Hannah (Baskel) Smith (abt. 1625 - aft. 1696)

Born about 1625 in England

Wife of Nicholas Phelps — married 1650 in Salem, Massachusetts Bay

Wife of Henry Phelps — married 1662 in Salem, Massachusetts Bay

Wife of James Hill — married 1676 in Perquimans, North Carolina

Wife of Joseph Smith — married 7 Mar 1696 in Perquimans, North Carolina

Descendants

Died after 1696 after about age 71 in Perquimans County, North Carolina

Problems/Questions Profile managers: T Stanton [send private message], Leila Schutz [send private message], and Michael Allen [send private message]

Biography

Hannah was a Friend (Quaker)

Hannah (Baskel) Smith was a Carolina colonist.

"Hannah Baskel was probably born in England before 1630 and died, probably in Perquimans County, North Carolina, after 1695."^[1] In the latest [2021] additions to the Early New England Families Study Project, Alicia Crane Williams gives her birth as "presumably in England, say 1625" based on her arriving to the colony about age 20 "in or shortly before 1645."^[2]

The rather lurid story of Hannah and Henry's voyage to the colony is found in an undated deposition filed with the colonial Essex court in 1652. This deposition is also the only known record of Hannah's maiden name. "Deposition of Jane Johnson: Saith yt: coming ov'r in the ship with henry Phelps & Hannah the now wife of Nich: Phelps: Henry Phelps going ashore the ship lying at the Downes: Hannah wept till shee made herselve sick because mr Fackner would not suffer her to goe ashore with Henry Phelps: & Henry came aboard late in the night, the next morning mr Falckner Chid Henry Phelps & Hannah & said was it not for y'w to let Hannah lay her head in y'r lapp but must shee ly in ye Cabbin to & called Hannah Strumpet & this deponent saith farther yt she saw Henry Phelps ly in his Cabbin & Hannah Baskel the now wife of Nich Phelps came & lay down her head by him & pull her head up again often as he lay in his Cabbin: Y when he was smocking in the Cook roome tobacco Hannah tooke the pip out of his mouth, etc., etc."^[3][4]

Hannah Baskel was first married to Nicholas Phelps in Salem between 1645 and 1652.^[2] She married 2nd Henry Phelps, the brother of Nicholas, after 18 Jul 1664^[5] before she, Henry and son Jonathan, daughter Hannah and Henry's son John moved to Carolina. She married 3rd James Hill between 1672-1676 at Perquimans (Carolina). She possibly married a 4th time to Joseph Smith on 7 Mar 1695/6 at Perquimans Quarterly Meeting^[6]. While some believe this last marriage record to be definitive, Alicia Williams lists it as "possible" without further elaboration.^[2]

A full appreciation of Hannah's life will benefit from reading the profile of her first husband Nicholas Phelps.

The earliest Quaker meetings in Salem, Massachusetts Bay were held in the home of Jonathan and Hannah Phelps. Similary, the first Quaker meetings in the Albemarle were held in Hannah's home in 1672.

In 1694 Hannah was the only one of the original family still living, it was she who proved headrights for fifteen persons transported into the county of Albemarle. They were Henry Phelps [her 2nd husband], Hannah, his wife [herself], John Phelps [Henry's son], Johathan Phelps [her son], Hanah Phelps, Jr. [her daughter], Robt. Pane, James Hill, her 3rd husband, Saml. Hill [son of James Hill], Mary Hill, Nathanl. Spivey and his wife, Judith, John Spivey, Sarah Spivey, Anne Spivey, [and] Jonathan Phelps, his freedom. This amounted to 750 acres, 50 acres per right. Hannah assigned the first six rights to her grandson, Jonathan Phelps, who was then seven years old; eight rights to her grandson, Samuel Phelps, age ten; and the last right to Robert Wilson, the executor of the estate of her son Jonathan.

In 1709 Mr. Gordon, a Church of England missionary, stated in a letter that the Quakers then numbered "about the tenth part of the inhabitants" of Carolina and in Perquimans Precinct they "are very numerous, extremely ignorant, insufferably proud and ambitious, and consequently ungovernable."^[7]

Nicholas and Hannah had the following children:

• Jonathan PHELPS was born about 1652 and died on 21 Feb 1688/1689. (see below)

• Hannah PHELPS was born about 1654 in Salem, Essex County, Massachusetts. She died between 1687 and 1689 in Perquimans County, North Carolina. Hannah married 1st James Perisho about 1672 and 2nd George Castleton in 1679/80, son of George and Mary Castleton of New Castle on Tyne, England. Hannah and George had a daughter Hannah born 13 Mar 1679.

