SABIN FAMILY

BIOGRAPHY

AS RECORDED IN:

COMMEMORATIVE BIOGRAPHICAL RECORD OF
TOLLAND AND WINDHAM COUNTIES CONNECTICUT.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES OF PROMINENT AND REPRESENTATIVE CITIZENS AND OF MANY OF THE EARLY SETTLED FAMILIES
PUBLISHER: J.H.BEERS & CO., CHICAGO; 1903 P. 68 & 69

SABIN. This family, of which the late Col. Horace Sabin was a distinguished member, is one of the oldest in Pomfret, Windham county.

William Sabin, the progenitor in America, appeared in the town of Rehoboth, Mass., at its organization in 1643. When he came to America is not known, but tradition says he came from Wales or the south of England, where he had found refuge in flight from France. He was a Huguenot, a man of considerable culture, and possessed wealth, as is shown in the account of his estate and gifts for the relief of the wants of those who suffered from the ravages of the Indians. He was one of the leading spirits of Rehoboth in school and church matters and in the affairs at Plymouth. The name of his first wife, who died shortly after 1660, is not known. For his second, he married, on Dec. 22, 1663, Martha Allen, born Dec. 11, 1641 (twin sister to Mary), daughter of James and Anna Allen, of Medfield. Martha Allen was a sister of Nathaniel and Joseph Allen, who married daughters of William Sabin by his former wife. Mr. Sabin died about 1687. His will was made June 4, 1685, and probated in Boston July 17, 1687, during the administration of Gov. Andros. In the original will, on file in Boston, are mentioned sixteen of his twenty children. His children by the first wife, all born in Rehoboth except the two eldest, whose place of birth is unknown, were as follows: The date of birth of the oldest, Samuel, is not known. Elizabeth, born in 1642, married (first) Robert Millard (Nov. 24, 1663), and (second) Samuel Howard; she died Feb. 7, 1717. Joseph was born May 24, 1645. Benjamin, born May 3, 1646, is mentioned below. Nehemiah, born May 28, 1647, was slain by the Indians in June, 1776. Experience, born June 8, 1648, married Samuel Bullin Aug. 20, 1672, and died without issue, June 14, 1728. Mary (or Mercy), born May 23, 1652, married Nathaniel Allen, and died Feb. 27, 1674, leaving a son Samuel. Abigail, born Sept. 8, 1653, married Joseph Bullin March 15, 1675, and died without issue, May 1, 1721. Hannah, born Oct. 22, 1654, married Joseph Allen, of Medfield, Mass., Nov. 10, 1673, and removed to Pomfret, Conn.; she was the mother of twelve children. Patience was born in December, 1655. Jeremiah was born Jan. 24, 1657; perhaps this name should be Jonathan, as a Jonathan is mentioned as being in the Narragansett expedition of 1676 (Bliss’ History of Rehoboth, page 117). Sarah was born July 27, 1660. Children by the second wife: James, born January 1, 1665; John, Aug. 27, 1666; Hezekiah, April 3, 1669 (died in 1693); Noah, March 1, 1671 (died in 1694); Mehitable, May 15, 1673 (married Joseph Bucklin, July 30, 1691, and died Sept. 27, 1751; he died July 28, 1729); Mary, Sept.8, 1675 (married Nathaniel Cooper Dec. 8, 1696); Sarah, Feb. 16, 1677-78; Margaret, April 30, 1680 (died July 10, 1697).

