The  Hulls: Reverend Joseph Hull (1594-1665) 8xggf, Hopewell Hull (1636-1693) 8xggf, Samuel Hull Sr. (1649-1734) 7xggf, Samuel Hull Jr. (1703-1661) 6xggf

Crewkerne, Somerset, England

Reverend Joseph Hull (1594-1665) 8xggf

Joseph Hull was born in April,1594, in Crewkerne, Somerset, to Thomas Hull, a yeoman, and Joane Peson/Pysing Hull. He graduated from St. Mary’s Hall, Oxford, in November,1614. He then studied theology and worked under his brother William Hull, vicar of Colyton in Devon. He married during this time, traditionally said to be to a Joanna, but the website for the Hull Society of America has an interesting page of mistakes often made with the Joseph Hull line which says there is no proof for that. In 1619 Joseph was ordained a clergyman for the Church of England by the bishop at Exeter, Devon, but the first record of his being a rector was in 1621 at the village of Northleigh, about four miles from Colyton, where he would serve for eleven years. In 1629 the wardens of Crewkerne were “presented” for allowing him to preach there without signing the Book of Strange Preachers. [Let’s don’t go there.] In 1632 Joseph resigned at Northleigh and returned home to Crewkerne. His first wife died, leaving him with several young children. Cole states that he married Agnes Hunt in 1633, but the Hull Family of America mistakes page says only the name Agnes for the second wife holds water. Joseph was apparently willing to preach anywhere, for he was continually in trouble for preaching “illegally.” At Glastonbury, he was quoted as saying that “judgement hung over the land, and that first it would fall on the clergy, and then the laity.”

In February,1635, he was expelled from the Church of England for failing to appear before the church court. The next month he gathered 106 followers, and with his wife and seven children, they boarded a ship to Massachusetts. They arrived in Boston early in May, and in July was allowed by the court in Boston to “sit down” in Wessaguscus with twenty-one families. Wessaguscus had been a failed colony up to that time. It had been attempted to settle the colony as early as 1622, but the group which Weston, the Londoner who arranged things for the Mayflower settlers, was trying for profits and sent a group without the cohesion provided by families and the Separatists/Pilgrims’ need for religious freedom. Problems arose when things got so dire that the colonists began to steal from the Indians, leading to hostilities and eventually the intervention of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. By the time Joseph Hull arrived with the 21 families, the settlement was quite small, and the Hull contingent doubled its size, and changed the name to Weymouth, which became a town with municipal rights and representation in the General Court. A church was formed with Hull as its pastor.

Joseph Hull did not please the Puritan leaders of Governor Winthrop’s Massachusetts Bay Colony. His teachings were not conservative enough, leaning more toward Episcopalians or Anglicans than Puritans. He had left England, so they expected him to be a Puritan Separatist, but he was not. In 1636 Hull moved to Nantasket, a part of Hingham. He took the oath of Freeman of the Massachusetts Bay Colony on Sept. 2, 1636, allowing him civil participation. In 1638 he was elected a deputy of the General Court for settling “small causes.” He twice represented Hingham as representative to the General Court (assembly). He was a religious and political enemy of Winthrop and considered very “contentious.” He seemed to side with the few Anglican residents, and was expelled from the colony in 1639.

Plaque in Barnstable recognizing Hull’s home and Thomas Dimmock [a name we will hear again]

Hull moved to the more tolerant Plymouth Bay Colony, and even received a grant for settling Barnstable. He is said to have preached the first sermon in Barnstable. We might suspect that John Lothropp’s entry into Barnstable from Scituate was not just coincidental, but planned as a means to move Hull out. It worked. Hull ceased all ministerial functions after Lothropp arrived. After about a year, Hull moved to Yarmouth and served as minister there. He had not notified the Barnstable church that he was doing that, so he was excommunicated from the Barnstable church.

Thereafter Hull became a sort of itinerant minister, moving from place to place, eventually living and preaching in Accomenticus/York, Maine, as well as in the Isles of Shoals, off the Maine coast, where there was no resident clergyman. Lois Williams in her book Religion at the Isles of Shoals: Anglicans, Puritans, Missionaries, UUs, and UCCs says that Hull “an early Church of England clergyman at York…occasionally visited the islands where he preached and administered the Holy Sacraments. In this Hull ran little risk of being disciplined, for he lived in the province of Maine which stoutly support Episcopalian and royalist friends.” (10-11). Eventually, however, around 1650 the Massachusetts Bay Colony brought Maine under their jurisdiction, and replaced Hull with a Puritan minister. The Hull family returned to England.

St. Buryan in Cornwall

In England Hull was given a parish at St. Buryan in Cornwall, and the family stayed there for more than a decade. Hull was eventually ejected from the parish after the 1660 Restoration of Charles II as king after Cromwell’s Commonwealth ended; there was again a greater emphasis on adhering to Church of England rules, with many ministers ejected from their parishes. Hull and his family returned to the colonies, staying briefly in Oyster River (now Durham), New Hampshire, before returning to the Isles of Shoals in 1663. He replaced his Puritan replacement there. Hull died Nov.19, 1665.

