Roger Sumner was baptized in Bicester, Oxfordshire, England, on 26 (not 8) August 1632, son of William[1] and Mary (Swift) Sumner.[2] [See Research Notes] By 1657 he married, probably in Lancaster, Mass., Mary Joslin, daughter of Thomas and Rebecca (Jude) Joslin;[3] they had eight known children before he died in Milton, Massachusetts, 26 May 1698. Records show that Roger was admitted to Dorchester First Church in 1656 and was dismissed to Lancaster in 1660. He tarried in the latter place until the town was destroyed in 1676 during King Philip's War. He then removed to Milton, where he became deacon of the town's first church and remained until his death, in 1698, leaving Mary a widow with at least 3 children still at home.
Children of Roger and Mary
Abigail b. 16 Nov. 1657.
Samuel b. 5 Feb. 1659.
Waitstill b. 20 Dec. 1661 married Manasseh Tucker.
Mary b. 5 Aug. 1665 married Israel Nichols.
Jazaniah b. 11 April 1668.
Rebecca b. 9 Oct. 1671 married (1) Aaron Hobart married (2) Edward Derby.
Baptism date: Roger's baptism date has been incorrectly reported as the 8th of August 1632.[5] The original parish register is difficult to read and FamilySearch, Ancestry.com and FindMyPast have transcribed the date as 25 August 1632. Here we are using the interpretation by R C Anderson in the Great Migration that register actually reads 26 August 1632.
Sources
↑Baptism:
"England Births and Christenings, 1538-1975"
FamilySearch Record: J3X5-RZ5 (accessed 5 May 2023) Film number: 007906840 > image 140 of 610
FamilySearch Image: 3Q9M-CSH7-NG69
Roger Sumner baptism on 25 (or 26) Aug 1632, son of William Sumner, in Bicester, Oxfordshire, England.
↑ Robert Charles Anderson, The Great Migration, Immigrants to New England, 1634-1635, Volume VI, R-S (Boston: New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2009), 598-604 (William Sumner) at 601; digital images by subscription, AmericanAncestors.
↑ William S Appleton, Record of the Descendants of William Sumner, of Dorchester, Mass., 1636 (Boston: D. Clapp & Son, 1879), 5, 6 (available at Archive.org) William Sumner; NEHG Register 158(2004):336–38.
↑ Holman, Mary Lovering . "Three Generations of the Sumner Family." The American Genealogist. New Haven, CT: D. L. Jacobus, Vol. 19 (1942) Page 162. AmericanAncestors (by subscription)
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DNA Connections
It may be possible to confirm family relationships with Roger by comparing test results with other carriers of his Y-chromosome or his mother's mitochondrial DNA.
However, there are no known yDNA or mtDNA test-takers in his direct paternal or maternal line.
It is likely that these autosomal DNA test-takers will share some percentage of DNA with Roger:
Thanks for the comment, Ron. I revised the date, along with a couple of other modifications, and M Cole added a citation that links to the original baptismal record at FamilySearch. It's very difficult to read, and a couple of websites of which I'm aware (FamilySearch and FindMyPast) have the day indexed as 25 August. I nevertheless agree with Robert Charles Anderson's reading of 26 August (see _The Great Migration: Immigrants to New England, 1634–1635, Volume VI, R–S_ [Boston, 2009], 601).
According to Anderson, _The Great Migration_, 6:601, Roger Sumner was baptized in Bicester, Oxfordshire, 26 August 1632; the original entry in the parish register confirms this. While the 8 August 1632 birth date presented above is certainly plausible, there is good reason to be suspicious of it. It appears that older secondary sources often present Roger's baptismal date as 8 August, and it has been translated here and elsewhere into his birth date, which presumably is not recorded.
update: Thanks Irene for changing Dean to Deacon - that makes more sense :D Still think we've got maybe a Massachusetts Sumner family mixed in with a Maryland Sumner family, but I haven't been able to make any headway in that regard.
first I've heard "Dean" in name... is this a title? Could you add some info/source? Thanks! Liz
edited by Gene Zubrinsky FASG
edited by GeneJ X
first I've heard "Dean" in name... is this a title? Could you add some info/source? Thanks! Liz