Sources

1. ↑ Bjorkman, Gwen Boyer, "Hannah (Baskel) Phelps Phelps Hill: A Quaker Woman and Her Offspring." National Genealogical Society Quarterly 75 (1987): 289-302. Retrieved 28 August 2015 from http://pages.suddenlink.net/phelpsdna/Southern_Phelps_Research/NorthCarolina/HannahBaskelPhelpsbyBjorkman.PDF
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2} Early New England Families Study Project, NEHGS, Vol 1, $ubscription
3. ↑ George F. Dow and Mary Tresher, eds. Records and Files of the Quarterly Courts of Essex County, Massachusetts, 1636-1692, 9 vols, Salem; Essex Institute, 1911-75, 1; 267-68; Ipswich Court Records and Files, Sidney Perley, ed. Essex Antiquarian 10 January 1906; 37.
4. ↑ The Essex Antiquarian. Salem, MA: The Essex Antiquarian, 13 vols. 1897-1909. (Online database: AmericanAncestors.org. New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2006.) "Ipswich Court Records and Files" p. 37, column 2.
5. ↑ Massachusetts Land Records, Essex County, 2:89, cited by Alicia Willims, deed of Henry Phelps which indicates she had not yet married Henry.
6. ↑ Guilford College; Greensboro, North Carolina; Minutes and Records, 1680-1762; Collection: North Carolina Yearly Meeting Minutes, 1st marriage intention
7. ↑ Phelps Family, Heirs and Roots[1]

See also:

• Early New England Families. (Original Online Database: AmericanAncestors.org, New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2013. (By Alicia Crane Williams, Lead Genealogist.) Profile of Hannah (Baskel) (Phelps) (Phelps) Hill. subscription site $
• The Essex Antiquarian. Salem, MA: The Essex Antiquarian, 13 vols. 1897-1909. (Online database: AmericanAncestors.org. New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2006.) "Ipswich Court Records and Files" p. 37, column 2.subscription site $
• Moore, Margaret B. The Salem World of Nathaniel Hawthorne. Columbia[u.a.]: University of Missouri Press, 2001), P. 34 from GoogleBooks .

Acknowledgements

• Profile re-sourced and rewritten by T Stanton 1 Nov 2018 with the aid of research from Heirs and Roots Phelps Family and others. Updated: 17 Mar 2021.
• This person was created through the import of Weaver.ged on 03 January 2011.
• WikiTree profile Bassett-984 created through the import of Allen_Nauman_Achey_Jahr.ged on Oct 11, 2012 by Michael Allen.
• This person was created through the import of Weaver.ged on 03 January 2011.

NOTES AND REFERENCES - By GWEN BOYER BJORKMAN

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~monticue/hannah_baskel_life_story.htm

4425132nd Avenue SE, Bellevue, WA 98006. The writer would like to thank her fellow Phelps researchers, Dorothy Hardin Massey, Thelma Larison Murphy, Virginia Parmenter, and Clifford M. Hardin, for their assistance and encouragement.

1. Proverbs 31:2829, New American Standard Bible.

2. George F. Dow and Mary Tresher, eds., Records and Files of the Quarterly Courts of Essex County,

Massachusetts, 1 6361 692, 9 vols. (Salem: Essex Institute, 191175), 1:26768 [hereinafter Quarterly

Courts of Essex]; Ipswich Court Records and Files, Sidney Perley, ed., Essex Antiquarian 10 (January 1906): 37.

3. Charles Edwards Banks, The Planters of the Commonwealth (Boston: Houghton Muffin Co., 1930),

10708; Carl Boyer, Shtp Passenger Lists: National and New England (1600182S) (Newhall, Cal.: Carl Boyer, 1977), 144.

4. Richard D. Pierce, ed., Records of the First Church in Salem. Massachusetts, 16291736 (Salem:

Essex Institute, 1974), 9.

5. Sidney Perley, The History of Salem. Massachusetts, 3 vols. (Salem: Sidney Perley, 192427),

1:32021.

6. Perley, Ipswich Court Records, Essex Antiquarian 6 (July 1902): 11112; George F. Dow, ed. The Probate Records of Essex County, Massachusetts, 3 vols. (Salem: Essex Institute, 191620), 1:21112.

7. Dow, Probate Records of Essex, 1:18384; Perley, Ipswich Court Records, Essex Antiquarian 5 (OctoberDecember 1901): 192.

