Last Page Activity:  April 16, 2013

Daniel BABBIT     Birth:    28 Apr 1744  Place: New Milford, Connecticut   Death:  12 Jul 1830   Place: Gagetown, New Brunswick Father:   Elkanah BABBIT  (1710-1816) Mother:  Obedience PRINDLE ( May 13, 1717-~ death abt 1816 Duchess County, New York   First Spouse:   Mary CLOSE Birth:  abt 1740   Place: Duchess Co, New York Death:   Jul 1795   Place: Gagetown, New Brunswick        Buried: 7 Jul 1975 Marriage:   abt 1771   Place: Duchess County, New York Children: Daniel (3 Dec 1770  Duchess County, NY -  16 May 1864, Gagetown, New Brunswick, Canada. Married Dorothy Hoben 30 Mar 1797, Gagetown, NB. Children: John, Mary & Ann) Samuel Wellington (-1850) Rebecca  (15 Jul 1773 - 23 May 1845.  Married Richard Yeamans 20 Mar 1796.) Hannah   (1775 - 11 Feb 1860, Gagetown, New Brunswick.  Married John Smith. Children; Daniel) Elizabeth (1777 - 03 May 1810.  Married Daniel Morton  23 Dec 1798)  William  1784 - Dec 1794 David Lee (1789- .  Married Mary Ann Purdy 06 Feb 1802(?) and Clarissa Hallet 18 Mar 1832. Children: Daniel & Richard) Phoebe (23 April 1790.  Married Gabriel Fowler 10 Jan 1818, Gagetown, New Brunswick.) Samuel Perry  (06 Apr 1792, Gagetown, New Brunswick - 01 Oct 1875. Married Susanna Thomas, Halifax, Nova Scotia; Phoebe Creighton 15 Mar 1827, Gagetown, New Brunswick. Thomas (05 Oct 1794.  Married Elizabeth Watson, 05 Sept 1822. Children: Thomas) ----------------------------------------

Photo is excerpt from The Babbit Family History by W. Bradford Brown. The image was taken from a painting.

Second Spouse:    Rhoda Annis CRONK Birth:............................  1750          Place: New York, USA  (according to 'The Babbit Family History) Death:............................9 May 1819?    Place: Gagetown, New Brunswick Marriage:  abt 1796  Place: USA   Children: Elkana (29 Oct 1798 - 23 Nov 1837.  Married Dorothy Creighton. Children: Henry) Henry  (1799-)  (Dec 1798 from gravestone marked Died April 17, 1896,  97 yrs 5mos - see pic) Children: William. Mary (22 May 1800 -)  Married George Tilley Children: George Obedience (13 June 1802 - 11 July 1809) Mahala  (19 Aug 1804-)  Married Henry Cromwell. Children: George W. William  (21 July 1805 - 11 July 1809) Benjamin   (2 Aug 1808 - 18 Mar 1893 Married Phoebe Burns 30 May 1833) - see gravestone pic) Ann  (11 Jun 1809 -)  Married James P. Brown. Children: Charles J. Rhoda  (18 Jul 1813 -  ~1870)  Archibald ?

Grave stone at Christ Church, Hillier, Ontario:  Henry Babbit Died April 17, 1896 Aged 97yrs 5 mos   Grave stone at Christ Church, Hillier, Ontario:  Benjamin Babbitt 1808 - 1893 His Wife Pheobe Burns 1810-1893

Excerpts from the book  "Some Loyalists and Others" by Irene L. Hill, 1977 (out of print?) read: "Daniel Babbit, Loyalist, the ancestor of the Babbit family of New Brunswick, was born in New Milford, Connecticut, a son of Elkanah and Obedience Babbit. According to family records, he was a great-great-grandson of Edward Bobet who married Sarah Tame in Plymouth in 1643. Daniel Babbit was living in Duchess County when the troubles broke out, and was drafted three times by the Revolutionaries. The first time, he bought himself off; the second time he provided a substitute, and the third time he escaped within the British lines. On Long Island, he worked as a blacksmith. His property in Duchess County was forfeited. In April, 1783, he returned to Duchess County, but his clothes and most of his money were taken. He came to New Brunswick during the summer of 1783; and early in September he went up the river to Gagetown where he established as a blacksmith. He is reported to have brought with him a horse, a large boat, hand mills and a quantity of gold which he had earned by shoeing horses at a guinea a horse. His grant of 200 acres on the Washadamoak he turned to profit. In 1787 he had built a house, barn and blacksmith shop on a small town lot in Gagetown. The land in front lying along Grimross Creek was a common. In 1792, when the town plan of Gagetown was laid out, Daniel Babbit and his neighbours petitioned, twice, to have the strip lying along Grimross Creek either granted to them or remain a common. It was needed for hay for their stock. Their petitions were not allowed, the land having been allocated for the Church. Daniel Babbit was granted 8 acres in the rear of the town. Through the years, he prospered. According to his will, years later, he owned many lots in and near Gagetown. The wife of Daniel Babbit was Mary, a sister of Lieutenant Abraham Close, who, in 1776, was publicly advertised as a Loyalist for whose capture a reward of 50 Pounds was offered. Daniel and his wife had nine children. She died, in Gagetown, in 1795. Daniel Babbit married, secondly, Rhoda Annis Cronk, and by his second wife he had nine children. Late in 1815 or early in 1816, Daniel Babbit returned to Duchess County to see his mother Obedience, a daughter of Samuel and Dorothy Plum Prindle. She was almost one hundred years old as she was born on the 13th day of May 1717. Daniel Babbit petitioned for more land in Gagetown, in 1823. "Daniel Babbit, widower, with fourteen children and of the age of 79 years, his sons Thomas a married man with one child, 29 years, Elkanah, a married man, 24 years, and Henry, a single man aged 24 years, all natives of this Province except Daniel who came in 1783, British subjects ...."

