Edmund Quincy I (1602–1636), known as "the Puritan", was an English settler, soldier, colonist, planter, landowner, merchant, and politician of

Massachusetts Bay Colony The Massachusetts Bay Colony (1628–1691), more formally the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, was an English settlement on the east coast of North America around Massachusetts Bay, one of the several colonies later reorganized as the Province of M ...

in what later became the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

. He is notable as the

progenitor In genealogy, a progenitor (rarer: primogenitor; or ''Ahnherr'') is the founder (sometimes one that is legendary) of a family, line of descent, gens, clan, tribe, noble house, or ethnic group.. Ebenda''Ahnherr:''"Stammvater eines Geschlec ...

of the

Quincy family The Quincy family was a prominent political family in Massachusetts from the mid-17th century through to the early 20th century. It is connected to the Adams political family through Abigail Adams. The family estate was in Mount Wollaston, fir ...

England

Born 1602 in

Wigsthorpe Wigsthorpe is a hamlet in the east of the English county of Northamptonshire, south of the town of Oundle and the village of Barnwell, Northamptonshire, Barnwell. It is in North Northamptonshire and is part of the civil parish of Thorpe Achurc ...

Northamptonshire Northamptonshire ( ; abbreviated Northants.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the East Midlands of England. It is bordered by Leicestershire, Rutland and Lincolnshire to the north, Cambridgeshire to the east, Bedfordshi ...

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, Edmund's family may have been connected with the Earls of Winchester in the 13th century.FamousAmericans.net/EdmundQuincy The surname is Anglo-Norman. One descendant named Eliza Susan Quincy wrote in 1844 that Edmund once had "a genealogical account of his family, which traced their descent from the time of the Norman Conquest," which

Abigail Adams Abigail Adams ( ''née'' Smith; – October 28, 1818) was the wife and closest advisor of John Adams, the second president of the United States, and the mother of John Quincy Adams, the sixth president of the United States. She was a founder o ...

apparently owned at one time, as well, but after a century in America it "was then unfortunately borrowed and never returned and has now been lost for more than 50 years." His parents were almost certainly Edmund Quincy (baptised 1559, died 1627) and Anne Palmer (married 1593).Robert Sewall: Quincy family
/ref> He is known to have lived in Thorpe in Achurch,

on an estate inherited from his father. He married Judith Pares in 1623 and had two children: Judith, born in 1626, and

Edmund Edmund is a masculine given name in the English language. The name is derived from the Old English elements ''ēad'', meaning "prosperity" or "riches", and ''mund'', meaning "protector". Persons named Edmund include: People Kings and nobles *Ed ...

, born in 1628. He appears to have converted to

Puritan The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to rid the Church of England of what they considered to be Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should b ...

ism by the time of the birth of his son. His daughter Judith Quincy (1626–1695), married John Hull (1620–1683), leading merchant and mintmaster of

Emigration

Quincy came to

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

for the first time in 1628, and emigrated to America along with the Reverend John Cotton on a ship called ''Griffin'' with his family and six servants, arriving in

Boston Harbor Boston Harbor is a natural harbor and estuary of Massachusetts Bay, located adjacent to Boston, Massachusetts. It is home to the Port of Boston, a major shipping facility in the Northeastern United States. History 17th century Since its dis ...

4 September 1633. The Quincys' names appear in the records of the First Church from the following year. On September 10, 1634, Quincy was the first person named to a committee, appointed by the Puritan colonists, to assess and raise the funds necessary to purchase the

Shawmut Peninsula Shawmut Peninsula is the promontory of land on which Boston, Massachusetts was built. The peninsula, originally a mere in area,Miller, Bradford A., "Digging up Boston: The Big Dig Builds on Centuries of Geological Engineering", GeoTimes, Octo ...

from

William Blaxton William Blaxton (also spelled William Blackstone; 1595 – 26 May 1675) was an early English settler in New England and the first European settler of Boston and Rhode Island. Early life and education William Blaxton was born in Horncastle, Li ...

. The following May, he was elected to represent the town of Boston at the first

Massachusetts General Court The Massachusetts General Court, formally the General Court of Massachusetts, is the State legislature (United States), state legislature of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts located in the state capital of Boston. Th ...

held in

Mount Wollaston

In 1635, a thousand

acre The acre ( ) is a Unit of measurement, unit of land area used in the Imperial units, British imperial and the United States customary units#Area, United States customary systems. It is traditionally defined as the area of one Chain (unit), ch ...

s of land in what is now

Quincy, Massachusetts Quincy ( ) is a city in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the largest city in the county. Quincy is part of the Greater Boston area as one of Boston's immediate southern suburbs. Its population in ...

, was sold by the

Massachusett The Massachusett are a Native American tribe from the region in and around present-day Greater Boston in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The name comes from the Massachusett language term for "At the Great Hill," referring to the Blue Hills ...

Indians to Quincy and

William Coddington William Coddington (c. 1601 – 1 November 1678) was an early magistrate of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and later of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. He served as the judge of Portsmouth and Newport in that colony, govern ...

; the town of Boston confirmed the sale in 1636. The property consisted of a broad strip of land along the

sea A sea is a large body of salt water. There are particular seas and the sea. The sea commonly refers to the ocean, the interconnected body of seawaters that spans most of Earth. Particular seas are either marginal seas, second-order section ...

, extending somewhat beyond the boundaries of the settlement established by Captain Wollaston and Thomas Morton in 1625. Around the time of the purchase, Quincy built a one-story home on this land which would eventually develop into the

Dorothy Quincy House The Dorothy Quincy Homestead is a National Historic Landmark at 34 Butler Road in Quincy, Massachusetts. The house was originally built in 1686, by Edmund Quincy II, who had an extensive property upon which there were multiple buildings. Today ...

. He died shortly thereafter, in 1636 or 1637.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Quincy, Edmund (1602-1636) People from colonial Massachusetts People from North Northamptonshire 1602 births 1636 deaths Quincy family English emigrants to Massachusetts Bay Colony 17th-century American merchants 17th-century American planters