Genealogy Wylie » Major Brian Pendleton (± 1597-± ????)

Personal data Major Brian Pendleton 

• He was born about 1597 in of,MaNorth Carolinahester,Lancashire,England.
• He died about 1680/1681 in Winter Harbor,ME.
• A child of Edward J. Pendleton
• This information was last updated on August 12, 2006.

Household of Major Brian Pendleton

He is married to Eleanor Price.

They got married on April 22, 1619 at St. Martins,Birmingham,Warwickshire,Eng..

Child(ren):

1. Nicholas Pendleton  1619-????
2. Mary Pendleton  ± 1622-< 1681 
3. Joseph Pendleton  ± 1624-????
4. Caleb Pendleton  ± 1626-???? 
5. James Pendleton  1627-1709 

Notes about Major Brian Pendleton

Other records show birthplace as Watertown, Sudbury, England and place of death Saco, Maine.

According to Pendleton Genealogy he died in Winter Harbor, Maine or Wells, Maine in winter of 1680/81.

Will: Dated 9 Aug 1677; probated 1 Apr 1681. Names wife Eleanor; grandchild Pendleton Fletcher; son James; grandchild James Pendleton Jr; grandchildren Mary & Hannah Pendleton. daus of son James by first wife; grandson Brian Pendleton; Overseers: Joshua Moodey & Richard Martyn.
Witn: Joshua Moodey & Ann Moodey. Addition to will witnessed by Joseph Dudley & Joseph Moodey.

Misc: Listed as householder in Parish of St. Sepulcher without Newgate in London, England in 1625.

Martha Perry Morrissette Date: June 22, 2000 at 16:31:05
Pendleton GenForum Msg #599

"My Perry family history", written in 1937 by Charles M. Perry, includes the following about the Pendleton family:

"Brian Pendleton was born in England (probably Lancaster County) in 1599.
He came to Watertown, MA in 1634. Became a freeman 3 Sept 1634.
He died about 1681.
He was a selectman of Watertown in 1635-7, deputy to the General Court of Mass. Bay Colony in 1636-8.
He moved to Sudbury in 1638 and was deputy from that town.
He was a member of the Artillery Co. in 1646.
In 1648 he was one of a committee to lay out the Winthrop farms and held many positions as surveyor in neighboring sections.

In 1648 he returned to Watertown and was for a brief time deputy to the General Court again.
Later in 1648 he sold his property in Watertown and moved to Strawberry Bank (now Portsmouth, NH).
Later he was a trader in Kennebunkport ME.
In 1652 with Simon Bradstreet and others he was chosen by the General Court of Mass to receive Maine under their jurisdiction.
This was accomplished, after a bitter struggle, and submission to Mass. was received on July 4, 1653.
At Portsmouth he was a magistrate and deputy.
He was continually holding civil and military offices and commissions until his death.
In 1664 he was commissioned Capt. at Portsmouth, in 1668 Major for Saco Maine.
In the Indian War of 1676 he was in Winter Harbor and was instrumental in bringing about the treaty of peace with Squano and other chiefs on Apr 12, 1678.
He acquired large holdings of land near Portsmouth and Saco, ME and in what is now Westerly, CT.

