Richard SEARS (1590?-1676)

	Richard Sears, Puritan

Individual Events and Attributes

Marriage

Individual Note

Richard Sears was an early settler who lived in both the Massachusetts Bay Colony and Plymouth Colony.

Richard Sears was born in 1590 to John Bourchier Sayer (or Sears) and Marie Van Egmond. Both of his parents were born in England but had moved to Holland during the Protestant Reformation and were married in Holland in 1585. They returned to England on or before 1590 when Richard Sears was born.

After coming to North America about 1630, Richard Sears married Dorothy Thatcher in 1632.[1]

Today, over 20,000 people, including Sir Evan Fritzenkotter, can trace their lineage to Richard Sears. These people have had an impact on not only the British Colonies but the United States and the world. Today, many thousands of those descendants live in the United States alone.

NOTES:

1 Geneaological Register of Plymouth Families.

SOURCES:

Anderson, Robert Charles. The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633. 3 vols. Great Migration Study Project, New England Historc Genealogical Society, Boston, 1995.

Banks, Charles Edward. Planters of the Commonwealth. [Banks PC]

Brainerd, Dwight.The Ancestry of Thomas Brainerd. [NOT CONSULTED YET]

Browning, Charles Henry. Americans of Royal Descent.. 3rd Ed. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Co., 1894. 708. [Spurious pedigree connecting Richard Sears to Edward III through a completely invented Bourchier line.]

Burke, John Bernard. Visitation of Arms. Vol. III. 5-7. [Yet another official printing of the fantasy Sears genealogy.]

Burkes American Families with British Ancestry. 1939. 2905. [Sears formerly of Colchester].

Conover, George S. & Lewis Cass Aldrich. History of Ontario Co., N.Y. NY, 1893.

Curfman, Robert Joseph. The Paddock Genealogy: Descendants of Robert Paddock of Plymouth Colony, Blacksmith and Constable, 1646. Fort Collins, Colorado, 1977.

Cutter, William Richard. Genealogical and Personal Memoirs Relating to the Families of the State of Massachusetts. NY, 1910. [Cutter M]

Dictionary of American Biography.

Early Settlers of Western New York.

Emmison, F.G. Wills of the County of Essex (England) 1571-1577. Boston: NEHG Soc., 1986.

Freeman, Frederick. The History of Cape Cod: The Annals of Barnstable Co. and of its Several Towns. 2 vols. Boston, 1860.

“Harwich, Mass. Vital Records.” Transcribed by George Ernest Bowman. The Mayflower Descendant 3 (1901): 175; 13 (Jan 1911), No. 1, p. 58; 13 (July 1911) No. 3, p. 148.

History of Adair, Sullivan, Putnam and Schuyler Counties, Mo. Goodspeed 1880.

An Illustrated Historical Atlas of Sullivan Co., Mo. by Edwards Brothers of Mo. Philadelphia, 1877.

Mass. Soldiers & Sailors of the Revolutionary War. Vol. 13, p. 947. Boston, 1905.

May, Samuel Pearce.The Descendants of Richard Sares (Sears) of Yarmouth, Mass.: 1638-1888. Albany, Joel Munsell’s Sons, 1890.

"Some Doubts concerning the Sears Pedigree." The New England Historical and Genealogical Register 40: 261-268.

National Cyclopedia of American Biography.

Pope, Charles Henry. The Pioneers of Massachusetts: A Descriptive Note. Boston, 1900. Rochester, Mass. VR.

Savage, James. A Genealogical Dictionary of the First Settlers of New England, showing Three Generations of those who came before May, 1692, on the basis of Farmer’s Register. 4 vols. Reprint. Baltimore, 1965.

Sears, Rev. Edward Hamilton. Pictures of the Olden Time. 1857. Includes the spurious pedigree derived from the fraudulent research of Horatio G. Somerby.

Sears Family History. Ms. in possession of Mrs. G.B Galyon, Rt. 1, Box 33, Berryville, Va.

"Spurious Pedigree," NEHGR 40: 261 foll.

Taunton, Mass. Vital Records to 1850. Boston: NEHG Soc., 1928.

Totten, John R.Thacher-Thatcher Genealogy. Publ. in NYGR.

The Visitations of Essex. Part 1. Ed. by Walter C. Metcalfe. London, 1878. 286-87.(Sayer, Sayre)

"Will of Captain Paul Sears" http://www.ca-probate/wills/SEARS_P.HTM

Woodworth-Barnes, Esther Littleford. Mayflower Families Through Five Generations: Descendants of the Pilgrims who landed at Plymouth, Mass., December 1620. Volume 16, Part 1, FAMILY OF JOHN ALDEN. Edited by Alice Crane Williams. Published by General Society of Mayflower Descendants, 1999.²

Sources