He was also said to have died 19 June 1682. 666

“The first American ancestor of the family was Thomas Macy, clothier merchant, who came, it is said, from the county of Wilts, England, and was in Newbury, Mass., a proprietor; he was a freeman of Sept. 6, 1639. He removed to Salisbury and was town officer and deputy. He removed about 1659 from there to Chilmark; his was the first family on Nantucket island. He was a friend of the Quakers. His death occurred June 19, 1682.” 266

“MACY, THOMAS came from Chilmark, England, to Newbury, thence to Salisbury, thence to Nantucket, in 1659. He m. Sarah Hopcot, who d. in 1706, aged 94. He d. 19 June, 1682, aged 74. He had sic children.” 666

“Thomas Macy [or Macie], b. ab. 1608, ‘a planter’, ‘clothier,’ or ‘merchant,’ came from Chilmark, Eng., to Newbury, Mass., but rem. to Salisbury, where he recd. land in 1639, ‘40, and ‘42; commoner and taxed 1650; rep. 1654; etc. He was one of the original commoners and clerk of Amesbury, 1654-9, the subject of Whittier’s poem, ‘The Exiles’. . . He was prosecuted and find for aloowing four Friends on a journey to take shelter in his house about three quarters of an hour one rainy day, in 1659, as his own letter to the court informs us. It is worth of note that his grandson and many others of his descendants became Friends. Like Roger Williams, he fled from persecution in Massachusetts. His family were the first white settlers in Nantucket, then under the jurisdiction of New York. Edward Starbuck and Isaac Coleman, a lad 12 years old, accompanied them.” 1016

“The first f Original list of ye townsmen of selisbury in ye booke of Records. . .
66 Tho: Macy . . .
This is a true Copie as they were first listed inye book of Records: as attests Tho: Bradbury recr. 1059

“Grantees of Salisbury.
The names of thofe yt have lotts & proportions granted p the Towne of Colchester in the first divifiion. . .
Tho macy . . .
This is A true Copie of the originall list taken out of the old book of Reccords for Salifbury as Attest.
Tho Bradbury rec.
Vera Copia Atest
Edward Rawson Secret
- Mass. Archives, vol. 112; leaf 2.” 1060

“Thomas Macy of Salisbury, merchant, for £6, ‘& a marke,’ conveys to Thomas Barnett of Salisbury, planter, land on west side of Pawwaues river in Salisbury, bounded by Luke Heard and John Severans, April 1, 1642. Wit: Tho: Severans, April 1, 1642. Wit: Tho: Bradbury and Robert Pike. Ack. before the court at Salisbury 13: 2: 1652.” 1061

“Thomas Macy of Salisbury, planter, conveys to Georg Martyn of Salisbury, blacksmith, for £3 10s., 1/2 of my 20 acre lot on wet side of Pawwaus river in Salisbury, adjoining land of Willi Sargent (formerly given by the town to Jno Severance) and Jno Hoyt (formerly the lot of Luke Heard), and Tho: Barnett (the present owner of the other half of the 20 acre lot), 3: 8 mo.: 1649. Wit: Tho: Bradbury and John Severance. Ack. before Samuel Symonds 2: 8 mo.: 1649.” 1061

“Georg Martyn of Salisbury, blacksmith, with consent of wife Susanna, for £13, conveys to Phillip Challice of Salisbury, planter, dwelling-house and part of lot granted by Salisbury to Thomas Macy, and sold by him to said Georg Martyn, founded by Willi: Sargent, Jno. Hoyt, Pawwaus river, Tho: Barnett; and 2 acres meadow, bounded by Vail: Rowell and another, ii: 2 mo: 1650. Signed by the M mark of Georg Martyn. Wit: Tho: Bradbury and Abraham.” 1061

“At a genll meeting of ye towne of alisbury 3d: 12th mo 1650
Also it was ordered att ye same meeting that all whose names are herevnder written shall be coompted townsmen and comoners and none but to this psent, yt is to say . . .
Tho: Macy . . .
This is a true Copie taken out of ye town Records for Salisbury
As attests Tho: Bradbury.” 1059

“Mr Wosters rate for 30ls: the 25: of December 1650. . .
Tho: Macy 15s 8d . . . ” 1059

“The Court had prohibited Joseph Peasley and Thomas Macy, of Salisbury, from exhorting the people on the Sabbath, in the absence of a minister. Pike declasred that ‘such persons as did act in making that law, did break their oath to the country, for it is against the liberty of the country, both civil and ecclesiatical.’ For expressing himself in this manner, he was disfranchised by the General Court, and heavily fined. At the next May Court, a petition was presented from a large number of the inhabitants of Hampton, Salisbury, Newbury, Haverhill, and Andover, praying that Pike’s sentence might be revoked. [The following are the names of the Haverhill signers, as copied from the original petition in the State Archives: . . .
Tristram Coffin
Peter Coffin . . .
Peter Ayre . . . “1062

“For full particulars respecting the Macy family, see ‘Genealogy of the Macy Family,’ 1868, pp. 457. The author states that Thomas Macy ‘was of the Baptist persuasion, and would frequently on the Sabbath exhort the people,’ in Amesbury. Pike’s ‘New Puritan’ also states that ‘both he and Peasley were at that time members of a Baptist sect in Salis.’ We have failed to find on the Ames. records any proof that they were Baptists. Joseph Peasley and Thomas Macy were leaders in the determination of the Ames. people not to attend meeting in Salis., but to hold one of their own in the new town.” 1016

“Thomas Macy was born 1608 or 1612 in Chilmark Parish near Salisbury, Wiltshire, England and emigrated to the United States about 1635. In 1636 he took the ‘Oath of a Freeman’ at Newbury, Massachusetts. At least 95% of the persons using the sur-name MACY in the United States in 1850 were descended from him. 1639 he married Sarah Hopcott who had also been born in Chilmark Parish in England, such marriage occurring in Salisbury (now in essex County), MA.”1063

“We find Thomas Macy frequently held positions of honor and trust in the new settlement [of Salisbury, MA]; he was a mercant, a planter, one of the select men of the town, a juryman, and withal a preacher. He was of the Baptist persuasion and would frequently on the Sabbath exhort the people. . . .Thomas Macy died on the island of Nantucket, the 19th day of April, 1682, aged 74 years. No tomb stone marks the final resting place of his earthly remains, but a monument has been reared in the hearts of his descendants in commemoration of him, which the ruthless hand of time neither obliterated nor crumbles. . . He appears to have died without a will, as letters of administration were issued to his son John Macy, as we find from the records of deeds of the island, book No. 2, page 33, the action of the court, as well as the copy of inventory then filed.”991

“William Huntington (his __ mark) of Salisbury, planter, for 55s., conveyed to Willia Osgood of Salisbury, millwrite, my division of sweepage ot ye beach, bounded by Willi: Allin and Sam: ffelloes, containing one acre and 92 rods: . .. also ye fourteenth lot of upland at the Indian field on west side of Pawwaus river, bounded by John Weed, Tho: Macy, ye Mayne river and Indian swamp, all in Salisbury, 24:1:1662.” 1064