Isles of Shoals off the coast of Maine

The Isles of Shoals are a granite cluster of nine islands less than ten miles off the New Hampshire coast at the mouth of the Piscatagua River and the inlet leading to Portsmouth. The largest island, Hog Island, accounts for almost half of the 200 acres that comprise the Shoals. In the early colonial period the Shoals prospered as a commercial hub. Commercial sailing vessels arriving along the Maine/New Hampshire coast, in search of such New World commodities as timber and furs, saved valuable time and avoided the dangers of a mainland coast approach by anchoring off the Isle of Shoals where goods could be loaded and unloaded by coastal shuttles. Between 1621 and 1623, a certain David Thompson convinced many fishermen to relocate to the Shoals in that they lay closer to the cod fishing grounds by six to twenty miles than the mainland. Another advantage to the Shoals was their relative remoteness provided security from attack by local indigenous peoples and hands-on control by the colonial magistrates. At one time the Shoals supported a population of between 200 to 600 people. Appledore Township had a fresh water supply from rainwater collected in the granite fissures of its 70' elevation. The island's top soil, however, was very thin and not agriculturally viable. In the 1680's Appledore Township was abolished.

I spent some time with a website by Laurence Cook, which provided some good information on the Reformation movements in Britain that might help explain why Joseph Hull, not a real firebrand Puritan or Separatist, was nonetheless compelled to leave England twice, and also had trouble conforming with the Puritan theocracies in the colonies. It’s like so many things in life, where the devil is in the details, and religion was a realm for political maneuvering, openly or behind the scenes. One of the areas of contention in the Church of England of Hull’s time was about what was allowed on Sundays. King James published in 1618 a Book of Sports stating that archery, dancing, leaping, vaulting, May games, Whitsun ales, Morris dances, Maypoles, and the decorating of the church with rushes or greenery were permitted, but not bear or bull baiting or bowling. This was aimed at the Puritans who wanted much stricter behavior for Sundays. It also required that only those who had been to church could participate, leaving out the Catholics. The church calendars had a lot of saint’s days and other reasons for holding parish ales or revels. The church would use these events as fundraisers, providing the ale, and then use those funds to keep up the churches and to donate to the poor; this meant they had less reason to look to the Bishops or local tithes for full support. The typical Sunday was spent with sports and “revels” that many ministers considered good for the community, and on religious holidays there would be more extensive celebrations. Charles I, under whose reign the Puritans faced much greater persecution, re-issued James’ Book of Sports and included the holding of wakes as allowed. Preaching was not a part of the established liturgy; the minister was limited to the Book of Common Prayer without expounding on it. The Church establishment was afraid that without the sports and revels, people would attend sermons or sit together in their homes discussing religion or, worse, politics, things bound to lead to dissension. Bishop Pierce, Hull’s bishop, sought to suppress activities like preaching on Sunday afternoons or evenings, or to attend such sermons or talk about them afterwards. Pierce condemned a minister who had two sermons on a Sunday that conflicted with a Church ale. Another man was questioned because he preached on the day of a revel based on a verse from Joel and fasting, weeping, and mourning as the way to approach God, undermining enjoyment of the revel.

Hull’s intellectual interest in theology and his willingness to preach when and where he could, and to encourage discussions with the people who heard his teaching, put him at odds with the Bishop and those seeking to stop the tide of change in the Church of England. He had a Puritan spirit in that he wished the Church to change, but he was not enough of a Puritan to satisfy those of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The very fact that he was accepted by the people in Accominticus was one of the reasons Winthrop gave for taking Maine into the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1643. The people of the Maine colonies were generally seen by the dour Puritans as encouraging public merriment, maypoles, morris dances, wassails, drinking in general, and dress that was not austere. That Hull could minister to these people made him a target for Winthrop.

Samuel Hull Sr. (1649-1734) 7xggf  

Samuel was the youngest of three Hull brothers who left New Hampshire to settle Piscataway, NJ in the 1660s-1670s. The middle brother, Benjamin, was a successful innkeeper whose license is dated 1678, but his line does not cross into South territory nor does Hopewell’s, the oldest brother who was among the first four settlers in Piscataway. Samuel was born in 1649 to Rev. Joseph Hull and his wife Agnes, most likely in Accomenticus (later York) Maine. Monette lists him with the early settlers of Piscataway, and gives a date of 1673; he is tied to various land acquisitions, some called patents which would indicate they came from the original grant. Monette also lists Samuel Hull as a resident of early Woodbridge in 1669; we know from the map attached to Thomas South’s section that Piscataway and Woodbridge were quite close to each other. Monette also mentions that Samuel lived on Doties Creek; there was a Doty family in the area, and in fact his daughter Elizabeth married a Doty. Samuel’s own marriage to Mary Manning (1663-1692) 7xggm is recorded in many sources as well as Monette’s to have been on 16 Oct. 1677. They had eight children, including  the first son who carries our line forward, Samuel Jr. In 1685 he was coroner at the inquest regarding the death of Hopewell’s servant who drowned in the Rariton. In a document dated 1696 he is called a cooper, one who would make barrels, buckets, tubs, churns, and the like with wooden staves and metal rings. He is recorded in various deed transactions and as a creditor to Francis Drake in 1687 and to John Bonne in 1714. His death is given as “after 1734.”

