Lt.
Ephraim
Morton
Born about [location unknown]
Ancestors 
Son of George Morton
and Julian (Carpenter) Kempton
Brother of
Nathaniel Morton, Patience (Morton) Faunce, John Morton, Sarah (Morton) Bonham and Joseph Morton
Husband of
Ann (Cooper) Morton
— married
18 Nov 1644 (to 1691) in Plymouth, Plymouth Colony
Husband of
Mary (Shelley) Cole
— married
18 Oct 1692 in Plymouth, Massachusetts Bay Colony
Descendants 
Father of
George Morton, Ephraim Morton II, Rebecca (Morton) Wood, Josiah Morton, Mercy (Morton) Rickard, Nathaniel Morton, Eleazor Morton, Joanna (Morton) Gray, Thomas Morton and Patience (Morton) Nelson
Died
at about age 70
in Plymouth, Plymouth County, Massachusetts Bay Colony
Profile managers:
Carolyn Adams 
[send private message], Allan Morton [send private message], and Katherine Sullivan [send private message]
[send private message], Allan Morton [send private message], and Katherine Sullivan [send private message]Profile last modified
| Created 5 Jan 2011
This page has been accessed 5,005 times.
Contents |
Biography
Ephraim Morton immigrated to New England as a child during the Puritan Great Migration (1621-1640).
Birth
According to Anderson's "Great Migration" entry for Ephraim's father George, Ephraim Morton was born by about 1623.[1] While George took part in the 1623 Plymouth land division, there is no proof of where Ephraim was born; in England or in Plymouth or on a ship. This profile previously asserted that he was born onboard the "Anne" but it is not entirely certain his father was on the Anne and in any case no indication is seen in primary records yet discovered exactly when and where Ephraim was born. Leon Clark Hills in his history of the colony placed George Morton and a few others on the "Little James" which also arrived in 1623.[2] See "Research Notes" for more on the two ships.
His father, George Morton, was a Puritan separatist and one of the Pilgrim "Saints" of Leiden, Holland, but remained at Leiden and looked after various of the Pilgrims' interests there after the sailing of the Mayflower. George came to New England on the 'Anne'[1] or on the "Little James"[2] Upon his father’s death in 1624, Ephraim was probably adopted by Governor Bradford: his mother was one of the Carpenter girls, another of whom was Bradford's wife. The Governor was thus Ephraim's uncle, and the boy was raised in the Bradford household; his mother was remarried, to Manasseh Kempton, in 1627.
Marriage & Children
Ephraim Morton married Anne Cooper as his first wife on 18 Nov 1644 likely at Plymouth according to "New England Marriages to 1700". Torrey said this about the union:
MORTON, Ephraim2 (1623-1693) & 1/wf Ann COOPER (-1 Sep 1691, 6 Sep); 18 Nov 1644; ?Plymouth[3] The marriage with his second wife appears on the same page of Torrey stating:
MORTON, Ephraim (1623-1693) & 2/wf Mary (SHELLEY) HARLOW, w William; m/3 Hugh COLE 1694; 18 Oct 1692, m cov 11 Oct; Plymouth[3]
Children legible in his water-damaged will along with second wife Mary were:
- Patience, wife of John Nelson
- Marcy (sic)
- George
- Josiah
- Nathaniel
- Thomas
- Eliazar (sic)
Colony Life
The information in this section does not have a specific source, some of it appears in a web page dedicated to the descendants of George Morton[4] which does not state it's sources but likely comes from various volumes of "Plymouth Colony Records" (Shurtleff).
Ephraim was made a freeman of the colony on the 7th of June, 1648; elected Constable for Plymouth, 1648; named a member of the Grand Inquest ,1654; and elected representative to the Plymouth General Court in 1657. He remained a member of the Court for 28 years.
In 1691-2 when Plymouth Colony was merged into Massachusetts Bay, Ephraim was chosen one of the first representatives to the General Court. He was head of the Board of Selectmen of Plymouth for nearly 25 years and Magistrate of the colony in 1683; and at the time of his death he was a Justice of the Court of Common Pleas. He was Sergeant of the Plymouth Military Company, elected Lieutenant in 1664, and in 1671 chosen a member of the ‘Council of War,’ in which he was of much service for many years -- including the time of King Philip’s War. For many years he was a deacon of the Plymouth Church, having been chosen on the first day of August, 1669, and serving until his death.