II. Benjamin Sabin, son of William, resided in Rehoboth until 1675, when he removed to Roxbury, Mass., and in 1686 he was one of the thirteen pioneers who settled Woodstock, Conn. He joined the same year in purchasing a large tract of land lying just south of Woodstock, Mashamoquoit, the present town of Pomfret. He lived in Woodstock until 1705, when he removed to his new purchase. The town of Pomfret was not incorporated until 1713, nor the church organized until 1715, which accounts for his continuing his church relations in Woodstock after his removal. He died in Pomfret July 21, 1725, in his eightieth year. He married first Sarah, daughter of John and Rebecca Polly, of Roxbury, who was born June 2, 1650 (a twin of Mary). He married (second), July 5, 1678, Sarah Parker who died Jan. 22, 1717-18. The will of John Polly provides that the four motherless children of his daughter Sarah are to have their mother’s part of his estate. Benjamin Sabin’s children by his first wife were: (1) Josiah, born in Rehoboth Oct. 11, 1669, married Rebecca Cheney, of Roxbury, Mass., June 18, 1706. They resided in Roxbury in 1730, and had two daughters. He died in Pomfret Feb. 22, 1745. (2) Ebenezer was born in Rehoboth Dec. 10, 1671. (3) Benjamin was born in Rehoboth Dec. 2, 1673. (4) Mehitable was born in Roxbury Sept. 7, 1677. Children by second wife: Sarah, born in Roxbury Aug. 1, 1679 (married Samuel Adams Jan. 6, 1705); Nehemiah, born in Roxbury Jan. 10, 1681; Patience, born in Roxbury May 3, 1682; Jeremiah, born in Roxbury March 11, 1684; Experience, born in Roxbury in February, 1686 (married David Morse, of Medfield, Aug. 22, 1705); Stephen, born in Woodstock May 30, 1689; and Timothy, born in Woodstock in 1694.

III. Ebenezer Sabin, son of Benjamin, lived in Woodstock in early life but moved to Pomfret. His wife’s name was Susanna. A Susanna Sabin was admitted to “full communion” in Roxbury in June, 1696 (Rec. Com. Rep. Roxbury Records, page 102). Ebenezer Sabin was ensign in 1700 in the expedition against Canada. He died Sept. 18, 1739. His children were: Ebenezer, born July 8, 1696; Joseph, Jan. 23, 1701; Susanna, April 5, 1704; Joshua, May 26, 1706; Mehitable, July 21, 1711 (died May 19, 1739); and Seth, Oct. 21, 1714.

IV. Joshua Sabin, son of Ebenezer, resided in Pomfret, and there married Mary Sabin (his cousin), Jan. 22, 1734. She was the mother of his ten children: Abishai, a clergyman, was born Sept. 10, 1735, and died Feb. 4, 1782. Susanna was born Aug. 25, 1737. Joshua, born June 6, 1740, married Ruth Wiswall, daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth (Franklin) Wiswall, and niece of Benjamin Franklin. Mary, born May 6, 1742, died Oct. 24, 1754. Sylvanus, born Jan. 14, 1744, married Lucy Wiswall, sister of Ruth. Phethena, born Jan. 6, 1747, died May 12, 1754. Lucy, born Aug. 9, 1749, died March 17, 1752. Walter, born Feb. 12, 1752, died Sept. 28, 1774. Alice, born April 20, 1754, died Oct. 13, 1754. Elizabeth was born Sept. 6, 1756.

V. Joshua Sabin (2), son of Joshua, served in the Revolution. On June 3, 1766, he married Ruth Wiswall, daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth (Franklin) Wiswall, the latter a sister of Benjamin Franklin. Joshua Sabin died in March, 1825, and his wife died Feb. 1, 1813. Children: Joshua, born Jan. 4, 1768, died April 27, 1770; Erepta, July 18, 1769, July 5, 1848; Clarissa, May 15, 1771, Dec. 25, 1825; Joshua, July 15, 1773, Sept. 20, 1778; Lucinda, March 15, 1776, Aug. 27, 1777; Horatio, April 25, 1778, March 19, 1835; Mary, Sept. 16, 1781, Feb. 7, 1844.

VI. Horatio Sabin, son of Joshua, married Elizabeth, daughter of Stephen and Judith (Paine) Williams, Jan. 4, 1809. She was born Jan. 4, 1777. They had two children: Horace, born March 11, 1810, and William Henry, born Nov. 29, 1812.

VII. COL. HORACE SABIN was born at Pomfret, and received the education afforded by the district schools of his day and generation. He grew up on his father’s farm, and was a lifelong tiller of the soil, largely interested in dairying in addition to farming, and also engaged in the lumber business. He was a man of very generous disposition, well liked, and was frequently called upon to serve the public in various capacities. He was justice of the peace, postmaster, and member of the school board of Pomfret; represented the town in the State Legislature, and was for many years prominent in the militia of the State; he was offered a commission in the Mexican war. In politics he was a Democrat of the old school. Fraternally he was a member of Putnam Lodge, No. 46, F. & A. M.

