Lush forests in Colonial America allowed settlers to build wooden homes.
The New England Meetinghouse was the only municipal building in a town. Both worship and civil meetings were held there. It was customary for men and women to sit separately and the town chose a committee once a year to assign seats according to what was paid, age, and dignity.
Joseph Richards was born in 1703 in Lynn, Essex County, Massachusetts. He was the son of Crispus Richards and Sarah Collins.
He married Mary Bowden on May 5, 1726. Mary Bowden (Bouden) was born on July 19, 1705. Her parents were Michael Bowden and Sarah Davis.
Joseph and Mary's children included:
William Richards (1730, married Sarah Bixby and Elizabeth Knapp),
Joseph Richards (1731),
Mary Richards (1733),
Ebenezer Richards (1738),
Martha Richards (1740),
John Richards (1742),
Hannah Richards (1744), and Esther Richards Dwinnell (1744/45).
His son Crispus (?) received a sheep from his grandfather’s will. Esther married Jacob Dwinnell's son, John, who served in Captain Gould's Company in the Revolution.
He died when he was about 45 years old on June 4, 1748 in Southborough, Worcester County, Massachusetts.
In 1754 their daughter, Esther Richards, was brought by her mother, in accordance with her father's wish, to live with his sister and her husband, Aaron and Esther Estey.
English colonists from Salem were the first settlers in Lynn.
Essex County, Massachusetts was created on May 10, 1643 by the General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, when it ordered "that the whole plantation within this jurisdiction be divided into four sheires."
A joiner is a carpenter skilled in finished woodwork.
The Essex Antiquarian, Volume 11 edited by Sidney Perley
Michael Bowden of Marblehead married Sarah Davis of Lynn (published Nov. 20, 1697); she was his wife in 1741; bought house and land near the burying place in Lynn in 1707; innholder, 1729-1741, waterman, 1722-3; will dated Sept. 26, 1741, proved Oct. 12, 1741; estate appraised at £555, 16-s.;
children:
1. John, of Exeter, N. H., wife Huldah, joiner, 1755;
2. Sarah, married John Riddan of Marblehead (Redding—publishment) (published in Lynn Aug. 30, 1723)
3- Mary, married John (Joseph— publishment) Richards in Lynn May 5, 1726 ; and she was his widow in 1755;
4. Lydia, married Samuel Kelley of Southborough, Mass. (and afterwards of Marblehead), March 30, 1731;
5. Susannah, married Moses Newhall of Lynn, gentleman, before 1755;
6. Benjamin, lived in Lynn, 1749-1772; innholder, 1756-1757; joiner, 1761, husbandman, 1763, housewright, 1770; married Abigail Hawkins of Salem Sept. 28, 1749; child: Frances, stillborn Aug. 6, 1750, in Lynn.—Records.
A gentleman had no title, but descended from an aristocratic family, was of the landed gentry, and had a coat of arms.
American colonists continued to use British monetary units, namely the pound, shilling and pence for which £1 (orli) equalled 20s and 1s equalled 12d. In 1792 the dollar was established as the basic unit of currency.