This c.1829 water colour portrait of Gagetown Loyalist, Daniel Babbit, aged 85 was painted by noted Canadian folk artist Thomas MacDonald and was aquired, in 2010, by Queens County Heritage.

Thomas was his youngest child by his first wife. Daniel, his eldest son, born in 1772 in Duchess County, was old enough to share the worries of his parents in his early youth, to assist his father in a blacksmith shop in Long Island, and recount, in his old age, the details of the journey to Gagetown. He was married, in Gagetown, to Miss Dorothy Hoben, in 1797, and he farmed for the rest of his life at Burton. They had seven children. Daniel Babbit, Loyalist, provided well for his large family, and he died in Gagetown in 1830. Two sons of Samuel Wellington Babbit who made his home in Fredericton and died in 1850 brought fame to the name, each in his way. George Nealon (1842-1915) was a valued civil servant and for his services was awarded the Imperial Service Order; and John Babbit (1845-1889) built the first telephone in New Brunswick. Daniel Babbit the Loyalist of Gagetown built better than he knew." Photo left: Chair donated by the Babbitt family to Queens County Heritiage

There is some great information to be found in the book 'The Babbitt Family History 1643-1900' by W. Bradford Browne.  Section (144) on Daniel Babbit begins:   “Daniel Babbit, the founder of the Canadian branch of the Babbit family was born April 28, 1749 in New Milford Conn., the son of Elkanah and Obedience Babbit.  Little is known of is boyhood or what influences led him to become a member of the Church of England and a Tory when all of his relatives and almost all of the Babbitt name were Revolutionists.” The 6 pages pertaining to Daniel start at page 146 and can be read online at http://archive.org/stream/babbittfamilyhis00brow#page/146/mode/2up as part of the Open Library a online line initiative of Online Archive. other excepts from The Babbitt Family History: “At the close of the war he was forced with the other Loyalists to seek a new home.  He embarked for the St. John River in what is now the province of New Brunswick in Canada with the summer fleet of 1783.  In a few weeks a city had grown up here, most at first a city of tents in which many of the Loyalists endured the inclemency of the Canadian winter, which was very vigorous at the time.”  “In September he went to Gage town forty-seven miles up the river ….” “At that time … the country was wooded to the river banks.  It was not an inviting spot to bring one’s family to with winter coming on rapidly, no home built and only moderate provision against the stress of the long hard winter.  Many of the Loyalists on the St John river, spent their first winter in tents or log huts and with a scarce food supply to further heighten the horrors of their circumstances.  With Daniel came his wife and five children, Daniel Jr who was 13 years old, Rebecca, 12 years old, Hannah, 8 years old, Elizabeth, 6, and William, the youngest who was 3.  It is said that he brought up river with him a horse, a large boat, a hand ill for grinding grain and considerable money in gold which he had made shoeing horses during the war at a guinea a horse.  He may therefore have been able to provide very comfortably for his family during that first trying winter.  He built the first frame house, it is said, in Gagetown and the first meeting of the Court of General Sessions of the county was held in his house on February 23, 1786, which would indicate that his home must have been one of the more pretentious in the rising village.” “In 1792  the Town Plot of Gage was laid out and he was granted 16 lots of one acre each.  He had erected a blacksmith shop and he farmed as well.  He was a strong churchman and served for forty years as warden of the parish church. He conveyed to the governing body the lot upon which the church was built.” “In 1795 his first wife died and she was buried on July 7, of this year.  His second wife was Rhoda Annis Cronk whom, it is said, his mother had brought up and whom he married in the States going there for that purpose.  It is said that he had twenty-two children and that at his death on July 12, 1830, seven sons and seven daughters attended his funeral.” In the list of children provided in the ‘The Babbitt Family History’ it shows “Rhoda Annis, July 18, 1813; m. Seth Thorne, July 10, 1833’ as being the last; making her father 64 years older than she.

 

excerpt from Queens County Heritage's - Loyalist of the Day - Daniel Babbit published online August 31, 2011 "Despite his standing as a fine Anglican convert, there is an interesting postscript to Daniel Babbit’s story. His grave and those of his wives are missing! While the church records are clear about burial, no stone remains and no oral history of location. The story is told that when the original church was torn down in 1880 to make way for the present, larger structure, the builders weren’t that concerned about some of the older graves close to the walls of the old building. It is supposed that Daniel Babbit, being the church warden for 40 years and the person who donated the land upon which the church was built, was in 1830 buried up close to the chancel of the old church. With the enlargement, the implication is that the new chancel probably sits over the resting places of several of Gagetown’s founders, including Daniel Babbit and his wives!"

Excerpt from The Babbitt Family History: Daniel's mother Obedience "was born May 13, 1716, and lied to an extreme age.  It is related that her son Daniel came from Canada to see her when she was almost one hundred." Excerpt from Queens County Heritage blog "Loyalist of the Day - Government & Church" "When Quaker Daniel Babbit converted, he not only supplied the land upon which St. Johns Anglican Church at Gagetown was built in 1790, but also hosted church meetings and served as the church warden for decades." Daniel Babbit's Will ... page 32 marked at top N2442 includes a reference to his daughter Rhoda Babbit:  "Unto my youngest daughter, Rhoda Babbit the upper or northern half of Block letter K containing four acres bring that upon which the Tan House now stands and in the Town Plot aforesaid." An enlarged view of the original may be seen by clicking here or on photo to right.