the estate "who Deceased february [17?] 1720-21." The day is only a probable reading; February 1720/21 is the firmest date the heading supplies. The land and buildings came to £620 and the personal items to £215 15s, for a stated "Total" of £835 15s. The inventory date also contains an unclear digit.

On February 5, 1721/2, Judge Francis Foxcroft commissioned five men, "at the Nomination of Mary the widow" and "Jonathan Forbush of Sutton ... Guardian to all the sd deceased's Children," to apprise the real estate and set out the widow's third as her dower, leaving the remaining two-thirds "to remain for the benefit of the decd's children until the sons come of age for a compleat settlement." That clause is the only place in either case that says why a full division waited. The committee returned a value for the home place and the family's meadow and planting lots, and gave an overall figure read as "Six hundred Eighty three pounds," to be paid, like the final 1729 division, in the province's bills of credit; it does not match the inventory's £620 for land, and no paper in either case explains the difference. Dated at Westborough on March 6, 1721/2 and signed by John Keyes, John Sherman, David Brigham, Thomas Ward and James Keyes, the return was presented at Cambridge by the widow and Forbush together on March 16.

Mary Oke's account appears to record her work as administratrix. She accounted for "all and Singular the Goods and Chattels of Nathanell Oke," repeating the £620 and £215 15s figures and listing charges and debts paid, among them one "to Adam Holloway," probably her own father; his family's own story is on Mary Holloway: three marriages and a working widow. The account carries an endorsement dated March 16, 1721/2, though that is the date of its allowance, not necessarily when the account itself was prepared; its closing balance was not recovered from the page.

Guardianship, 1721 to 1729

A second case, numbered 16186, holds the children's own papers. On February 1, 1721/2, four days before the dower commission, Jonathan Forbush of Sutton and John Fay of Westborough bonded Forbush as guardian, "w^th there mothers consent & desire," of eight children of "the late Nathaniell Oak late of Westborow ... decead intestat": Mary, Anne, John, Jonathan and George, whose guardian was appointed for them "by my special appointment," and then Nathaniel, William and Hannah, whose guardian the bond says was chosen "at their own Election in all Eight." The split follows the usual practice: the judge named a guardian for children under fourteen, and older minors chose their own, although the bond does not say so.

Seven years later, two of the daughters had come of age to choose their own guardian. At Westborough on January 25, 1728/9, Mary, in her nineteenth year, and Anne, in her seventeenth, told the judge in their own two-line note that they had chosen "Joseph Wheeler," witnessed by Gershom Fay, by then Hannah's husband, and Ebenezer Hayward.

The court allowed their choice on March 17, 1728/9, with James Ball as surety in a bond of £400 for each sister, and Wheeler was separately bonded for each of them the same day.

A week later, on March 24, 1728/9, John, "a Minor in his fifteenth year," made his mark choosing "my unkill William Holloway to be my gardean," witnessed by Joseph Dowsing and William Badcock; the judge allowed it the same day, with James Eager as surety, and Holloway was bonded before witnesses John Banister and Jonathan Goodenow. William Holloway was probably Mary Holloway's brother, making him John's maternal uncle; these papers say only "unkill," without stating that he was her brother.

Forbush's own account as the children's guardian, allowed at Cambridge on June 30, 1729, is headed "The Account of Jonathan Forbush Guardian of Nath^ll William John Jonathan George Hannah Mary and Anne Oak Eight Children of Nath^ll Oake late of Westborough ... decd Intestate." He brought forward £132 0s 10d, two-thirds of the balance on Mary's earlier administration account, and added £14 for the estate's improvement, making £146 0s 10d. Against that he claimed £67 9s 6d. The items included two cows and a steer delivered to him, a £20 shortfall against an earlier appraisal of the cows, £20 paid to the widow "for her quitting her right of Dower to the whole Estate," and the charges of the real estate settlement. That left a balance of £78 11s 4d. The allowance names Nathaniel, by then "of full age"; William Holloway, guardian for John; and Joseph Wheeler, guardian for Mary and Anne, as present and satisfied. The son William, together with Jonathan, George and Hannah, is named only in the account's heading, not accounted for individually.

