Jeremiah Patten

Jeremiah Patten was born in Billerica on October 21, 1771, the son of William Patten and Rebecca (Brown) Patten. He came of one of the town's first families and was a great-grandson of Deacon William Patten, the representative who died at Cambridge in 1730; his mother was a sister of the wife of Lt. Jacob Richardson. The family farm, long called the Patten Place, lay on the west side of the road to Boston north of the center and ran back to the Concord River. When his father died in 1801, his will left Jeremiah, the executor, "all the rest of my estate, both real and personal," the homestead with it, after legacies to his brothers and sisters.

He was a selectman from 1805 to 1807 and again from 1810 to 1813, and in those last four years he was also town clerk. He was a deacon of the church. His neighbors often called on him to value and settle estates: in 1810 he helped appraise the goods of James Abbot and was named a commissioner of that insolvent estate, in 1812 he was one of the appraisers who set off land of William Manning for a debt, and in 1814 he was a surety for Manning's administrator.

On January 21, 1808 he married Hannah Davis, daughter of Benjamin Davis. Their daughters were Abigail Field (1809), Julia Ann (1811), Elizabeth (1813, died 1818) and Hannah, born on March 16, 1815, two months after her father's death. Deacon Patten died on January 21, 1815, aged 44, without a will. Joseph Locke was made administrator, and the inventory of April 1815 began with "The Homestead of said deceased situated in said Billerica containing about 26 Acres with the Buildings thereon," valued at $1,850, followed by the Whiting place and several other lots.

In 1819 the guardian of his three daughters, Josiah Crosby Jr., sold at auction "thirty acres of land ... bounded easterly on Boston road ... westerly on Concord river ... with a dwelling house and barn thereon," the part of the farm outside the widow's dower, and the old William Patten House passed out of the family after more than a century. His widow Hannah died on February 28, 1827, aged 46.

References

1. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), Genealogical Register p. 110, PATTEN 16: Jeremiah, son of William, b. 1771, m. Hannah Davis, "He was deacon; d. 1815, Jan. 21"; children
2. Hazen, Genealogical Register p. 109, PATTEN 11 and 14: his grandfather Thomas and father William, who m. Rebecca Brown, dau. of Josiah
3. Hazen, p. 304: list of town clerks, Jeremiah Patten 1810-13
4. Hazen, p. 307: list of selectmen, Jeremiah Patten 1805-07, 1810-13
5. Vital Records of Billerica (1908), births p. 147: Jeremiah, son of William and Rebecah, Oct. 21, 1771, and his daughters
6. Vital Records of Billerica, marriages p. 298: Jeremiah Patten and Hannah Davis, Jan. 21, 1808
7. Vital Records of Billerica, deaths p. 383: Deacon Jeremiah Patten, Jan. 21, 1815, aged 44; Hannah, wife of Deacon Jeremiah, 1827
8. Middlesex probate case 17043 (1801): will of his father William Patten, the residue and homestead to Jeremiah, executor
9. Middlesex probate case 17001 (1815): estate of Deacon Jeremiah Patten, intestate; inventory of the homestead
10. Middlesex probate case 19 (1810): estate of James Abbot; Jeremiah Patten appraiser and commissioner