78 FACTS RELATING TO GROTON, MASSACHUSETTS. 



LEOMINSTER. 



The first settled minister of Leominster was the Reverend 

 John Rogers ; and the first marriage ceremony performed by 

 him in that town was that of Ezra Hale, of Leominster, and 

 Lydia Frost, of Groton. My authority for this statement is 

 found on page 15 of the Reverend Rufus P. Stebbins's "Cen- 

 tennial Discourse " (Boston, 1843), delivered on September 24, 

 1843. The date of marriage, as given in the Groton Historical 

 Series (I. No. XIH. 49), is June 5, 1744. 



THE LAWRENCE FAMILY AT GROTON. 



The following account of several Groton families is furnished in 

 order to correct certain errors which appear in the Rev. John Law- 

 rence's " Genealogy of the Family of John Lawrence " (Boston, 1869). 

 The leading error is printed on page 79, where it is said that John 



Lawrence, born at Groton, Nov. 13, 1741, married Sarah , and 



had seven children. According to the author " Mr. John Lawrence 

 died Dec. 26, 1799, having been thrown from a sleigh in Cambridge, 

 in the sixtieth year of his age, the same person, // is believed [Italics 

 mine], who was born in Groton, 1741. The widow Sarah died 

 Nov. 16, 18 10, aged sixty-five years." This belief on the part of the 

 author, based on an entire misapprehension of facts, has led to much 

 confusion in the record of many families, as printed in the book. In 

 fact it breaks utterly the connection of these families with this line of 

 descent, and without authority adds another line of descendants. 



Without attempting to trace the various branches as there men- 

 tioned, I will give the correct record of John Lawrence, together, with 

 an account of some of his descendants. The facts in the main are 

 taken from the family Bible, now in the possession of Abel Lawrence, 

 a grandson. 



Nathaniel Lawrence, Jr., and Dorothy Chambedain, both of Groton, 

 were married by the Rev. Caleb Trowbridge, on Feb. 4, 1728-9; 

 and they had eight children, of whom John was the youngest son, 

 born Nov. 13, 1741, and died Nov. 26, 1S22. See Groton Histori- 