There is much information on file regarding Thomas Macy from “Genealogy of the Macy Family” by Silvanus J. Macy (including deeds, letters, etc.) which has not yet been entered.1065

He is “often described as ‘the first settler,’ was a native of Chilmark, Whitshire, England. It is stated that he embarked for America ‘probably in 1635, but not later than 1639’. He occupied a good position in the old country, where he was much respected and prominent. Macy’s History says” ‘He lived in Salisbury in good repute for twenty years, and acquired a good interest, consisting of a tract of land, a good house, and considerable stock’.”1066

More details to be entered from “Nantucket: A History”.1066 and Early Settlers of Nantucket.1067
More details to be entered from Starbuck’s “History of Nantucket” 1012

His death is also listed as 9 April 1682. “Thomas came to Newbury about 1635 and was made Freeman there in 1639. 1014

“The earliest Macy ancestor we have been able to trace in the United States was Thomas Macy, who lived in Southern England in the County of Wiltshire, the parish of Chilmark near the town of Salisbury. About the year 1632 or 1635 he came to America, landing on the Eastern shore of Massachusetts at or near where the Pilgrim fathers landed about 15 years earlier. Thomas Macy was a farmer and a member of the Baptist church and he was a man of strong positive convictions. In the absence of the minister he sometimes exhorted in church. Strange as it may seem, the Puritans who came to America to enjoy religious freedom passed laws denying that right to others. Thomas Macy, who believed in religious freedom, resented these laws. Being a man of strong will, he with nine others, in an effort to escape persecution, left Cape Cod where they had been living, and moved 123 miles east. They, as a group, bought Nantucket Island, then owned by New York. The deeds involved in this transaction are on record in Albany, New York. Thomas Macy, although a Baptist, was kindly disposed toward people of other faiths. Once he furnished shelter for four Quakers during a heavy rain. The Puritans had passed a law forbidding Quakers from living in the Quaker colony, under penalty of death, refused to permit anyone to befriend them. Thomas Macy was summoned to appear in court and to answer charges of befriending Quakers. He was ill and could not appear in court but he addressed a very courteous letter to the court explaining just how it was. He said it was raining very hard and they did not stop more than three quarters of an hour, but for this the court fined him thirty shillings. It is interesting to know that two of these four men were hanged about two months after this incident, hanged because they were Quakers. Numerous documents signed by Thomas Macy, in the early history of Nantucket Island, indicate that he was prominent in the affairs of the community, and that he had a lofty sense of integrity and justice. The Quaker poet, John Greenleaf Whittier wrote a long poem entitled ‘ The Exile’ commemorating the fearless and resolute spirit of Thomas Macy, our first American Macy ancestor. “1058

“While still in England, Thomas Macy married Sarah Hopcott and they had seven children, four daughters and three sons.”. 1058

“The earliest list of inhabitants of Amesbury, MA is dated 19 March 1654-5.” [This includes Thomas Macy] . . . There are some local historians who say that most evidence points to the Osgood House, still standing, as having been built prior to the Macy-Colby house just below Bartlett’s corner on Main Street which Thomas Macy sold to Anthony Colby in 1854 and which he probably built previous to that year. In 1656 Richard Currier and Thomas Macy were given permission to build a sawmill on the West side of the Powow. Since it was found that more than one sawmill was needed. The town gave Currier and Macy the privilege of using all the wood on the common lot that had not been granted to the first mill, William Osgood’s , with the exception of the oak trees which were needed by the settlers to make canoes. After Macy went to live at Nantucket in 1659 Currier continued the sawmill for many years. “1068

“Like Richard Currier, Thomas Macy is listed on Amesbury records as one of the first settlers and was its first Town Clerk, 1655 through the first week or so of November 1659. He too signed the 1654 ‘Articles of Agreement’. Merrill says that he was a good penman and kept fine records and was probably well educated. It is through his copying of the ‘Articles of Agreement’, which laid down conditions with which the settlers West of the Powow had to comply before they could become a distinct town separate from Salisbury, that we have such information today. The voters of the new town agreed to these at their town meeting on 18 March 1655. . . In 1654 Macy sold his home at Bartlett’s Corner to Anthony Colby and evidently built or bought a house at what was later to be called the Mills District. In 1656 he and Richard Currier built their sawmill on the Powow and on 20 August 1658 he mortgaged the place in which he was living in to Radah Gove of Roxbury, ‘1/3 of all his part of sawmill at ye New Town and all utensils and priviledges and his dwelling house with 3 acres of upland thereto adjoining with the barn out house more or less bounded by Powow’s river East, the street West and the land of Richard Currier South.’ These boundaries fix his home after he sold the ‘Macy-Colby’ house in 1654 near the Powow, probably behind the present Post Office in the vicinity of Currier Street. It was from this house at the Mills that Macy and his family fled, supposedly in an open boat, to Nantucket in 1659. There is doubt in the minds of many that his departure was a dire result of his harboring Quakers during a severe rain storm. He had purchased Nantucket Island, at the time under New York’s jurisdiction, in July of the same year with Christopher Hussey, Tristram Coffin and others for 30 lbs plus two beaver hats, one for myself and one for my wife’, from John Mayhew. This would seem to indicate that Goodman Macy was contemplating a change of scenery several months before the incident occurred which later inspired Whittier to express his thought in ‘The Exiles’. Macy had enemies in town and the information passed on by a ‘good neighbor’, to local authorities, of the presence of Quakers in the Macy home at the Mills might be construed as an act vengeance.” 1068

“The Macy-Colby house lot was bounded, in 1654, on the West by the land of Edmund Elliott and the burying ground, called Union Cemetery since 1663, and on the East by what is now Main Street. This early home of Macy’s is about one quarter of a mile below the lights at the junction of Route 10 and Main Street. Although Macy was buried on the island of Nantucket, as were some of his descendants, his name appears of the Golgotha Stone near the Powow river. Undoubtedly this man is the best known of all the early settlers because of John Greenleaf Whittier’s poem, the Exiles.”1068

“Arms: Quarterly, gules and or, in the first a lion passant argent
Crest: A moorcock sable, combed and wattled gules, charged on the breast for distinction with a cross crosslet or
Motto: Pro libertate patriae” 1014

“The incidents upon which the following ballad has its foundation occurred about the year 1660. Thomas Macy was one of the first, if not the first white settler of Nantucket. The career of Macy is briefly but carefully outlined in James S. Pike’s ‘The New Puritan’. “ The full text of ‘The Exiles” by John Greenleaf Whittier is on file. 1069

“Thomas Macy selected his house lot on the east side of the Reed Pond, which was then a creek, and extended from the north shore south to the road. At his death this lot was occupied by his son John. Eastman Johnson is now the owner of this section. Macy left an estate of 71 pounds but claims against it were established so that it was insolvent.” 1011

“Almost obvious is that the distinction for the family is the ‘hard’ rather than the ‘flat’ sound of ‘a’ in the name MACY. Even today in the families centered upon Wiltshire i is a method by which there may be a distinction of the family from the more numerous MASEY family in England. In Wiltshire there are memers of both families, the common spelling for those (closer?) kindred to the American MACYS spelling the name MACEY. It is obvious that some time after 1635 there were other members of the Wiltshire MACY/MACEY family who came to America” Details of various, but not necessarily connected MACYs in England are listed. 1063