The order

The judge was Jonathan Remington, and the register was Francis Foxcroft. The five were John Banister of Marlborough and James Eager, Daniel Warren, James Ball and a Goodenow, all of Westborough; the Goodenow's given name is lost under an ink blot on the first page of the order, and the signature page gives it as Jonathan. The Oak entry begins partway down register page 500 and closes on the upper part of page 503; the saved image of page 500 also carries the top of an unrelated estate, which is not the Oak family's. They were to value each piece of land by itself, "in Bills of publick Credit," the paper money of the province, and then divide the estate. "It being Supposed that Mary the widow hath quitted her thirds," the order says, two shares were to go to "Nathaniel Oak the s^d Dec^d's Eldest Son," and the rest to the other children "in Six Equal Shares." Anyone who had already had something "in Advance of the Intestate" was to say so. The widow, Mary Holloway, had married Thomas Rice in 1722, and the order still calls her the widow; her story is in Mary Holloway: three marriages and a working widow.

The value

The committee reported that the estate came to "Eight hundred pounds." The home place, "where the dwelling House Stands and the Lands adjoyning to it only parted by Highways," was 356 acres and £660. The rest was small: two lots of meadow in Cold Harbour, about seven acres, £49 14s; three quarters of an acre more, £4; a fifty-five-acre "new Grant Lott," £41; a lot of cedar swamp, £6 16s; a town right of twenty-two and a half acres in Marlborough's undivided land, £4 10s; two acres in Pine meadow, £4; and three and a half acres in the River meadow, £30. The figures as written add to the stated £800.

The division

"And we have divided the same among the Children of the said Nathaniel Oak Dec^d," the return says, and then names them in order of birth, sons first.

• Nathaniel, "the s^d Dec^d's Eldest Son," received the mansion house and thirty-two acres around it, with meadow, six acres, a cedar swamp share and a town right, £200, a double share.
• John, "the s^d Dec^d's Second Son living," received forty-seven acres, meadow and swamp, £100.
• Jonathan, "Third Son living," received the seventy-eight acres "commonly known by the name of the Farm," with swamp and a town right, £100.
• George, "fourth Son living," received fifty acres and eight more, meadow and swamp, £100.
• Hannah, "Eldest Daughter," and Mary, "Second Daughter," each received fifty-seven acres, a third share of a cedar swamp and a town right, £100.
• Anne, "youngest Daughter," received a fifty-five-acre lot in two pieces, twenty-two acres beside it, a meadow lot and further shares. Her items run onto the next page and total £100, like the other single shares.

Every allotment is described by its bounds, and the neighbors read like a map of the north side of Westborough: "the Land of Jacob Rice," the swamp "lott of William Ward," the heirs of Jonathan Hayward, the meadow of "James Eager" (also one of the five committeemen) and of Joseph Rice, and the lands of Josiah and Thomas Newton and Edward Johnson. The brothers' lots are laid out against each other, George's against John's and Jonathan's, and the sisters' share the same cedar swamp, "Chaney Swamp or Birch Swamp," a third each.

Seven names and a gap

Seven of the eight children in Forbush's 1721/2 guardianship are in the division: Mary, Anne, John, Jonathan, George, Nathaniel and Hannah. The eighth, William, is not in the division. The division calls John the "second Son living," Jonathan the "third" and George the "fourth." William, the second son, was born at Marlborough in 1705, and a William Oakes, an apprentice aged eighteen, died in the burning of Captain Keyes's house at Shrewsbury in August 1723. The reference to "living" sons probably reflects William's death; the division never names him or the fire. The story of that night is told in William Oake and the fire at Shrewsbury.

By 1729 the children's lives had already begun to separate. Nathaniel Jr. had married Tabitha Rice in 1727, and Hannah married Gershom Fay the same year. Mary would marry Daniel Maynard in 1735, and John would marry Susanna Allen in 1742. Jonathan, at fifteen, chose Forbush his guardian in 1732, and George came under him in 1734, though the settlement of 1729 already names Forbush guardian for both. The records of where they went are on Where Nathaniel Oak's family went.