Brian Pendleton, born in 1599 during the reign of Queen Elizabeth, belonged to the ancient Pendleton
family of Manchester, England -- several of whom were prominent merchants and churchmen during
the 16th century. He married Eleanor Price in 1619 at St. Martin's Church, Birmingham, England. In
1625, a householder in London when Charles I was crowned, he belonged to the parish of "St.
Sepulchre's without Newgate." Captain John Smith, adventurer and explorer, was a communicant of
this church at the time. Hugh Peters (b. 1598), a lecturer and "apostle of righteousness with reformer's
zeal" in this church, emigrated to New England in 1635.
Brian Pendleton, with his wife and children, probably crossed the Atlantic in Governor Winthrop's fleet
of eight ships in 1630. They sailed from Southampton to Salem and the mouth of the Charles River
(later Boston) settling at Dorchester, Roxbury, and Watertown.
Brian quickly became a leader. In 1634 the first record of Watertown proceedings states three persons
were chosen to order civil affairs: William Jennison, John Eddy, and Brian Pendleton. They were
known as Selectmen. In 1635 Watertown increased its Selectmen to eleven. Their duties included
dividing the land among the inhabitants. Brian Pendleton held at least one public office each year and
sometimes held as many as five or six public offices at once.
Some landholders became Freemen, or stockholders in the company, and thus gained a voice in the
colony's government. However, Massachusetts and New Haven, Connecticut, in 1631 imposed
restrictions on Freemen, requiring them to be church members. Only a fourth of the inhabitants were
church members, enabling them to be Freemen with a vote.
In 1635 Watertown decided to limit immigration: 1) no more free land to new arrivals and 2) new
arrivals henceforth shall purchase land. Brian Pendleton, who served as a Deputy to the Court of
Massachusetts from 1636 to 1638, had to enforce these new rules. Deputies to the Court were chosen
by towns. Assistants to the Court were elected by Freemen. During Brian Pendleton's time, the
Massachusetts Bay General Court dealt with the following matters:
1. Levy general tax for building stockade around Newtown (Cambridge).
2. Fine or imprisonment for those absent from church services.
3. Banishment of John Smith for "diverse dangerous opinions".
4. Banishment of Roger Williams for antagonism to Government ("free thinking and pugnacious").
5. No new churches established without Magistrate approval and approval of the majority of elders of
existing churches.
6. Empower Freemen to dispose of their own lands, choose their own officers, make such local
ordinances as might be necessary.
In 1638 the more liberal inhabitants of Watertown (fifty four families) migrated up the Charles River en
route to Concord and established Sudbury. They sold their homes and improved land in Watertown,
establishing a new settlement. The local Indian chieftain, Cato (Karte), gave them a deed in 1639. The
Pendletons built their home east of the river on Pendleton Hill, now Mt. Pleasant Cemetery.
Sudbury grew quickly. A grist mill was established in 1639 by giving 40 acres of land, frame and
planking to the mill operator. In 1640 a church was organized with Edmund Brown as pastor. A
meeting house was built in 1643, erected by the house holders themselves as a community project. In
1640 the first bridge was built across the river to facilitate commerce in the community.
A "train band" was organized for defense and all able-bodied men were enrolled except magistrates,
clergy, and workers in fisheries and ship-building. Weekly military drills were held as well as contests
in marksman-ship. Lieutenant Brian Pendleton was one of the founders of the Military Company of
Massachusetts, according to the 1648 records. He was appointed by the General Court to drill the
military company of Sudbury. He served as Selectman and as Commissioner of Sudbury to 1646, then
returned to Watertown where he served as Deputy in 1647 and 1648. He moved to Topsfield,
Massachusetts, and served in civil affairs 1648 and 1649.
Next he moved to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where he was appointed Associate Justice from 1651
to 1665. He also served as Selectman from 1652 to 1662 and Commissioner and Commander of the
military company. He was also selected as Justice at Kittery, Maine. He served on the "annexation
commission" to Maine from Massachusetts and was Deputy to the General Court of Massachusetts
from 1653 to 1663. He was town treasurer of Portsmouth from 1654 to 1663.
After giving his goods, houses, warehouses, wharves, and lands in Portsmouth, New Hampshire,
Westerly, Rhode Island, and Sudbury, Massachusetts, to his son James, Brian Pendleton moved to
Winter Harbor (Saco) Maine, in 1665 where he was chosen Selectman 1666 and 1667, elected a
Burgess to General Court of the Province of Maine in 1667, appointed surveyor of highways, served as
Major of York County regiment in 1668, Associate Justice of the Province of Maine 1668 to 1676,
town clerk of Saco in 1672, and assessor of taxes at Saco in 1676, and became deputy president of the
Province of Maine in 1680.
He returned to Portsmouth in 1676 with his wife because of the Indian War. He remained in
Portsmouth 1677 to 1678 then returned to Saco to review the devastation wrought by the Indians. He
died the winter of 1680-1681 at the age of 81.
Brian Pendleton was an active and energetic man, acquisitive and generous, devout and pragmatical in
every sense of the word with a long career in public affairs. He was somewhat inclined toward
liberality in his earlier days, but later became an ardent partisan, a typical Puritan, and engaged in
enforcing the laws. He became involved in maintaining authority over the non-Puritan settlements
which Massachusetts absorbed "at the Eastward" -- Portsmouth, New Hampshire, and Maine. During
these years he became engaged in foreign commerce by sailing ships, including exporting timber and
importing rum and sugar from Barbados.

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Timeline Major Brian Pendleton

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