“In the year 1659, Thomas Macy, a name which has become noted in our colonial annals on account of his persecution for entertining Quakers, in violation of the law of 1657, then a resident of Salisbury, desiring a greater freedom of conscience than he had hitherto been permitted to enjoy among his own people, formed a company for the purchase of the island of Nantucket, then inhabited solely by a tribe of Indians. The company formed by Macy consisted of Tristram Coffin, Thomas Macy, Cristopher Hussey, R. Swain, Peter Coffin, Stephen Greenleaf, Thomas Barnard, John Swain, and William Pile. To them were afterwards added thirteen others, among whom were Tristram, Jr., and James, sons of Tristram Coffin, sen., there were twenty persons, who became the proprietors, in equal parts, of the island.”1070

“On THOMAS Macy of Nantucket Island, MA, who married Sarah Hopcott and resided at Salisbury: He was of the Baptist faith at a time when that sect was undergoing a greater persecution in England than were the puritans. He was a ‘Lay Preacher’. He has an education; 1543, 1646, and 1652 he was Administrator of town affairs, and in 1654 he was Deputy to the General Court from Salisbury. 1658 the Batpists of Salisbury petitioned to set up a community, but this was denied and in that year an Order was entered to compel all the Salisbury residents to support the Puritan minister. 1659 THOMAS gave shelter to four of the sect of Quakers, for which he was fined. The occasion was when the Quakers were stranded on the road near THOMAS’ home in a storm. In the same year two of these Quakers were hanged at Boston for their forbidden belief. THOMAS had already negotiated the purchse of Nantucket Island earlier in that year along with 9 other men, and in October, a few months after he had ‘harboured’ the Quakers during the storm, he, with Esaac Coleman and Edward Starbuck embarked with their families in a small sail boat for Nantucket and reached it safely. The foregoing is glamourized, with THOMAS Macy made the hero, in a peom by John Greenleaf Whittier.” 1063

“The first family of Nantucket - or the first family of off-islanders, depending on your point of view - was not named Coffin but Macy. . . .It was one thomas Macy who was first to settle on Nantucket Island. Thomas macy lived in Salisbury, in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Salisbury was populated by people who had fled religious ersecution in coming to Massachusetts from Europe. Now they had launced their own brand of persecution. Their chief target was Quakerism. Not only did Massachusetts Puritans abhor the Quakers, they also outlawed them. It was more than a sin to be a quaker; it was a crime. Quakers were legally banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony on pain of death. They were hounded from town to town and often were mutilated and hanged. So it was also a crime for Thomas Macy to take pity on the four Quakers who knocked on his door on a rainy April morning in 1659. In his anwer to the charges against him, Macy explained tht he had been out, that he had returned to find his wife ill and in bed. While he was trying to tend to her, there was a knock on his door. he opened it to find four men, one of whom was an acquaintance and a man suspected of being a Quaker. Standing in the rain outside his door, they asked Macy for directions. The rain was severe at the moment and Macy asked them in. He later pleasded that he told them he could not shelter them if they were Quakers; but he could not be callous enought to drive them out into the pouring rain. They stayed by his fire for a little over an hour. The rain let up; they thanked him kinly and went on their way. Word of Macy’s unchristian act reached the authorities in Salisbury, and he was threatened with a fine and possible imprisonment. Meanwhile, during the summer of 1659, friends of Thomas Macy, including one Tristram Coffin, invited him to join in the purchase of some land on an island called Nantucket, 30 miles off Massachusetts’ southern coast. There were ten families in the group, and their plan was to escape the harassment of the Puritan town fathers of Salisbury by starting yet another new life on Nantucket. They were not Quakers themselves; they had no particular views pro or con Quakerism. They simply were fed up with the arbitrary and sanctimonious rule of their Puritan neighbors. And Thomas macy had more reason than the rest of them to jointhe group of refugees. ”1033

“A poem entitled The Exiles, by John Greenleaf Whittier, depicts Thomas Macy and his family fleeing from his house in Salisbury a few steps ahead of the autorities, rushing to the rivebank and embarking in a ‘light sherry’ for Nantucket. Whittier’s descriptionhas a charming commentary of Salisbury’s pastor, who dashes to the riverbank.
‘Come back, - come back,’ the parson cried,
‘The church’s curse beware.’
‘Curse, an’thou wilt!’ said Macy,
‘Thy blessing prithee spare.’
Actually Macy’s voyage was a somewhat more leisurely process, though it was a flight from the avenging authorities nonetheless. Thomas and his wife Sarah took along their five children and three adventurous young friends: Edward Starbuck, Isaac Coleman (a twelve-year-old orphan), and eighteen-year-old James Coffin. Crowded into an open boat, the exiles sailed first to Martha’s Vineyard, where they put into Great Harbor (now Edgartown) for ‘comfort and further direction,’ as Macy succinctly phrased it. On they shortly went to the island just below the horizon to the south. They ran into a squall, with rain, strong winds and mounting seas, but macy held his course for Nantucket - a wise decision, considering the size of his boat; to have turned back would have meant running with the squall and spending many more hours in it. They made their landfall at the western end of the island, in what is now known as Madaket Harbor, where Mayhew had built a dock for his visits to Nantucket.”1033

“The Macy family built a hut on the shore of the harbor. Their first tentative meetings with the Indians were friendly . . .Nantucket’s new family had scarcely settled in by wintertime. It was a typically long, cold and dreary Nantucket winter, and Macy and his fmily used up the provisions they had brought with them. They would perhaps have been wiser to come to the island in spring, thereby allowing themselves time for planting, harvesting and preserving food for the winter. But had Thomas Macy stayed in Salisbury that winter, he might had wound up in jail. “ 1033

“So bitter had the two factions become that a simple misunderstanding, one that might normally have called only for a judicial ruling in New York, erupted into recriination, defiance and repression. Thomas Macy was Nantucket’s chief magistrate, under a one-uear commission from the governor. On October 1, 1676, Macy’s commission expired. Preoccupied with other matters, governor Andros did not immediately renew the commission or apoint another chief magistrate. Accordingly, Macy called a town meeting, in which it was voted that he would continue to serve until his successor was named by New York. Thomas macy was one of the Coffin faction. the the clerk of the court was Peter Folger, who had joined forces with John Gardner. . . Folger now decided that Thomas Macy was serving illegally; herefore he would not turn over his court records, nor would he serve any longer as clerk. The town met again, in raucous confrontation. The vote - corn kernels for yea, beans for nay - supported Macy. Folger was requested again to hand over the court records. He refused. He was sentenced to jail.” 1033