8. Rufus M. Jones, The Quakers in the American Colonies (1911; reprinted New York: W. W. Norton & Co., 1966), 6465.

9. Christine Alice Young, From Good Order to Glorious Revoluttow Salem, Massachusetts, 16261689 (Ann Arbor, Mich.: UMI Research Press, 1980), 2728; Ernest W. Baughinan, Excommunications and Banishments from the First Church in Salem and the Town of Salem, 16291680, Essex Institute Historical Collections 113 (April 1977): 9 192; Kai T. Erikson, Wayward Puritans. A Study in the Sociology of Deviance (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1966), 9192. Henry Phelps and Nicholas Phelps were witnesses to the will of Robert Moulton, Sr., dated 20 February 1654/55. Robert Moulton, Sr., and Robert Moulton, Jr., were witnesses to the will of Eleanor Trusler on 15 February 1654/55. Perley, History of Salem, 1:320, proposes that Eleanor may have been a Moulton, since the inventory of Thomas Trusler mentions one fame near fathr Moltons. (Dow, Probate Records of Essex, 1:18384, 2 10-12.) The inventory was taken 5 in [March] 1653/54, by Robt. Moulton, Sr., and Thomas Spooner. Father appears to be used as a term of respect in the Salem Town Records of 1637. Win. P. Upham, Town Records of Salem 1634-1659, Essex Institute Historical Collections 9 (January 1868): 48, reports: It is agreed That ifathMolton & in Ed: [ arile appointed Auditors.

10. Richard P. Gildrie, Salem, Massachusetts. 16261 683: A Covenant Community (Charlottesville, Va.: University Press of Virginia, 1975), 7883. Gildrie mistakenly said that Mrs. Truslers husband and children became Quakers (p. 80), but the first Quakers landed at Boston in July 1656, after the death of

Thomas Trusler in 1654. Jonathan M. Chu, Neighbors, Friends, or Madmen. The Purttan Adjustment to Quakerism in Seventeenth Century Massachusetts Bay (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1985), 11, 35 and 52. Chu recognizes that it was Nicholas Phelps whose mother, Ellen [sic] Truslar, was the celebrated dissident of the previous decade in Madmen and Friends: Quakers and the Puritan Adjustment to Religious Heterodoxy in Massachusetts Bay During the Seventeenth Century (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Univ. of Washington, 1978), 122. See also recommendation of John Endecott to Winthrop, Winthrop Papers, Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 4th ser. (Boston: The Society, 186365), 4:45556; and Salem Quarterly Court Records and Files, Essex.Antiquarian 5 (January

11. Henry Phelps probably married a daughter of Thomas and Elizabeth Batter Antrum. Elizabeth was a sister of Edmond Batter, who was a selectman and served two terms as deputy to the General Court. Batter and Antrum arrived in Salem in 1635 with a group from Wiltshire who were prominent in Salem affairs. Mr. Batter and his brother Antrum are mentioned in the town records of 1637; see Essex Institute Historical Collections 9 (January 1869): 43. In the settlement of the estate of Obadiah Antrum, son of Thomas and Elizabeth Batter Antrum, John Phelps, son of Hen. Phelps, kinsman, shares equally with Hana, wife of Isaack Burnap, sister of the deceased. The testimony mentions that Obadiahs Uncle Edmond Batter had been an administrator of the estate of his father, Thomas Antrum; see Dow, Probate Records of Essex, 2:1314. It appears that Edmond Batter was uncle to Obadiah Antrum, Hannah Antrum Burnap, and [?] Antrum Phelps (wife of Henry Phelps and mother of John).

12. George Bishop, New England Judged by the Spirit of the Lord (1661; reprinted, London, 1703), as quoted in Perley, History of Salem, 2:251.

13. Perley, History of Salem, 2:248; Dow, Probate Records of Essex, 1:21112. In addition to sons Henry and Nicholas, who were to be Eleanors executors, her will of February 1654/55 named Henrys son John and referred to (but did not name) the two children of Nicholas.

14. Sidney Perley, Persecution of the Quakers in Essex County, Essex Antiquarian 1 (September

1897): 135; William Sewel, The History of the Rise, Increase and Progress of the Christian People Called

Quakers, 3rd ed. (1774; reprinted, Philadelphia, Pa.: Friends Bookstore, 1856), 1:255; Nathaniel B.

Shurtleff, ed., Records of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England,

16281 686, 5 vols. in 6 parts (Boston: W. White, 185354), 4:pt.1:314 [hereinafter Records of Massachu­setts Bay]; and Chu, Madmen and Friends, 12

15. James Bowden, The History of the Society of Friends in America, 2 vols. (London: Charles Gilpin,

1850), 1:55.

16. Jones, Quakers in American Colonies, 64; David S. Lovejoy, Religious Enthusiasm in the New World (Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1985), 122.

17. The court testimony in Salem, Essex Antiquarian 12 (January 1908): 7277, seems to be th