Death & Estate
Lieutenant Ephraim Morton died at Plymouth on the 5th of October, 1693.[5][6]
The first and last parts of the original September, 1693, handwritten will of Ephraim Morton, Senior, are partially water-damaged;[7] the name of his second wife Mary was once surely present in a damaged line that begins, at the left margin, "unto my deare and Loveing...", but all that can be clearly read of the bequest to her is "... the Sum of Ten...". Son Ephraim may also have been named in a missing segment of the line following; in the next, however, mention of daughter Patience (Morton) Nelson is readily inferred from the phrase, "... Wife of John Nelson...". Mentioned in the first mostly-legible section are a "[d]aughter Marcy [sic]", followed by son George -- to whom are left some "acres of land that [were giv]en to me by the Inhabitants of the Town of Plim[oth]", and then Josiah, Nathaniel, Thomas, and Eliazar [sic], also bequeathed various parcels of land. "Unto all the Rest of My Children" is left "such a part to Each of them of My Estate as I have thought fitt to be their full portion of My Sd Estate." His inventory was taken on 1 November 1693.[8]
The marriage agreement between Ephraim and Mary was recorded in the probate records of the town. On 11 October 1692, Ephraim signed and Mary Harlow made her mark on the document.[8]
Research Notes
Immigration: Anderson in "Great Migration"[1] cites Plymouth Colony Records Vol 12 p. 6[9] which does indeed list a group of people receiving land as passengers of the "Anne" and shows George Morton receiving 8 acres along with Experience Mitchell (perhaps 6 for George, wife and 4 children). However, Leon Hills lists the "Little James" as a smaller ship built to remain in the Colonies and not return to England which carried only 10 passengers. The captain was E. Altham, the master John Bridges. The ship was only 44 tons and supposedly took 90 days to make the crossing. He included John "Jenny" (Jennings), William Bridges and Edward Burcher & wife as the other passengers along with "George Morton, merchant, Harworth, Notts County" and "Mrs. Juliana Morton". Hills lists Experience Mitchell as being a passenger on the "Anne". Charles Edward Banks in his book covering early ships[10] also asserts that George Morton was on the Little James but does not give details on why he believed this.
Most web-sites describing these ships state that they arrived a week or 10 days apart (the "Anne" first) and they co-mingle the passengers, noting that the "Little James" carried mostly cargo and only a few passengers. There seems to be little practical difference in which ship the Mortons traveled on and passengers of both ships were grouped together in the 1623 land division so the description of them in Plymouth Colony Records as passengers of the "Anne" should not be considered definitive. See Wikipedia article on the Anne and Little James.
Sources
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633, Volumes I-III. (Online database: AmericanAncestors.org, New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2010), (Originally Published as: New England Historic Genealogical Society. Robert Charles Anderson, The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633, Volumes I-III, 3 vols., 1995). entry for George Morton p 1296- (link for subscribers)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Hills, Leon Clark,. History and genealogy of the Mayflower planters and first comers to ye olde colonie. Washington, D.C.: Hills Pub. Co., c1936-c1941.Vol 1. p. 86 $subscription and free image courtesy of ancestry.com
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 New England Marriages to 1700. (Online database. AmericanAncestors.org. New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2008.) Originally published as: New England Marriages Prior to 1700. Boston, Mass.: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2015. Vol 2. p. 1065
- ↑ Descendants of George Morton and Juliana Carpenter web site Ephraim Morton page
- ↑ "Massachusetts Deaths and Burials, 1795-1910", database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FHYX-JM9 : 17 January 2020), Left Ephraim Morton, 1693.
- ↑ van Antwerp, Lee D (comp.). Vital Records of Plymouth Massachusetts to the year 1850. Ruth Wilder Sherman (ed.) (Camden, Maine: Picton Press, 1993 [https://www.americanancestors.org/DB190/i/14012/135/253514917 p. 135 Link at AmericanAncestors ($)]
- ↑ NEHGS; broadsheet will of Lieut. Ephraim Morton, is presented in split images: Plymouth County, MA: Probate File Papers, 1686-1881.Online database. AmericanAncestors.org. New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2015. (From records supplied by the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Archives.); left image, https://www.americanancestors.org/DB1558/i/20954/14264-co4/45472876, and right image, https://www.americanancestors.org/DB1558/i/20954/14264-co5/45472877 (both by subscription)
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 "Massachusetts, Plymouth County, Probate Records, 1633-1967," images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-897D-JD6Q : 20 March 2023), Probate records 1686-1702 and 1849-1867 vol 1-1F > image 96-97 of 490; State Archives, Boston.