“Thomas Macy was born in 1608. Sometime between 1635 and 1639 he left Chilmark Parish, near the town of Salisbury, Wiltshire County, England, and sailed to the Massachusetts Bay Colony (MBC). During his life time, he was a merchant, a planter, one of the selectmen of the town of Salisbury, MBC, a juryman, and a minister of the Baptish persuasion. There is evidence that Thomas, while living in Salisbury, MBC, offered his home as shelter during a severe storm to several Quakers. Although our history books extoll the virtue of freedom of religion for all who settled here; in truth, the colonists were rather narrow mnded about what were acceptable religious practices! Thomas was hauled into court, severely chastised for having anything to do with Quakers and fined 30 shillings. In a fit of righteous pique, he wrote a crisply worded letter to the court mentioning something about ‘30 pieces of silver’ and apparently decided to take leave of Salisbury, MBC. In 1659, he joined with Tristram Coffin Sr., Richard Swain, Thomas Barnard, Peter Coffin, Christopher Hussey, Stephen Greenleaf, John Swain, and William Pile, to purchase nine tenths of Nantucket Island from Thomas Mayhew who had bought it from New York as pasture for his sheep. The Island was divided into two parts - one portion was set aside for permanent use by the native Indian inhabitants, the second portion was divided equally among the ten Colonists. Shortly thereafter, Thomas moved to Nantucket with his wife, Sarah (Hopcott) Macy and their five children to become the first white family to live on the island. During the period 1698-1712, the Society of Friends or Quakers brought their ministry to the second generation of the colonists living on Nantucket.”1017

“Macy, Thomas, h. Sarah Hopcot, ____, 1608, in England, P.R. 38.”995

“[1659]
This year several persons were prosecuted and fined for violating the law of 1657, which prohibited ‘entertaining quakers.’ Among them was Thomas Macy, one of the first settlers of Newbury, but at this time a resident in Salisbury. Complaint having been made against him, he was summoned to appear before the general court, to answer the charges preferred against him. Instead of complying with the requisition, he sent a letter, of which the following is a copy.
‘This is to entreat the honored court not to be offended because of my non-appearance. It is not from any slighting the authority of this honored court, nor from feare to answer the case, but I have bin for some weeks past very ill, and am so at present, and notwithstanding my illness, yet I, desirous to appear, have done my utmost endeavour to hire a horse, but cannot procure one at present. I being at present destitute have endeavoured to purchase, but at present cannot attaine it, but I shall relate the truth of the case as my answer should be to ye honored court, and more cannot be proved, nor so much. On a rainy morning there came to my house Edward Wharton and three men more; the said Wharton spoke to me saying that they were traveling eastward, and desire me to direct them in the way to Hampton, and asked me how far it was to Casco bay. I never saw any of ye men afore except Wharton, neither did I require their names, or who they were, byt by their carriage I thought they might b e quakers and told them so, and therefore desired them to passe on their way, saying to them I might possibly give offence in entertaining them, and as soone as the violence of the rain ceased (for it rained very hard) they went away, and I never saw them since. The time that they stayed int he house was about three quarters of an hour, but I can safely affirme it was not an houre. They spake not many word in the time, neither was I at leisure to talke with them for I came home wet to ye skin immediately afore they came to the house, and I found my wife sick in bed. If this satisfie not the honored court, I shall subject to their sentence: I have not willingly offended. I am ready to serve and obey you in the Lord,’
Tho. Macy [General Court files]
Notwithstanding this explanation and apology, he was fined thirty shillings, and was ordered to be admonished by the governor, for ‘entertaining quakers,’ two of whom, William Robinson and Marmaduke Stephenson, were hung in Boston, December twenty-seventh, 1659. Tradition informs us, that Thomas Macy immediately after his sentence, took an open boat, and with his wife and children, went to Nantucket, was one of the first English settlers in that island, and there resided the remainder of his life. An amusing ballad, founded on the above-mentioned incidents, was written by the poet J.G. Whittier, and published some years ago in a Philadelphia annual. See appendix.” 666

“Macy, Thomas [dup. Macey], Mr. Apr. 19, 1682. [Macy, h. Sarah Hopcot, 19th, 4 mo., a. 74, P.R. 38].”996

“The record of the General Court on the case against Thomas Macy and others is -
‘Nov. 12, 1659. . .
7. That Thomas Macy pay as a fine the some of thirty shillings,and be dmonished by the Governo’r.” 1071

“Deed of Nantucket to Ten Purchasers.
Recorded for Mr. Coffin and Mr. Macy afordsd ye Day and Yeare aforesd.
Bee it known unto all Men by these Presents, that I, Thomas Mayhew, of Martha’s Vineyard, Merchant, doe thereby acknowledge, that I have sould unto Tristram Coffin, Thos. Macy, Christopher Hussey, Richard Swayne, Thomas Bernard, Peter Coffin, Stephen Greenleafe, John Swayne, and William Pike, that Right and Interest I have in ye Land of Nantuckett, by patent . . . “
[full text to be entered] 1072

“In September or October [1659] of this year, Thomas Macy, one of the purchasers, thinking it a good opportunity to carry out a long-contemplated plan, ‘embarked at Salisbury in a small sail-boat, with his wife and children and such household furniture as he could conveniently carry, and in company with Isaac Coleman and Edward Starbuck set sail for Nantucket.’ (Macy Genealogy, page 22).” 1072

“The first election for Magistrates was held April 15, 1672 , and the names of Edward Starbuck and Richard Gardner were submitted to the Gov. at New York, and Richard Gardner was chosen by the Governor. Thomas Macy was the next Chief Magistrate. Tristram Coffin the third. ” 1011


A map showing the location of his house in “House-Lot Section 1665-1680” on file (found at Nantucket Historical Association Research Library).

“August 1, 1682. Administration on estate of Thoms Macy granted to his son John. The estate was valued at £71, of which about one-half was land and the rest cattle.” 1011

He was said to be buried in Settler’s Burial Ground, with his name recorded on existing memorial marker stating “Thomas Macy, Proprietor 1598-1682” 1049

“Thomas Macy neither fled from persecution nor did he abandon his property. He was not the man to do either. One of his replies to his wife during a storm on this memorable voyage shows his mettle: ‘Woman, go below and seek thy God. I fear not the witches on earth, nor the devils in hell.’ [The Macy Genealogy is authority for the above quotation; but the compiler very much fears that Thomas told his wife to go somewhere else, as she could not very well ‘go below,’ being in an open boat, unless she went through its bottom.] Mr. Macy left Salisbury simply ‘because he could not, in justice to the dictates of his own conscience, longer submit to the tyranny for the clergy and those in authority.’ Having with others purchased the island of Nantucket, he wisely concluded that there no one could or would dictate to him in regard to his religion or his dress. After rather a stormy voyage, they arrived safely at Nantucket. They found upon the island about 3,000 Indians, who received them kindly and assisted them in preparing for winter quarters. Thomas Macy and family were the first white settlers on the island of Nantucket. In the winter of 1659, they were joined by one Daggett, who came to the island from Martha’s Vineyard for the purpose of hunting. [Everything goes to show that though Macy and his companions were the first settlers, white men had, previous to Macy’s coming, been frequent visitors to the island, - from the fact that neighter Mayhew, Macy, Coffin, no the rest of the purchasers would have bought the island, unless some one of them or some other white man had visited it; for how did Macy happen to know where the island was, and how did Daggett know that there was game on the island?] “ 1072

“ ‘ What a picture we now have before us! this devout man with his wife and five little children, the oldest thirteen years and the youngest four years of age, with Isaac Coleman and Edward Starbuck, the former a mere lad of twelve years, living upon this island through the severity of a winter, surrounded by native Indians of whose character and language they were entirely ignorant. . . . (Macy Genealogy, page 23.)” 1072

