Top of Form 1 October, 2001 Colliers of Mass Research Update Posted by: Wade Collier Date: October 11, 2001 at 04:36:52 of 2712 Bottom of Form 1 October, 2001 Colliers of Massachusetts Research Update Oct. 10, 2001 Dear Family and Friends, Since the horrific events of September 11th I’m sure that none of us have spared much time for our genealogy work. As I wrote to most of you a few weeks ago, our little town lost a fine young man, Kevin Szocik, in the World Trade Center attack. We have had our candlelight vigil, and our memorial service for Kevin, and those events have been duplicated all across the country, and beyond. We hope that our attack on the terrorists, now started, will quickly be triumphant, but I doubt that this will be the case. …. I do want to bring everyone up to date on recent work on the Colliers of Massachusetts, but will try to be brief. In this update: INDEX 1) Number of "North Yarmouth" Lorings continues to grow. 2) Database and surname numbers update. 3) Recent Internet Genealogy Forum postings. 4) New Jersey lines update. 5) Possible connections in 18th Century Leeds, Maine 6) New cousins and contributors. 7) Recent research trip to Hull and Scituate. 1) I have sporadically continued updating my database with new material, most of which has concerned the Collier descendants of the surname Loring who went to the area of North Yarmouth, Cumberland County, Maine about the middle 18th Century. The Loring Genealogy of 1917, which I have previously used, covers some - but not all - of these families. Liz Burdick of Colorado, whose husband was a Loring descendant, kindly furnished me a copy of "Historical Sketch of the Loring Family: Those Who Were Early Residents of North Yarmouth, Maine," by Rev. Amasa Loring, from Old Times in North Yarmouth, Maine, No. 3, Vol. 6, July 1882, which adds considerably to the 1917 material. Rev. Loring has extensive information on some individuals, particularly on their religious affiliations and activities - there having been quite a number of ministers and deacons in the group - but also offers nothing beyond "…had a family" in many cases. There is quite a bit of information on the North Yarmouth area available on the Internet, particularly a series of files called "Royal River Valley Families," on US Gen Web, which in many cases gives details on families and individuals not covered in the other two sources. So, there is a lot of material to check and transcribe to my files. I am nearing the end, but will be another couple of weeks getting there. 2) As of today, my database of Collier descendants and spouses is nearing 5, 200 individuals. As I had anticipated, the number of "Lorings" in the file now exceeds the "Colliers." (Note that in the Hull of 1720-1730 Lt. Gershom Collier was the only man of the South Shore line with children, while there three women, married to Lorings, with families.) Many of the Maine Lorings had families of over 10 children, and, as you can tell from the previous paragraphs, they are exceedingly well recorded. Totals by surname, through today: COLLIER 365 COLLYER, COLYER 39 LORING 423 (To repeat, the "Collyer" spelling was by about 1740 the preferred spelling among the descendants of Moses (2) Collier, who moved from Hingham or Boston to Woodbridge, New Jersey shortly before his death in 1684.) 3) I have posted draft genealogies to the various Internet forums: Moses (2) Genealogy Rept, Thomas (2) Gens. 1-5, and Gen. 6. I plan to do another for the 7th Generation as soon as the database is fairly complete. I have not included biographies or references in these postings, but of course would be happy to provide them to interested parties. 4) In the spring, desperate to find added information on the New Jersey lines, I sent about 20 letters to current Collier/Collyer/Colyer residents of northern New Jersey. I had about 10 responses, but all were negative. I have located a few more "preliminary and unproven" names of Collyers who lived in the vicinity of Basking Ridge, Somerset County, the latest record being of a William K. Collyer, who died in Bernardsville in 1908. Cousin Tim Kelley is still the only New Jersey descendant I have corresponded with, although I do correspond with two researchers of related families.. A research trip to New Jersey is somewhere in my future. On a summer trip to Maryland my wife and I noted that Woodbridge, where Moses (2) arrived about 1683, is now the location of the intersection of the Garden State Parkway and the New Jersey Turnpike. It was a scenic highlight of the trip. I understand that Basking Ridge is a much more attractive area. 5) There was a family of Colliers in Leeds, Androscoggin County, Maine in the late 18th-early 19th Century - Isaac and Moses being two of the early names. Isaac arrived before 1790. A reference I noted a year or two ago called this family "well known," but I haven’t been able to make a connection to our South Shore family, or any other known one. Leeds is about 25 miles north of New Gloucester, where some of the "North Yarmouth" Lorings were living, and where some of the early Leeds settlers originated. Perez (7) Loring settled in Leeds for a time, and there may have been others. Isaac and Moses of Leeds could be the sons of Moses (4) and Susannah Foster of Boston, about whom we have very little after their births in Boston, in 1755 and 1760, respectively. They do not appear in Boston City Directories that I have checked. Perhaps something will turn up to identify this family. 6) We have one new cousin since I sent along the Thomas (1) Collier Great Migrations article: Holly Willman Irwin, whose husband is a descendant of Daniel (6) Pratt, who left Cohasset for Springfield, Vermont. If only Daniel, or my Collier ancestors, had just held on to some of that Cohasset real estate …! I will repeat a list of other recent contributors: Steve Klatka is doing research on the Jacobs family of Ohio (Elva Collier of the Ohio branch married Harmon Jacobs, May 2, 1900); Robert Forrest has contributed a few generations on the descendants of Hannah Collier (daughter of "Gershom of Farmington and Avon") and Joshua Soule, married in Franklin County, Maine, 1819, who later moved to Wisconsin; Charles Pelton is working on the "Pelton of Chesterfield" lines, among others, and may have something to contribute on the Joel Pelton/Catherine Collier descendants; John Vinton has added two generations to the Dorus Vinton/Priscilla Collier line of Chesterfield and Ellicottville, NY; and Arthur Osgood has added some information on the descendants of the Rev. William Collier of Scituate, Charlestown and Boston. It seems more and more unlikely that there are any living descendants of the Rev. Collier, about whom I have written before. 7) I was able to make a brief trip to the Massachusetts Archives in Dorchester, Hull and Scituate in late August. The Archives yielded some worthwhile new information, although nothing earth shattering. I will summarize the results of the trip in my next letter. I will have some new photos of Hull Village and Boston Harbor posted before too long - the view of Boston Light and the entrance to the harbor from the hill above Thomas (2) Collier’s 17th Century home is striking. I had hoped to visit with Frances Tower Maroni, who spends the summer in Cohasset, but that didn’t work out. I spent a little time at the Scituate Historical Society, and can recommend it highly. Will close at this point for now. If anyone wants a more up to date FTW file, or any other material as the book slowly gets assembled, just ask. Wade Collier Trumbull County, Ohio and Lunenburg, Massachusetts