Week # 8 - Hosea Joyce (1642 - bef. 1712)
An ancestor a week for 52 Weeks! #52ancestors
Hosea Joyce, our 6th great-grandfather, is my ancestor of choice for week 8 of this great challenge. I am studying the children of those involved in the Puritan Great Migration. Hosea is the son of migrants John Joyce and Dorothy Cotchet. John Joyce is one of the first men to settle Sandwich on Cape Cod in 1637. He took the oath of fidelity and was on the list of those 16 to 60 able to bear arms in Sandwich.[1] This same year, 1643, he removed to Yarmouth, Massachusetts where he also appears on the list of men able to bear arms. When John arrived in Yarmouth I am sure he had the good fortune of attending church with our 7th great-grandfather, Richard Sears and his family.
All able bodied free men between the ages of 16 and 60 comprised the colonial militia. Service in the militia was an obligation as a citizen and militiamen were not paid. The town militia companies would muster for training on a regular schedule. “The frequency of training varied. In the early seventeenth century it could be as frequent as once a week in Massachusetts … but decreased as time went on, to a few days throughout the year.” A 1693 Massachusetts law specified Regimental musters "but once in Three Years.” That must have been a sight to see in Barnstable village! I can just picture John and son Hosea lined up in the ranks practicing his Majesty's Manual Exercise, an extensive ritual of 35 steps including: Poise your firelock. Cock your lock. Present. Fire! Half-cock your firelocks. Handle your cartridge!?
One requirement for you to be "able bodied" was to have at least one tooth on top of your jaw and one in proximity on the bottom jaw to allow you to tear the powder cartridge open during loading of your firelock. One fellow on Yahoo says gunpowder tastes sharp and peppery, with a definite metallic flavor.
John and Dorothy had four children and Hosea was their only son. Hosea was probably born in Sandwich about 1642 when his father is about 27 and mother, Dorothy, a little older.
There is a great article in the The American Genealogist, 1967, which includes Hosea's will.[3] Hosea was a constable in Yarmouth in 1672 [4]. "It is said he was a man of influence and means in Yarmouth and it would seem likely that this is true." However his will describes him as Yeoman rather than Mister. A yeoman was someone who was settled, staid, married and engaged in earning a living from the soil.[5] A gentleman, called Master (abbr. Mr.), had the ability to live without manual toil, usually ministers, landowners or successful merchants.
Hosea is in Yarmouth at the time of his death and again, his will, written 24 Jan 1712 is preserved in the old Plymouth colony archives at the Barnstable courthouse.[6] Hosea's first wife, Martha dies when their first child is only 3 years old. Hosea marries second, Elizabeth Chipman (subject of last week's profile), and they have ten more children. You might recognize the name Chipman as Elizabeth is the oldest of eleven children of John and Hope (Howland) Chipman. Elizabeth is granddaughter of Mayflower passengers, John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley. As mentioned last week, when Hosea dies he requires his sons to pay their mother £10 yearly. Son Thomas is our 5th great-grandfather and his contribution to his mother's allowance is only 30 shillings. Thomas gets his mother's part of the house when she dies along with several small parcels of land near the house and with his brother, Samuel, the barn, barnyard and stockyard. I hope they were good friends and able to share the homestead.
You may wonder why the Joyce surname is not common on Cape Cod? Two of Hosea's sons died without issue. The Joyce family name "daughters out" when the other two sons combine to have seven daughters and one son, who also dies without issue. Hosea ends up with 58 grandchildren, 50 of them born to his six daughters. In total, 31 granddaughters and only 17 grandsons but only one with the family name, Joyce.
The vital records of Yarmouth say that "Hoseah Joyce of Yarmouth departed this life some time in February 1711."
[1]John Joyce profile https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Joyce-78
[3] Maclean W. McLean, "John Joyce of Yarmouth, Mass. (ca. 1615-1666)" TAG v.43 p. 7(1967) https://www.americanancestors.org/databases/american-genealogist-the/image?volumeId=11857&pageName=5&rId=23577549
[4]Ply Col Recs 5:91 https://archive.org/details/recordsofcolonyo0506newp/page/n103/mode/2up
[5]Titles as Symbols of Prestige in Seventeenth-Century New England: The William and Mary Quarterly Vol. 6, No. 1 (Jan., 1949), pp. 69-83 https://www.jstor.org/stable/1921860
[6]Hosea Joyce profile https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Joyce-43
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