“The probabilities are that the site of a town was not immediately determined upon: each one, doubtless, having due regard for his ownership, placed his house in the locality that suited him best. Three or four locatlities are claimed by as many different people as sites of the first town. Macy’s History says, ‘Thomas Macy chose a spot for settlement ont he southeast side of Madaket harbor,where he found a rich soil and an excellent spring of water’; but give no authority for the statement. Allen Coffin, Esq, in his ‘Coffin Family,’ claims Capaum Pond as the site of the first village, and quotes from the first book of Nantucket Records to substantiate his claim; he says, ‘At a meeting held at Nantucket, July 15, 1661, of the owners or purchasers residing there, it was agreed that each man have liberty to choose his house lot within the limits not previously occupied, and that each house lot hsall contain sixty rods square to a whole share. Tristram Coffin appears to have been allowed to make the first selection,’ which he did at ‘Cappamet Harbour head sixty rods squar, or thereabouts,’ as did also Peter Coffin, Tristram Coffin, Jr., William Pike, James Coffin, Stephen Greenleaf, and others. William C. Folger, Esq., says that -
‘Thomas Macy and Edard Starbuck stopped at Maddequet during the winter of 1659. In the spring each took a hoe and went to find a better place. Edward chose near the north head of Hummock Pond, where he settled, - probably on the now Cornish farm. Thomas settled at Watercomet (the pond field), where his son John and grandson Thomas - who died in 1759 - lived. ‘T is very near the Reed Pond, and the land now belongs to Capt. henry Coleman and others. Foundations of several houses are found there now.’ After careful examination of the map, after listening attentively to all the arguments brought forward by different people to prove that this or that locality was the place where the first town was situated, and after carefully weighing all the evidence in favor of each site, the compiler has arrived at the following conclusions: first, that the houses were few and scattered widely apart; second, that the site of the first town was a considerable distance to the eastward of Long Pond, and that the larger portion of the houses were situated around the heads of Cappamet Harbor, now Capaum Pond (but which then opened to the sea), and Hummock Pond, and in the near vicinity of Maxcy’s, Reed and Washing Ponds, - or in other words, at Watercomet.” 1072

“Thomas Macy went back to Salisbury, and lived there in 1664, as the following from a letter written to a gentleman in Nantucket by the historian Joshua Coffin, in 1831, shows conclusively. This letter says:
‘Thomas Macy was a merchant, an enlightened man and much too wise to apprehend any danger to his person or property from any person or persons, either legally or illegally . . . The idea that his property was forfeited is not correct. It will perhaps be new to some people to know that Thomas Macy went back from Nantucket and lived in Salisbury again, and sold his land, house, etc. The record says, ‘ thomas Macy sold unto Anthony Colby the house in which he, Thomas Macy, dwelleth at the present, together with the barne, and so much land as the garden conteyneth on a straight line to the eastermost corner of Roger Eastman’s barne,’ etc. See Registry of Deeds, 1664; for in that year he lived in Salisbury . . . Macy was certainly a man of fortitude, courage, good sense, and education.’ “ 1072

“The sweeping assertion that the first settlers of the island were ignorant and very illiterate is another absurdity . . . Thomas Macy, the first settler, was far from being an illiterate and ignorant man: he was a preacher and merchant, and his letter to the General Court in 1659 can, for clearness and force, hardly be surpassed by any scholar of to-day.” 1072

“Among the note-worthy incidents of this year [1653], may be mentioned the case of Robert Pike, of Salisbury. The Court had prohibited Joseph Peasley and Thomas Macy, of Salisbury, from exhorting the people on the Sabbath, in the absence of a minister. Pike declared that ‘such persons as did act in making that law, did break their oath to the country, for it is against the liberty of the country, both civil and ecclesiatical.’ For expressing himself in this manner, he was disfranchised by the General Court, and heavily fined. At the next May Court, a petition was presented from a large number of the inhabitants of Hampton, Salisbury, Newbury, Haverhill, and Andover, praying that Pike’s sentence might be revoked. 1062

“The duke appointed Francis Lovelace governor of new York, and the latter, in May, 1670, ordered all claimants to lands in Nantucket to appear before him within four months and prove their titles. It was not until a year later, however, in May, 1671, that Tristram Coffin and Thomas Macy were appointed to go to New York and represent the proprietors. A new patent was thereupon issued to thee two ‘for and on behalf of themselves and their associates,’ the consideration this time being ‘four barrels of merchantable codfish to be delivered in New York annually,’ and a condition being that the proprietors must purchase the lands from the Indians, after which the Crown would ratify and confirm the titles so obtained. The town was then incorporated, and in 1673 Governor Lovelace gave it the name of Sherburne, by which it was known down to 1795.” 1073

“There is a legend that when the very first settlers, the Thomas Macy family, were fighting their way through a storm at sea on their way to the island, Sarah Macy suggested that they turn back. Her husband’s response was: Woman, go below and seek thy god! I fear not the witches on earth nor the devils in hell!’ Nor only might it be said that this was the first and last example of feminine frailty (Sarah was not yet, of course, a Nantucket woman), but it is also an unreliable account, if only because their vessel was an open boat and there was nowhere below to go.” 1033

“The Macy family’s journey to Nantucket in 1659 has become legendary. In an open boat in late autumn, they encountered a fearsome storm that tested Sarah Macy’s resolve to the limit. At one point Thomas Macy is said to have silenced his frightened wife by shouting, I fear not the witches of earth nor the devils in hell!’ Whether or not his defiant words were intended as a religious creed, their rejection of Puritanism’s embodiments of evil was prophetic. From the date of Macy’s landing until the turn of the next century, no religious orthodoxy was to be found on Nantucket. The individual, and the individual alone, would choose whom and when to fear.” 1054

“In the fall of the same year [1659] one of the purchasers, Thomas Macy, was convicted of the crime of harboring Quakers in Salisbury. Within days of his conviction, Macy, with his wife Sarah and their five children, abondoned the Merrimack Valley region. Accompanying the Macys were Edward Starbuck, James Coffin, and a twelve-year old boy named Isaac Coleman. After arriving in November of 1659, the group dug in for the winter at Madaket - the west end of the island - to become Nantucket’s first white settlers. Within a few years more of the proprietors’ families had moved to the island, creating a microcosm of religious New England. Among them were several Coffins, who as a clan owned the largest block of shares and whose diffidence in religious matters earned them the epithet ‘Nothingarians.’ Thomas Macy and Edward Starbuck were Baptists.”1054

“Salisbury Commoners, 1650.
The following extract is also copies from the Salisbury records:
‘3d: (12th) mo 1650
Also att ye same meeting it was ordered yt all whose names are here vnder written, shalbe accompted townesmen & Comoners, & none butt them, to this prsent, that is to say: . . .
Tho: Macy . . . “1016

“Salisbury Rate, 1650.
‘Mr Wosters rate for 30ls: the 25: of December 1650 . . .
Tho: Macy s 15, d 8 . . . “1016

