Biographical Information
 Francis
Eaton was baptized in 1596 in Bristol, Gloucester, England, the son of
John and Dorothy (Smith) Eaton. Nearly all of Francis Eaton's
siblings died in 1603/1604, apparently due to a sickness that had spread
throughout the household. He and brother Samuel did survive;
Francis would name his first son Samuel.
Francis took up the profession of a house carpenter. He married
his first wife, Sarah, probably around 1619, and they had their first
child Samuel about 1620. Francis, Sarah, and "sucking" child
Samuel came on the Mayflower to Plymouth in 1620. Sarah
died the first winter at Plymouth, and Francis then remarried to
Dorothy, the maidservant of John Carver, sometime before 1623.
John Carver had died in April 1621, and his wife Katherine died a few
weeks later, so perhaps the marriage occurred not long thereafter.
In the 1623 Division of Land at Plymouth, Francis Eaton received four
shares: one for himself, one for his deceased first wife Sarah, one for
Samuel, and one for his current wife Dorothy, all of whom came on the
Mayflower.
Dorothy died sometime shortly thereafter: no children are known to
have been born from their marriage. Francis then married, about
1626, to Christiana Penn, and they had three children together: Rachel,
Benjamin, and a child that was called "an ideote" that was still living
in 1651, but whose name has not survived.
Francis Eaton himself died in 1633, apparently suffering the same
fate as his siblings in childhood, dying of a disease that spread
through Plymouth that autumn. Francis Eaton's estate included one
cow and a calf, two hogs, fifty bushels of corn, a black suit, a white
hat and a black hat, boots, saws, hammers, an adze, square, augers, a
chisel, boards, fishing lead, and some kitchen items.
|