On March 24, 1836, Col. Sabin married Emily A., daughter of Benjamin and Chloe (Trowbridge) Grosvenor, and eight children were born of this union: Mary Ann, born Jan. 6, 1837, died March 11, 1854. Harriet Ely, born July 29, 1838, lives on the homestead. Henry, born Oct. 9, 1839, died March 31, 1896. A son, born Aug. 18, 1841, died the following day, Aug. 19, 1841. Ralph James, born Sept. 9, 1842, served in the Civil was as a soldier of the 43d Mass. Regt., known as the “Tiger Regiment;” he is now a civil engineer, and resides on the home farm; he is a member of Putnam Lodge, F. & A. M., of which he has been master five years, and is a Royal Arch Mason. Horatio, born June 24, 1844, also lives on the farm. Chloe Grosvenor, born Nov. 6, 1846, died Jan. 12, 1871. Emily Adaline, born April 28, 1850, is at home. The Misses Sabin are ladies of education and refinement, and highly respected, and during the lives of their parents were much devoted to them. Referring to the death of Miss Chloe G. Sabin, which occurred Jan. 12, 1871, it was said: “In the death of this lovely young lady society, as well as kindred, has sustained a heavy loss. ‘Death loves a shining mark,’ and here he has taken the brightest and best. She early chose the ways of wisdom, and they have been to her paths of pleasantness and peace, but she has gone from us leaving her childhood’s hearth and home desolate. Yet will her rare beauty, her gentle nature, her unconscious purity of character, remain in our memory with a fragrance which time cannot destroy,”

Col. Sabin died in his eighty-fifth year, and the Putnam Patriot of Nov. 16, 1894, spoke of him as follows: “The familiar face and stalwart form of Col. Horace Sabin, who died at his home in Pomfret Oct. 30, will be missed by a wide circle of friends and acquaintances. He was a man of great mental and physical energy. He has long been identified with many of the prominent enterprises of his time and State.

“As an agriculturist he was perhaps most widely known, and upon the branches of this calling, especially in dairying, he was competent authority. For over fifty years he was a member of the board of education, where he made his influence for good felt in the public schools.

“When he was eighteen years of age he entered the State militia, rising gradually from one command to another until he attained the rank of colonel, the title by which he has been affectionately known to the people with whom he has so heartily mingled. He was chief marshal at the burial of Gen. Nathaniel Lyon, in September, 1861. He came within one vote of being chosen general of the State troops.

“Col. Sabin will be widely missed. He was in the eighty-fifth year of his age, and until within a year of his death he had always been a very active man in business and society.”

In the resolutions of Putnam Lodge, F. & A. M., of South Woodstock, passed at the time of Col. Sabin’s death, it was said that he was with one exception the oldest member of Putnam Lodge. “He has been an active and consistent member of this lodge for thirty-three years, a man of exceptionally good judgement, whose wise counsels were often sought, and we shall miss his genial face.

“Resolved, That while we humbly submit to our loss, his family mourn the departure of a kind husband and indulgent father, and in their hour of grief and sorrow they have the sympathy of Putnam Lodge.”

Mrs. Sabin died at her residence Feb. 21, 1898, at the advanced age of eighty-nine years. She had lived in Pomfret all her life, having been born on the place where she lived and died, and was for years one of Pomfret’s most prominent ladies.

Henry Sabin, previously mentioned as third in the family of Col. Horace Sabin, enlisted during the Civil war in the 1^st Conn. Cavalry, and was discharged on account of ill health. Like his father, he was a member of Putnam Lodge, F. & A. M. On Jan. 9, 1864, he married Mary E. Burton, who died Dec. 17, 1870, the mother of three children: Harry Burton, who died in infancy, Feb. 21, 1865; John Grosvenor, born Dec. 1, 1865, who is now married and resides in Worcester, Mass.; and Everett Chandler, born Sept. 9, 1867, who is married and lives in Ayer, Mass. For his second wife Henry Sabin married, Nov. 19, 1873, Myra Leavens Harvey, and they had two children: Ralph Harvey, born in Meriden, Conn., June 19, 1877, and another son, born Nov. 27, 1878, who died Nov. 29^th, same year. The former is a graduate of Woodstock Academy, studied civil engineering at Maine University, and has been engaged in Mexico and the West; his home is at Pomfret, Conn. Mrs. Myra L. Sabin died Dec. 2, 1878, and in 1886 Mr. Sabin married Bertha I. Ely, who survives him.

Reproduced by:

Linda D. Pingel

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