Samuel Hull Jr. (1683-1761) 6xggf  and wife Margaret  There are 5 Ancestry DNA matches with Samuel Hull,Jr. as common ancestor for Bob, me, or Michael Wilson-South.

I have not been able to find a lot of information with any good documentation about Samuel Hull, Jr. Many early Hull family genealogies placed his birth as 1703, but that is incorrect. He is mentioned in the classic American Genealogical-Biographical Index or AGBI, but that is just a name and colony. A New Jersey Census of 1741 placed him not far from Piscataway, but in another county, and gives Maidenhead Township as the location; that is 13 miles from Amwell, given as both his birthplace and the place of his death. Amwell is only 21 miles from Piscataway. There is record of a will which mentions wife Margaret—who is often given as Margaret Mundy, but that is most likely incorrect—and his children. Samuel's will mentions Johanna Hull South by name. The will of Margaret, Feb. 1, 1768, provides evidence that she lived seven years beyond Samuel. In New Jersey, Abstract of Wills, 1670-1817 it has the abstract of her will giving her residence as Amwell, NJ; she divides her property between her daughters Patience Williamson, Margaret Thatcher, Mary Ann Cane, and Johanna Hull South (1734-?) 5xggm; sons Moses, Gershom, John, and Daniel Hull get 6 shillings each. The will was proved Jan. 26, 1769. Son-in-law Edmund South (1718-1785) 5xggf is mentioned by name as receiving over 7 pounds.

Resources

https://kindredconnection.wordpress.com/2018/02/19/joseph-hull/  Nice blog by K.T. Cole with lots of good documented information; makes my blog look shabby

https://www.hullfamilyassociation.org/genealogist_errors_joseph.shtml   Mistakes page for Joseph Hull researchers; this group has definite opinions about what's true and what is not

http://www.metacirque.com/laurencecook/genes/bicknell/bicknellnotes.html Cook’s website with a nice concise explanation of the forces of Reformation and Church of England history during Rev. Hull’s time.  I must say that Cook could use a good Grammar Nazi editor, but the information is sound.

https://www.weymouth.ma.us/history/pages/first-hundred-years  Article about the failed settlements before Hull

https://archive.org/details/revjosephhullsom00hull  Amy Hull’s 1904 Rev. Joseph Hull and some of his descendants available online

 https://ascendingthestairs.wordpress.com/2012/05/09/neither-fish-nor-fowl-rev-joseph-hull-part-i/  Nice blog with links to two other parts about Rev. Joseph Hull

http://homepages.rpi.edu/~holmes/Hobbies/Genealogy2/ps12/ps12_126.htm  genealogy by Mark Holmes with some interesting notes; says that Hopewell and Samuel were Quakers and calls Piscataway a Quaker colony

 https://books.google.com/books?id=I0YVAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA216&dq=hopewell+hull&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiSxvn7mr_aAhWJxVQKHbQjAdsQ6AEIKTAA#v=onepage&q=hopewell%20hull&f=false Francis Bazley Lee’s New Jersey as a Colony and as a State online

https://books.google.com/books?id=mEYVAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA194&dq=hopewell+hull+piscataway&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiRgK-IvL3aAhWKwVQKHZKkA0kQ6AEIKzAA#v=onepage&q=hopewell%20&f=false  Andrew Melick’s The Story of an Old Farm: Or, Life in New Jersey in the Eighteenth Century online

https://books.google.com/books?id=ADIUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA63&lpg=PA63&dq=first+grand+jury+in+piscataway,+nj+hopewell+hull&source=bl&ots=oIrCsm2LuR&sig=avfvldeQa1uy1hYUS2qJTB4cW1U&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi2sMLEvb_aAhWpjFQKHdKQCDcQ6AEINTAC#v=onepage&q=first%20grand%20jury%20in%20piscataway%2C%20nj%20hopewell%20hull&f=false  John Patrick Wall’s History of Middlesex County, New Jersey, 1664-1920 online.

https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.35112103455855;view=1up;seq=272 online access New Jersey Colonial Documents 1899  with reference to Thomas as cooper

https://books.google.com/books?id=1ZgYZ0Qr1IgC&pg=PA148&lpg=PA148&dq=samuel+hull+piscataway&source=bl&ots=6JPRftLgxF&sig=bP2thD_HsmvHBgdmqZlbsIJzue0&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwioiIOevLfaAhXM0J8KHfn5AoIQ6AEIPzAF#v=onepage&q=samuel%20hull%20piscataway&f=false  online access to American Marriage Records before 1699 by William M. Clemens with Samuel Hull’s marriage to Mary Manning

http://www.lawrencetwp.com/history.html Site saying that Maidenhead is now Lawrence Township, NJ

https://archive.org/stream/hullfamilyinamer00weyg#page/95/mode/2up  The Hull Family In America by Col. Weygant, 1903, online.

Freas, Margarey Huston. “Which Samuel Hull Had Patience?” The American Genealogist,Vol. 63,               October, 1994.  This article clarified the birth date of Samuel Hull, Jr.