Tenth Generation

1020. William SLADE was born in 1638 in England. He died on 12 October 1682 at the age of 44 in Newport, Newport Co., RI. There are varying stories among descendants about how the Slades first came to America. One story has William coming with his father Edward, and they returned to England to claim an estate left to Edward. William was abused by his stepmother in England and returned to Rhode Island, buying a farm in Portsmouth and later land in Swansea, now Somerset.

William Slade, founder of the family in this country, is said to have been born in Wales, and was the son of Edward Slade. The family appears to have been but temporarily located in Wales, as it was long identified with Somersetshire, England. William Slade appears at Newport, R. I., in 1659, when he was admitted a freeman of the colony, and became an early settler in the Shawomet purchase, included in that part of Swansea, Mass., which became the town of Somerset in 1690. As early as 1680, when the first record of the town begins, Mr. Slade was a resident of Swansea, and the meetings of the proprietors were held at his house after their discontinuance at Plymouth, in 1677. He was a large landholder, his domain including the ferry across Taunton river, which has ever been known as Slade's Ferry, and this ferry remained in possession of the family until the river was bridged in 1876, at which time it ws operated by William L. Lawton and Jonathan Slade. William Slade married Sarah, granddaughter of Rev. Obadiah Holmes;
Sarah Holmes is NOT THE DAUGHTER OF OBADIAH HOLMES: as stated in many genealogies,
but the Granddaughter. Her father was Jonathan, mother Sarah Borden.
(NOTE: The last sentence "William Slade married Sarah Holmes" must be about his son William Slade Jr. Family trees indicate that William Slade Sr. married Frances Sylvester and that William Slade Jr. married Sarah Holmes.) Frances SYLVESTER and William SLADE were married about 1662.

1021. Frances SYLVESTER was born in 1640 in Cumberland, Providence Co., RI. She died about 1693 at the age of 53.

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