The return and the court, May and June 1729

The committee dated its return at Westborough on May 28, 1729, and charged for its time: Daniel Warren seven and a half days at five shillings; James Ball seven days, plus three shillings for "Charges going to Cambridge"; Jonathan Goodenow six and a half days, plus three shillings; James Eager eight and a half days, plus three shillings; and John Banister ten days, plus three shillings; with four shillings more for surveying, £10 13s 6d in all. The five signed. In the register's copy, Nathaniel Oak, by his mark, and William Holloway and Joseph Wheeler, by signature, declared "their satisfaction with the work." The original papers with their marks have not been seen.

At Cambridge on June 30, 1729 the judge's order records who stood for whom. "This day appeared Nathaniel Oak Eldest Son, Jonathan Forbush Guardian for Jonathan and George, William Holloway Guardian for John, Joseph Wheeler Guardian for Mary & Ann and said Nathaniel Says he has bought out his Sister Hannah's Right." Hannah, married two years, is the only child who appears neither in person nor through a guardian, and her share had been bought by her eldest brother. William Holloway, probably the widow's brother, and Forbush had been named guardian in 1721/2, so the two guardians already on the family's papers appear here beside a third, Joseph Wheeler. The court read the return, "all Parties declared Satisfaction," and ordered it recorded "as a Settlement of the aforenamed Dec^d Nathaniel Oak's Real Estate." It also told Forbush, who "by virtue of this former Power of Guardianship has all the Dec^d's personal Estate in his hands," to pay all the charges of the settlement.

What is missing

The 1721/2 commission says the children's two-thirds share was to wait "until the sons come of age for a compleat settlement," but no page says why the actual settlement waited until 1729 rather than an earlier year. The committee's £683 return for the real estate does not match the inventory's £620 for land, and the two figures are not reconciled here. Mary's administratrix account closes without its own balance fully recovered from the page. Forbush's 1729 guardian account's final balance is recovered and given above; that account cites "the account of the administration ... of Record Liber 16 page 372" as the source of the balance he started from; that register volume has not been examined. The judge's own signature does not appear on the page that closes the 1729 real-estate order, and the register's volume and the entry's number are not in the saved images. The account in Liber 16 page 372 remains a lead for resolving the earlier balance.

Sources

• Middlesex County, Massachusetts, probate case 16185 (Nathaniel Oake's own estate: jacket, the appraisers' oath of May 23, 1721, the inventory, the commission of February 5, 1721/2 to apprise the real estate and set out the widow's dower, the committee's return and Mary Oke's administratrix account) and probate case 16186 (the children's guardianship: jacket, Jonathan Forbush's guardian bond of February 1, 1721/2, the 1728/9 slips and bonds for Mary's, Anne's and John's own chosen guardians, and Forbush's guardian account of June 30, 1729). FamilySearch, "Probate records 1648-1924 (Middlesex County, Massachusetts)," film 007553698, images 766-782, transcribed by one researcher and read by a second.
• Middlesex County, Massachusetts, probate register, "Nath^ll Oake's Real Estate Settled," pp. 500-503: commission of April 7, 1729 (Jonathan Remington, judge of probate; Francis Foxcroft, register), the committee's return and the division. FamilySearch, "Probate records 1648-1924 (Middlesex County, Massachusetts)," film 007554526, images 277-279.
• Vital Records of Marlborough (births of the children, 1703/4 to 1719/20); Vital Records of Westborough (marriages of Nathaniel Oake and Tabitha Rice, 1726/7, and of Hannah Oake and Gershom Fay, 1727).
• Middlesex guardianship of 1721/22 and the Worcester docket for Jonathan's and George's guardianships (1732, 1734), as recorded on the research log.

The first account of the family is on Nathaniel Oak and the cabin-boy story, and the searches made for it are summarized on the research log.