Windsor, Connecticut

Located north of Hartford on the Connecticut River, Windsor was the first permanent settlement in the, soon-to-be Connecticut Colony and the home of Thomas Holcombe. In 1633 a group from Plymouth established a trading post at the meeting of the Connecticut and Farmington Rivers. A year later, the first group from Dorchester, Massachusetts, established itself just north of the trading post. Others from Dorchester would follow and a foothold in Connecticut was established.

North-central Connecticut prior to 1625 showing tribal settlements
along the Connecticut River in the area of future Windsor.

The Towns of My Ancestors

The primary focus of Genealogy is often concentrated on individual ancestors and their connection to others in the family. It is concerned about birth, parents, marriage, children, work, service, accomplishments and eventually death. These are the markers of a life and form a thread that connects each generation to the next. The place where they lived is another point of data but not always the focus of a Genealogy. Place was certainly an important part of each individual's life and yet, one constant seems to be that these folks were always on the move. It took a lot of work to put down roots and build a life but often, just as they had made a place for themselves, they would pack up and head out, usually toward the horizon of the setting sun. Still, those places . . . their home . . . was everything to the colonists and pioneers of America. Being able to settle in a place of one's own was the very definition of the freedom these people were looking for.

Town of Blue Mounds, Wisconsin. A survey from about 1833 shows the military
 road (on the ridge at the top of the map) and one settler (upper left corner). Like
the calm before the storm, over the next 30 years, the town will fill up; first with
 Yankees from the east, then a mix of Germans, Norwegians, Swiss and others.

Holcombe Family (1) - Colonial Generations

Note: Thomas Holcombe of Windsor, Connecticut, and his descendants are well-documented in both written texts and on the Internet. This report presents a narrative of the early generations in my personal family line and is not meant to be a full and complete history of Thomas Holcombe or the Holcombe family.

Part 1 - Thomas Holcombe in the New World

It is unclear exactly when Thomas Holcombe arrived in New England. It could have been as early as 1630 on the Ship Mary & John or as late as 1633 on the Ship Thunder. As passenger lists for many of the Puritan voyages did not exist, the actual date that he first set foot on New England soil will probably never be known. Regardless, his arrival 10 - 15 years after the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth places him in the company of the first few hundred or few thousand white men to live in the English Colonies of North America.

Drawing of the ship Mary and John. While it is unclear if Thomas Holcombe came
to the New World on this particular ship, it represents the type of vessel that
was plying the Atlantic Ocean between England and America in the 1630s.