William Stickney

William Stickney (1704-1781), deacon, town clerk and Revolutionary leader, was a son of William Stickney of Bradford and a descendant of William Stickney, the emigrant ancestor who settled at Rowley. His mother, Anna Hazeltine, took as her second husband Samuel Hunt of Billerica. His brother, Capt. Daniel Stickney, who led a troop of horse toward Fort William Henry in 1757, also settled in Billerica, as did their cousin Abraham Stickney. In June 1729 William married Anna Whiting, daughter of Oliver Whiting; her sister Dorcas was the wife of Deacon Joshua Abbott. Anna died on March 26, 1749, and on November 23 of that year he married Mrs. Hannah Abbot, widow of the saddler Jeremiah Abbot. Of his many children several died young; his son Eleazer served in Colonel Bridge's regiment at Bunker Hill, and his son William, who was also at Bunker Hill, declined the office of deacon after his father's death and moved to Townshend, Vermont.

Stickney owned the old Manning farm on the west side of the road north of the meeting-house, the land now described under the Samuel Manning Homestead; the tax list of 1776 places him at the Pillsbury place, and after his death his executors sold the farm to Dr. Isaac Hurd in 1786. He was a deacon of the church by 1749, when his second marriage was recorded under that title, and he held the office until his death. Hazen names him among the well-informed citizens who, in the absence of lawyers, did much of the legal business of their neighbors. He was the town's Town Clerk for twelve years from 1757, a selectman for more than twenty years, and its representative for seventeen years between 1750 and 1779, and he was a justice of the peace, styled "Esquire" in the town records.

In the struggle with Britain the town leaned on him. In September 1768 it chose him its delegate to the convention of towns at Faneuil Hall. In 1774 he was elected, with Ebenezer Bridge, to the Provincial Congress that met at Concord in October, and as representative to the General Court called for Salem he was instructed to pay no regard to the King's mandamus Council. In January 1775 he was again chosen delegate to the Provincial Congress at Cambridge, and in the same month the town named him first of twelve Conservators charged to keep the peace against disorderly and tumultuous people. In March 1776 he took Colonel Bridge's place on the Committee of Correspondence, Inspection and Safety. When the town voted unanimously in May 1776 to stand by a declaration of independence "with their lives and fortunes," Hazen wrote that with such leaders as Dr. Cumings and William Stickney the vote was not taken without understanding what it might cost.

Deacon Stickney died on August 27, 1781, at seventy-seven according to his gravestone. His widow Hannah died on February 17, 1789.

References

1. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), Genealogical Register p. 145, STICKNEY 2
2. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 227 (delegate to the convention of towns, 1768)
3. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 231 (Provincial Congress and General Court, 1774)
4. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 233 (Provincial Congress at Cambridge; Conservators, 1775)
5. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 304 (lists of town clerks and representatives)
6. Journals of each Provincial Congress of Massachusetts (1838), p. 77 (members from Billerica)
7. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 251 (tax list of 1776: Pillsbury place)
8. Vital Records of Billerica to 1850, deaths p. 402 (William Stickney, Esq., Aug. 27, 1781)

Deed References Expand all

Recorded is Book/Page at the Middlesex North Registry of Deeds unless noted.