152 NATURAL HISTORY AND TOPOGRAPHY OF GROTON, MASS. 



BENJAMIN GARFIELD. 



Benjamin Garfield, an ancestor of President Garfield, 

 was one of the original proprietors of Groton, where he owned 

 a "ten-acre right." His name is found several times in the 

 early records of the town. See the printed edition of the 

 same (pp. 56, 143, 145, 146, 148, 154), for allusions to him 

 and to parcels of land situated in Broad Meadow and Pine 

 Meadow, which he owned before the destruction of Groton 

 by. the Indians, though he did not return permanently after 

 the re-settlement. He was the youngest son of Edward, Jr., 

 and Rebecca Garfield, and born at Watertown, where he died 

 on November 28, 1717, aged 74 years. 



THE NAME OF GROTON. 



The town is indebted for its name to Deane Winthrop, a 

 son of Governor John Winthrop and one of the petitioners 

 for its incorporation. He was born at Groton in the County 

 of Suffolk, England, on March 16, 1622-3 ; and the love of 

 his native place prompted him to perpetuate its name in New 

 England. He stands at the head of the first list of Selectmen 

 appointed by the General Court, and for a short time was 

 probably a resident here. At the age of exactly 81 years he 

 died, on March 16, 1 703-4, at Pullen Point, now within the 

 limits of Winthrop, Massachusetts. I feel a special interest 

 in his memory, as he and I were born on the same day of the 

 month of March, throwing out the difference between Old 

 and New Style of reckoning. 



A few years before the settlement of the town Emanuel 

 Downing, of Salem, who married Lucy, a sister of Governor 

 John Winthrop, had a very large farm which he called Groton. 

 It was situated in what was afterward South Danvers, but now 

 Peabody, on the old road leading from Lynn to Ipswich, and 

 thus named, says Upham in his " Salem Witchcraft," " in dear 

 remembrance of his wife's ancestral home in 'the old country' " 