“First Settlers of Amesbury.
On the Amesbury records we find, dated march 19, 1654-5, the following list of the ‘present inhabitanc and comenors heare in the new towne.’ . . .
Thomas Macy . . . “ 1016

“Signatures to Articles of Agreement
Between the Inhabitants of the Old Town and those of the New Town, May 1, 1654. [The date, March 14, 1654, is also given] . . .
Tho: Macy . . . 1016

“Division of Land, Salisbury, 1654.
Tho: Macy” 1016

“Salisbury Petitions of 1658.
In the Massachusetts archives are found two petitions about church matters, both dated May 19, 1658, on which appear the following names of inhabitants of Salisbury: . . .
Tho: Macy . . . “1016

“Many of the inhabitants,’ noted Thomas Macy in 1676, ‘do frequently purchase it [alcohol] p[re]tending for their own use and sel it to the Indians.’ . . . Gardner had delivered a shipment of sixteen gallons to the Indians, but as it was, in the words of Macy, a trader himself, merely ‘a small Quantity,’ we can assume that the trade was normally quite vigorous.” 1074


“The following is a copy of a paper found in the Massachusetts archives, Boston, without date, but indexed under 1639. The use of the name ‘Colchester’ places the date of the original record between September, 1639, and October, 1640, unless the new settlement used the name before it was authorized by the General Court. The Salisbury records have the name ‘Merrimack’ in May, 1639. The Boston copy must have been made after October, 1640, as it uses the name ‘Salisbury’: ‘The names of those yt have lotts & proportions granted pr the Toune of Colchester in the first division . . .
Tho Macy. . . “1016

“On the Salisbury records, Carr, Morrill, Macy, Fitts, wid. Christian Brown, and perhaps Rowell, are not mentioned as participating in the ‘first division’ [AThey all, doubtless, received land in the ‘first division,’ but may have failed to pay for recording their grants in the ‘new book.’] though they all received land in 1640, and Macy in 1639.“ 1016

“By referring to Merrill’s map, History of Amesbury, it will be seen that all these lots were located on the ‘circular road,’ except those of Fuller, Macy, Rowell, and Brown. The list looks as if Fitts, Rowell, and Brown were added later, and wid. Brown may have first had the lot of her son Henry Brown on the ‘circular road.’ Macy’s lot is given on the ‘road to the neck.’ . . . It seems probable that the first lots laid out were all on the ‘circular road,’ except, perhaps, those of Fuller and Macy, and they either located away from others, or afterwards exchanged lots for those represented on the map.” 1016

“The Macy-Colby House
Main Steet
The home of Thomas Macy until his departure to Nantucket island in 1659. Macy was one of the original negotiators for Nantucket island, which was bought for thirty pounds and two beaver hats. He also was featured as the hero of Whittier’s poem The Exiles.” 1075

“Over the Merrimac River from Newburyport is Salisbury, settled in 1638. Its istoric homes are clustered in the town of Amesbury, which broke away from Salisbury in 1654. Thomas Macy, the first town clerk of Amesbury, erected the Macy-Colby House prior to 1654 and then fled Amesbury for Nantucket when his Quaker sympathies were exposed.” 1076

“Initally researched by K. Little - 2001
Macy-Colby House (259 Main Street)
Thought to have been built around 1652, (actual date still in question) this home is considered to be one of the least spoiled examples of early American architecture in the nation. Thomas Macy, the original owner sold his property to Anthony Colby in 1654.
Thomas Macy was one of eightenn first settlers who crossed the Powow River into what became Amesbury about 1649. He was Amesburys’ first town clerk. He was involved in numerous land transactions until 1659 when he moved to Nantucket Island becoming the first white settler there.” 1077

Monument in Settler’s Burial Ground reads
“Erected A.D. 1881, by
A Descendant of the First
Settlers of Nantucket
In Memory of those whose remains
Are buried on this hallowed spot,
Where stood the first church
Gathered here in 1711,
Since removed to where it
Now stands as the vestry of the
First Congregational Society. . .

1598 - Thomas Macy - 1682 . . .

Many of the Descendants of
These Worthy Sires have been
Distinguished for their Courage and
Energy, and Left a Record
for Others to Emulate.” 1051

“It seems strange that the Macy party would have risked settline in Nantucket so late in 1659, with winter almost upon them. Most writers say it was the fall of 1659. The poet Whittier had them fleeing to Nantucket the very day that Thomas Macy was discovered harboring the Quakers from the storm, but this immediacy seem apocryphal. The dequence, fairly well documented: Teh Court’s warrant was dated October 18, 1659. Macy wrote his apologetic letter to the Court on October 27. The Court gave its decision in his case on November 12. That date would ahve been ominously late for Macy to move his family to the desolate wesat end of Nantucket. without shelter against the imminent winter. The penalty was not large (thirty shillings), and did not call for imprisonment, so there is little reason to believe that he was forced to leave at that late date.
On the contrary, knowing that he owned a share of Nantucket, and knowing that the court sentence might be more severe than it actually turned out to be, he might well have left before the sentence was passed, early enought to get at least a start toward a shelter against the winter on Nantucket. Given the known facts, this seemed to be the most plausible reconstruction.” 1078

“Each of the ten original proprietors of Nantucket Island took an equal partner soon after the purchase agreement was signed in July 1659. These twenty men are known as the First Purchasers (Thomas Barnard & Robert Barnard - Peter Coffin & James Coffin - Tristram Coffin Sr. & Nathaniel Starbuck - Stephen Green leaf & Tristram Coffin Jr. - Christopher Hussey & Robert Pike - Thomas Macy & Edward Starbuck - Thomas Mayhew & John SMith - William Pile sold his share to John Bishop & William Bunker - John Swain & Thomas Coleman - Richard Swain & Thomas Look) and had an equal share in the land on the Island.” 1079

“1639
Thomas Macy, who became one of the first settlers of Nantucket, came from England this year and settled at Salisbury, where he and his wife (Sarah Hopcott) lived twenty years before coming to Nantucket.” 1057

“1659
Thomas Macy and family, accompanied by Edward Starbuck and Isaac Coleman, moved from Salisbury to Nantucket, and were the first white people who lived on the island. This year the island was deeded by Mayhew to the ten original purchasers for the sum of thirty pounds sterling and two beaver hats. The ten purchasers were: Tristram Coffin, senior, Thomas Macy, Christopher Hussey, Richard Swain, Tehomas Barnard, Peter Coffin, Stephen Greenleaf, John Swain, William Pile. .. . Each of the above chose an ‘associate’ with whom to settle the island, namely: Tristram Coffin, junior, John Smith, Robert Pike, Robert Barnard, Thomas Coleman, Edward Starbuck, Nathaniel Starbuck, Thomas Look, James Coffin, Thomas Mayhew, junior . . . Tuckernuck island was this year deeded by Thomas Mayhew to Tristram Coffin, Sr., Peter Coffin, Tristram Coffin, Jr., and James Coffin, for the sum of six pounds.” 1057

“In the autumn of 1659, Thomas Macy with his wife and five young children, set sail in an open boat from Salisbury, bound for Nantucket Island. With two male companions, one of then a young boy, he erected a primitive shilter, probably with the aid of friendly Indians, in the neighborhood of Madaket Harbor. No account has come down to us of this first winter spent by a white family on the island, but the lonliness and hardships can well be imagined. The prospect improved the following spring when the other settlers who had purchased the island from Thomas Mayhew, began to arrive, laid out their house lots and built their houses.” 1080

