Early Settlers of Old Somerset
A Revision and Expansion of Bogerternorton Hundred and Surrounding Areas
of Old Somerset County,Maryland. Volume 1, Inventories, 1665-1700.
Transcribed, compiled and revised by G. Ray Thompson, PhD.
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Please select one of the following links or scroll down for a list of probate inventories
in this collection, sorted alphabetically by estate owner.
About This Volume
Preface to the Revised Edition
Acknowledgement
Appendix B: Samples of Colonial Clerks' Handwriting
A Note About Spelling and Terminology
Preface to the Revised Edition
Initially the revision of Studies in the Primary Sources of the Lower Eastern Shore was prompted by the
decision to correct typographical errors in the original manuscript. In addition, as I transcribed additional
inventories, it was clear that a revised edition of this volume should be made due to the large increase in
number of transcribed inventories. This edition has been more than doubled in size by the addition of a
variety of inventories. In each case, I was led by the desire to illustrate the diversity of life here
on the Lower Eastern Shore. Although the initial edition was limited to Bogerternorton Hundred, one of
the nine hundreds into which old Somerset was divided, in this edition, I have provided inventories for
all areas of the county, as well as individuals from various walks of life. The "new" inventories provide
substantially more information about the social and economic conditions in which the first generation of
Old Somerset settlers found themselves than that which was found in the original volume. Here husbands and
wives are inventoried rich and poor, planters and merchants, shoemakers and coopers, chirurgeons and cordwainers.
In short I have striven to provide the basics for the recreation of a microcosm of life here in Old Somerset with
the hope that students will be encouraged to help write the rich history of Delmarva's past using her original sources.
Since the earliest inventories are often very difficult to read, either because of the unfamiliar handwriting of
seventeenth century clerks, or because of the faded condition of the original records, I was determined to add
significantly more inventories from this germinal period of Eastern Shore settlement. Where I have been unable
to decipher the original script, I have provided the closest transcription possible, even though that too might
sometimes appear unrecognizable as a word in a dictionary today. At other times, I have merely left a blank line
indicating the omission of a word or words. Throughout, I have tried to leave the original spellings, even though
there was a great temptation to correct and to make uniform the various spellings, since a given word might be
spelled in a number of different ways in one single document. In a few cases, I have enclosed in brackets a word
which might be so badly misspelled that the reader might not be able to recognize the actual word.
As stated above, the inventories provide a cross section of the inhabitants of seventeenth century Old Somerset.
Although the majority of Eastern Shore residents farmed the land, within the "planter" class itself there were
substantial economic and social divisions. Great extremes of wealth separated those who owned the majority of
Old Somerset's land and those who were merely eking out a living there. Certain estate owners are identified by
the term "Mr.", a title which would have been accorded to only a very few individuals. Widows or single women
might also leave inventories. Merchants, planters, sailors, lawyers, tanners, tailors, shoemakers, surgeons,
ministers, coopers, cordwainers, wheelwrights, weavers, and innkeepers are all recorded as resident in Somerset
during this period and have left informative inventories.
Many extended family groupings are also found within these inventories. In a few cases, the inventories are
of a husband and wife who lost their lives at the same time in Indian uprisings. How many wives died before their
husbands, there is no sure way of knowing. The fact that the inventories of several members of a single family
are recorded at approximately the same time might indicate that these family members may have died as a result of
some disease which was ravaging the area or that they might have died as a result of impure water or improperly
processed food.
Finally, although this work deals primarily with inventories, I have included a few examples of accounts as well.
Accounts provide an additional type of information and should be used in conjunction with inventories to draw a more
complete picture of a person's life in Old Somerset. Accounts might record such valuable information as debts owed
to or by the deceased. An account could also provide a clue to the religious predisposition of the deceased as
often a minister is paid to deliver a funeral sermon. Accounts might also provide information about relatives,
especially married daughters who are left legacies and whose married name is not recorded elsewhere. Finally,
accounts flesh out the social network by indicating who were the neighbors of the deceased.
G. Ray Thompson, PhD.
Professor of History
Salisbury University
Salisbury, MD 21801
April 18, 2004
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