[[Category:Puritan Great Migration]]

{{Puritan Great Migration}}

== Disputed Origins & Wife ==[[Betts-116

John Betts]] of Bearsted, Kent, England and his wife [[Bigge-54

Mary Bigge]] had a son John, bpt at West Peckham4 Jan 1600/1; alive in 1619/20 at the time of his father's will, but presumably died without issue before 3 May 1638, since he was not mentionedin any of the Bigge wills. Therefore, he was not the John Betts of Claydon, possibly father of John Betts bpt 1627 or the husband of the widow Mary Betts, who immigrated to the New World.

There is no evidence that John Betts married Mary Bigg, or that Mary the widow Betts of Hartford was a Bigg before her marriage. This is probably a mixup with the alleged parents mentioned above.

==Biography==John (?) Betts, of Claydon, Oxfordshire, England, was born (estimated at 1597) and died in England. He married Mary ______, born in England. She died at Hartford, Connecticut, a little before 19 July 1647. Jacobus, Donald Lines, et al., Hale, House and Related Families, Mainly of the Connecticut River Valley (Hartford: Connecticut Historical Society, 1952)

John is not mentioned in any records in New England, but the Widow Mary Betts of Hartford undoubtedly had a husband. It is sometimes speculated that he died after immigration and some genealogists believe he died in England before the family emigrated.

'''Evidence for the origins and name of John Betts:''' In Claydon, Oxfordshire (Banbury Hundred), a Richard Bett was listed in the lay subsidy of 1546. John Bett of Kings Sutton (near Banbury) made a will 15 Jan 1615, naming several children including John, who may be the husband of Widow Mary Betts. Widow Mary Betts had a daughter who married Samuel Boreman, a resident of Claydon. Widow Mary Betts had a son, John, and at Claydon is found the record "John Bet, the sonne of John Bet and Mary his wyffe was baptised the 5th daye of May 1627." "This seems to establish the English origin of the family." Jacobus footnotes that this information came from ''The Ancestryof William Francis Joseph Boardman'' (1906).

There is no evidence that John Betts married Mary Bigg, or that Mary the widow Betts of Hartford was a Bigg before her marriage.

===Children===#[[Betts-118

Mary Betts]] b. 1623 England, d. 1684 m. 1642 [[Boreman-90

Samuel Boardman]] b.1615 d. 1673[[#S4]] ''New England Marriages Prior to 1700'' pg.66#[[Betts-384

Martha Betts]] b. 1625 Claydon Oxfordshire, England d. April 13, 1701 at Wethersfield, Connecticut, m. January 16, 1655 at Wethersfield, Connecticut [[Graves-200

Nathaniel Graves, Sr.]], b. 1629 Kent, England, d. September 28, 1682 Wethersfield, Connecticut[[#S4]] ''New England Marriages Prior to 1700'' pg.319#[[Betts-55

John Betts]] b. May 5, 1627 at Claydon Oxfordshire, England, d. May 6, 1690 at Huntington, Suffolk, New York. m. 1) about 1660 at [[Elderkin-33

Abigail Elderkin]], b. September 13, 1641 at Dedham, Massachusetts, d. January 27, 1686, divorced 1672;[[#S4]] ''New England Marriages Prior to 1700'' pg.66[[#S2]] ''Genealogical records of Thomas Burnham'' pg.58 m. 2) March 13, 1672 at Huntington, Long Island to [[Smith-7448

Abigail Smith]] widow of John Adams b, 1632 at Werhersfield, Connecticut, d. 1673 at Long Island City, Queens, New York.[[#S4]] ''New England Marriages Prior to 1700''

==Genealogical Questions==:Very little is known for certain about John Betts, Information about his birth and parentage are only a best guess and more informationis needed. Most of what we know of him is through his wife, the opposite of most cases where we know almost nothing about the women.

==Sources==

*[[#S2]] Burnham, Roderick Henry, 1884. [http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/BookView.aspx?dbid=15702&iid=dvm_GenMono000945-00036-0&sid=&gskw= ''Genealogical records of Thomas Burnham, the emigrant,who was among the early settlers at Hartford, Connecticut, U.S. America, and his descendants.'']] Case, Lockwood & Brainard Co., Hartford, Connecticut*[[#S4]] Torry, Clarence A., 2004, [http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/view.aspx?dbid=3824&path=New+England+Marriages+Prior+to+1700 ''New England Marriages Prior to 1700.''] Genealogical Publishing Co. Inc., Baltimore, Maryland

See Also:*Torrey, Clarence Almon. New England Marriages Prior to 1700. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Com, 1985. Text:Betts, [John?] (-d in Eng?) & Mary ______ (bef 19 July 1647, Hartford); by 1623, [1621?], ?Claydon, Eng,by 1627; Hartford {Hale (1952) 458, 483, 577; Reg. 59:316, 110:68;Bridges Anc. 20; Boardman Anc. 127, 197–8; Paul Anc. 119; Wethersfield 2: 98, 109,391; Sv, 1: 172; Boardman 138+} Most of these have been looked at there is no mention of Bigg as surname for Mary.*Bridges, Samuel Willard, Bridges Genealogy including Britton, DeNike [Boston: GeorgeH. Ellis, 1960]*Boardman Anc.: Boardman, William F. J., The Ancestry of William Francis Joseph Boardman (Hartford, 1906)*Barbour, Lucius Barnes, 1982, [http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/BookView.aspx?dbid=48020&pageno=57 ''Families of Early Hartford, Connecticut''], Genealogical Publishing Co. Inc., Baltimore, Maryland and Connecticut Society of Genealogists, Inc., Glastonbury, Connecticut pp.57

== Acknowledgments ==*WikiTree profile Biggs-124 created through the import of Lent_Vise_2011-05-11aa.ged on May 26, 2011 by [[Sypniewski-1

Bryan Sypniewski]]*Profile adopted by [[Thompson-9019

Daniel Thompson]] on February 15, 2013*See the [http://www.wikitree.com/index.php?title=Special:NetworkFeed&who=Betts-117 Change Page] for edits by WikiTree Contributors.