“Tradition on Nantucket Island says that Thomas Macy and his family with Edward Starbuck and family and Isaac Coleman came from the mainland to settle there in the fall of 1659.
(1) Thomas Macy, 1608-82, hailed from Wiltshire, England; lived at Newburyport, Mass., where he is listed as freeman, Sept. 6, 1639; married Sarah Hopcott, 1612-1706.” 143

“Sound a ‘Tucket
The veins tht have their ichor mixed
Of every island flavor
Should bleed no whit at thrme affixed
Of old Nantucket savor: -

‘The Rays and Russells coopers are,
The knowing Folgers lazy,
A learned Coleman very rare,
And scarce an honest Hussey;

The Coffins noisy, fractious, loud,
The silent Gardners plodding,
The Mitchells good, the Barkers proud,
The Macys eat the pudding:

The Swains are swinish, clownish called,
‘The Barnards very civil,
The Starbucks they are loud to bawl,
The Pinkhams beat the devil.” 1050

“The real pioneer of the little island-colony was Thomas Macy, who embarked from Salisbury, Mass., in a small boat in 1659, in compay with Edward Starbuck, Isaac Coleman, and probably James Coffin, and sailed round the Cape to Nantucket. Macy had been a man of infludence in Salisbury. He was a Baptist of the seeker-type and frequently ‘exhorted’ in public. He came into collision with the authorities for preaching without ordination, and again for entertaining Quakers in violation of the law of 1657. The reason assigned for his migration was his desire to follow his conscience, and to get free from ‘the tyranny of the clergy and those in authority.’ “ 1081


“Macy, Thomas, Newbury, came, it is said, from Chilmark, Co. Wilts, freem. 6 Sept. 1639, m. Sarah Hopcot, wh. d. 1706, aged 94, rem. to Salisbury, had Sarah, b. 9 July 1644, d. young; Sarah, again, 1 Aug. 1646; mary, 4 Dec. 1648; and Thomas, 22 Sept. 1653; was rep. 1654, rem. to Nantucket a. 1659, being there one of the the first sett. had six ch. an d. 19 June 1672, in 74th yr. Coffin’s Newbur; Holmes’s Ann.; Machy’s Nantucket, 13-18. His d. Sarah m. 11 Apr. 1665, William Worth; Mary m. 11 Apr. 1669, William Bunker; and Bethia m. 30 Mar. 1670, Joseph Gardner.” 8

“Tristram Coffin was a leading spirit among the Islanders. Both he and his son Peter were wealthy proprietors and to a large extent controlled the enterprises of the island. . . For a time the two islands were under the jurisdiction of the colony of New York. His commission, thereofre, is found in the ‘Third Deed Book’ at Albany:
‘Francis Lovelace, Esq. etc. Whereas upon address made unto mee by Mr. Tristram Coffin and Mr. Thomas Macy on ye behalfe of themselves . . . Given under my Hand and Sealer at fforte James, in New York this 29th day of June, in ye 22 yeare of his Maties Regine; Annog. Dn’i. 1671.
Franccis Lovelace.’ “ [full text to be entered]. 1027

“Many of the founders resided, for a time at least, in Salisbury or Newbury, Massachusetts, or both. Included in this groups were Tristram Coffin, Sr., and his sons, Thomas Macy, Thomas Coleman, John Bishop, Robert Pike, Thomas Barnard, and John Rolfe.” 1022

“Thomas Macy was a self-described merchant and clothier.” 1022

“Thomas Macy and Robert Pike served Salisbury in numerous town and provincial offices.” 1022

“Other Nantucket fonder supported the activities of lay preachers in Salisbury. When Amesbury was established as a separate settlement in 1654, but was still religiously and politically tied to Salisbury, the inhabitants of Amesbury, ncluding the future Nantucketers Thomas Macy and Edward Cottle, refused to cross the river to Salisbury’s church or pay its minister. Instead they establishe their own meeting and listened to the lay preaching of Joseph Peasley and perhaps Thomas Macy.” 1022

“Thomas Macy and Richard Swain were both fined, and Swain disenfranchised, for entertaining Quakers in 1659.” 1022

“Not all half-share grants were made to new inhabitants. Thomas Macy, for example, received in March 1664 a grant to ‘supply the occasions of the island in the trade of weaving.’ “ 1022

“Thomas Macy in 1677 was given ‘liberty to take up part of his divdent land and to have [it] laid out adjoining his houselot.’ “ 1022

“Half-share grants to the tradesmen were made to promote the communty’s welfare, as when Thomas Macy received his grant as a weaver ‘for the benefit of the inhabitants as well as of himself.’ “ 1022

“In June 1671 Thomas Macy, representing the Nantucket town meeting, and Tristram Coffin, Sr., representating his family’s interest in the island, arrived at Fort James accompanied by the representative of the Vineyard. Macy brought with him a set of regulations proposed by the town for the government of Nantucket. He and Coffin presented the proposals to the governor and his council. the resolutions resulting from the meeting largely adhered to the proposals submitted by the town.” [details to be entered] 1022

“Settlers such as thomas Macy supported the lay prophesying of Joseph Peasley in Salisbury.” 1022

“An important complement to the Indian trade in goods was alcohol . . . In May 1676 Thomas Macy charged that JOhn Gardner regularly ‘bargained with the Indians to give each man a dram before they go fishing in the morning.’ Again according to Macy, an active trader himself who claimed to ‘have been the utmost opposed to the trade,’ many English Nantucket ;inhabitants do frequently purchase it pretending for their own use and sell it to the Indians.’ “ 1022

“Macy, for example, believed that the Indians had ‘been by the drunken trade kept all the while like bears and wolves in the wilderness.’ “1022

“In 1676 thomas Macy wrote to the governor of New York, remarking acidly, ‘that some that dwell elsewhere have for some years past sent goods to trade with the Indians upon account of fishing and otherwise; and great quantities of strong liquor have been one way or another disposed to the Indians.’ Macy requested ‘a strict law or order’ preventing any vessel from entering the harbor to sell liquor.” 1022

“Thomas Macy was born in England and as a young man resided near Salisbury int he parish of Chilmark, Wiltshire. He died at Nantucket 19th of 4th month 1682. He married in England Sarah Hopcott who was born about 1612 and died at Nantucket in 1706 at age 94.” {Many details to be entered] 626

“1645. . .
The committee chosen last year to inquire into the violation of the order concerning cutting trees did their duty faithfully, and reported the names of those subject to fines, as follows: -
Samuel Hall, Richard Currier, George Martin, John Hoyt, Thomas Whitcher, William Sargent, Willi. Brown, Thoams Rowcil, Henry Munday, Thomas Macy, William Barnes.
Jan. 2d. What the amount of each man’s fine was does not appear; but at this meeting it was ‘ordered that Samuel Hall’s forgeiture shall be abated to £5, & he to have the trees, to be paid forthwith. . . Thomas Macy’s to 15 s. . . ” 1082