- ↑ Records of the colony of New Plymouth, in New England by New Plymouth Colony; Massachusetts. General Court; Shurtleff, Nathaniel Bradstreet, 1810-1874, ed; Pulsifer, David, 1802-1894, ed Publication date 1855 Vol. 12 p. 6
- ↑ The English ancestry and homes of the Pilgrim Fathers who came to Plymouth on the "Mayflower" in 1620, the "Fortune" in 1621, and the "Anne" and the "Little James" in 1623 by Banks, Charles Edward, 1854-1931 Publication date 1962 p. 149
See also:
- Find A Grave: Memorial #55075606 very lightly sourced memorial without a headstone photo
Is Ephraim your ancestor? Please don't go away!
Login to collaborate or comment, or
contact
a profile manager, or
ask our community of genealogists a question.
Login to collaborate or comment, or contact
a profile manager, or ask our community of genealogists a question.
Sponsored Search by Ancestry.com
DNA
No known carriers of Ephraim's DNA have taken a DNA test.
No known carriers of Ephraim's DNA have taken a DNA test.
Have you taken a DNA test? If so, login to add it. If not, see our friends at Ancestry DNA.
Ephraim is 19 degrees from Emeril Lagasse, 18 degrees from Nigella Lawson, 19 degrees from Maggie Beer, 41 degrees from Mary Hunnings, 24 degrees from Joop Braakhekke, 23 degrees from Michael Chow, 19 degrees from Ree Drummond, 19 degrees from Paul Hollywood, 17 degrees from Matty Matheson, 20 degrees from Martha Stewart, 29 degrees from Danny Trejo and 23 degrees from Molly Yeh on our single family tree. Login to find your connection.
Please feel free to improve the profile(s) by providing additional information and reliable sources. PGM encourages the Profile Managers to monitor these profiles for changes; if any problems arise, please contact the PGM Project via G2G for assistance. Please note that PGM continues to manage the parent's profile, but is happy to assist on the children when needed.
Known passengers on board the Little James in 1623
George Morton – historically famous to Plymouth Colony by being revealed as the author (possibly with William Bradford and Edward Winslow) of Mourt’s Relations, a manuscript of life and times from the earliest colony days, published in England in 1622. Morton was of York or Nottinghamshire in the north of England. He married Juliann Carpenter, then about twenty-five, in Leiden on July 22, 1612. She was the eldest of the five daughters of Alexander Carpenter of Wrington, co. Somerset in England and of Leiden in Holland. Juliann’s sister Alice was on the ship accompanying the Little James, the Anne. She came as a widow but soon married Governor Bradford. The Thomas Morton who came over on the Fortune in 1621 may have been his brother with the Thomas Morton Jr. who came on the Ann possibly being Thomas’s son and George’s nephew. Morton died in June 1624, about a year after arriving in Plymouth. In the 1627 Division of the Cattle, the Morton children are listed with his wife Juliann now listed under her second husband’s surname as “Julian Kempton” (Stratton).[83][84]
Juliann * (Carpenter) Morton – Per Banks she was baptized in March 1584 at St. James church in Bath, co. Somerset. After her husband’s death in 1624 she married “Manasseh” Kempton. In the 1627 Division of the Cattle she and her second husband are listed along with the five Morton children. She died in Plymouth, February 19, 1664. Note: other writers report her name as Juliana (author Stratton) or Julian (author Banks). Johnson reports her name in the 1627 Division of the Cattle as “Juliana Kempton.”[84][85][86]
11. Nathaniel Morton (age 10). He later became Secretary (Clerk) of the Plymouth General Court. He married Lydia Cooper, sister of John Cooper, husband of his aunt Priscilla (Carpenter) Wright Cooper.[87]
12. Patience Morton (age 8). In the 1630s she married John Faunce, an Anne passenger.[87]
13 John Morton (son) aged 6.
14 Sarah Morton (age 3). She married William Dennis on December 20, 1644.[88][89]
15 Ephraim Morton (infant). He married Ann Cooper, daughter of his aunt Priscilla (Carpenter) Wright Coope
edited by Faylene Bailey
edited by Faylene Bailey
Activity feed check
2nd wife Mary is not visibly mentioned in the 1693 will; I assume this is because her name was in the damaged or cut-off sections. There is however a _daughter_ Mary prominently mentioned ahead of all the (visible) sons and we do not yet show her among the offspring on this profile. Ephraim (II) is not visible.
I will shortly add a par. to the narr. Bio summarizing what can be gleaned from the will.