“At the incorporation of the new town there appears to have been but thirty-six freeman, by which is meant voters and commoners, viz.: - . . .
Thomas Macy . . . “ 1082

“On Nantucket a crowd of aggressive English traders, locked in sharp competition among themselves, employed alcohol as a means of gaining control over Indian labor. ‘Many of the inhabitants,’ noted Thomas Macy in 1676, ‘do frequently purchase it p[re]tending for their own use and sel it to the Indians.’ [Thomas Macy to Gov. Andros, May 9, 1676, quoted in Starbuck, Nantucket, 59]. . . . According to Macy, these merchants ‘have some Yeares past sent Goods to trade with the Indians upon the accompt of Fishing and otherwise and great quantities of strong Liquor have bin sent . . . The agent here [John Gardner] that carried on the Trade for the Gentlemen hath bargained with the Indians to give each Man a dram before they go out fishing in the Morning; but under that p[re]tence much Abuse hath bin.’ Recently, Gardner had delivered a shipment of sixteen gallons to the Indians, but as it was, in the words of Macy, a trader himself, merely ‘a small Quantity,’ we can assume that the trade was normally quite vigorous.“1083

Early Settlers of Essex and Old Norfolk lists: “Macy. - Thomas, Salisbury, planter, 1649; wf. Sarah, clothier, 1658.” 849

“At some time between the years 1635 and 1639, Thomas Macy (1612-1682) left his home in Wiltshire, one of the southern counties of england, to come to New England with his wife and settled at Newbury in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He joined a group establishing a new settlement at Salisbury in 1639, and soon became a Freeman and later one of the elected selectmen. He was a merchant and dealt in textiles, as well as being a planter. All of his children were born in Salisbury, and the Nantucket Macys stem from his son John, who was four years old when the family moved to Nantucket. Thomas held a number of positions of trust in Salisbury and in 1654 he was elected to the General Court” 1038

“The government of the Puritans in Massachusetts made strict allegiance to the Protestant church mandatory, and among the rigid rules was a regulation against the new sect of the Society of Friends called Quakers. Thomas Macy, who had allowed some traveling Quakers to come into his home during a rain storm, was fined for breaking this discriminatory order. Recognizing the threat to the lives of free men through living in a colony which sanctioned such bigotry, Thomas Macy joined with some of his neighbors and acquaintances to purchase land on the Island of Nantucket. Ten men, who later took ten partners, formed the first company, and one of the original groups was Thomas Mayhew, a merchant of Watertown, Mass., who had obtained grants for the settlement of both Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket following negotiations with agents of the Crown.” 1038

“Thomas Macy was a friend and relative of Mayhew and it is probable that he first learned of Nantucket as an available place of settlement from Mayhew. It took men of courage to remove themselves from the comparative safety of Salisbury to a remote island, inhabited only by Indians, and a good deal of the character of Thomas Macy may be gleaned from this fact as well as from his spending the first winter on the island with his wife and family, together with Edward Starbuck and a 12-year-old boy Isaac Coleman. That first winter was spent in a rude habitation on the shores of Madaket harbor, and it was no doubt an exploratory period for Macy, who kept the record.” 1038

“The first agreement that concluded with the deed to the first ten purchasers of Nantucket was recorded for ‘Mr. [Tristram] Coffin and Mr. Macy,’ and dated at Salisbury on July 2, 1659. the island was then under the Colony of New York. Macy was a man of education as his letters show, especially the one he wrote to the General court explaining his reasons for ‘harboring’ the Quaker wayfarers. He had married Sarah Hopcot in England before coming to America, and as already stated, all his children were born in Salisbury, Mass., two sons and tree daughters. As his partner in the Nantucket venture thomas Macy chose Edward Starbuck.” 1038

“While Tristram Coffin, Sr., played a leading role in the settlement of Nantucket, with is sons and daughters, Thomas Macy was the second leader. Both men became Chief Magistrates of the island community, and held dominant roles. When the famous ‘Revolt of the Half Share Men’ occurred, Thomas Macy showed more understanding of the situation than did Tristram Coffin. The strong personalities of both men were factors in that important part of Nantucket history. Macy died in 1682, and his son John (1635-1691) was his worthy successor.” 1038

“There was, also, John Macy’s father - Thomas Macy, (1608-1682) - co-founder of the Nantucket settlement, who had been a Baptist lay preacher, and a man who had been fined by the Puritan-controlled Massachusetts Bay Colony for harboring some Quakers during a rain storm, at his home in Salisbury.” 1023

“The numerous descendants of the Macy Family of Nantucket will be very much interested in a letter recently received by Walter Weston Folger, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, one of our Association’s members, which was in response to an inquiry he made to Chilmark, in England . . .
There is nothing here that assists directly with the parentage either of Thomas Macy (c. 1608-82) or his wife, Sarah Hopcott (1612-1706), whose name is unrecorded in our indexes. . . .
Mr. Folger adds a note to the above: ‘In Charles E. Banks’ History of Martha’s Vineyard, Vol 1, page 112, there is a reference to the will of Thomas Maycie of Chilmark, dated in 1575, which, if extant, was not included in the above compilation by Archivist Rathbone, The reference to which I allude is as follows:
‘The adjoinging parish of Chilmark, disclosed some early Macy stones in the churchyard. it will be remembered that Thomas Macy of Nantucket, who is said to have been from Chilmark, referred to Thomas Mayhew of Martha’s Vineyard as ‘my honored cousin’ (N.Y. Col. Mss., Vol. XXV), ad while searching for Mayhew wills, I accidentally found the will of Thomas Maycie of Chilmark, dated 1575, which may serve as the basis of some future investigations concerning the well-known family, whose emigrant ancestor first settled in Salisbury, Massachusetts.’
Unfortnatley, the parish registers of Chilmark are missing prior to 1653.” 1084

“Francis Lovelace became the Duke of York’s appointee as the governor of New York, and in May, 1670, ordered ‘all about you [Thomas Mayhew] who are concerned’ t come to New York and show what ‘clayme to any of those islands,’ meaning Martha’s Vineyard and the adjacent islands, as well as Nantucket. In response to this order, the Proprietors of Nantucket sent Thomas Macy to New York and Tristram Coffin accompanied him in the interests of the owners of Tuckernuck and other Coffin lands.” 1052

“Thomas Macy and Edward Starbuck, two of the leading figures in the Madaket settlement were electarian Baptist lay readers: men who believed in adult baptism and an unpaid clergy.” 1036

“On 2 July 1659, Thomas Mayhew of Martha’s Vineyard sold his rights to the island of Nantucket to Tristram Coffin Sr., Thomas Macy, Richard Swaine, Thomas Barnard, Peter Coffin, Christopher Hussey, Stephen Greenleaf, John Swaine, and William Pile.” 1085

“On 18 October 1659, arrest warrants were issued by the General Court for eight men charged with entertaining Quakers. Among the group were two fo the Nantucket proprietors - Richard Swaine and Thomas Macy.” 1085

“Estate of John Bayly of Newbury. . . .
Inventory taken Nov. 12, 1651, by Mr. Edward Woodman and Thomas Macy . . . Essex Co Probate Fiels, Docket 1,334.” 193