The Tragic Story of John Ball and his 2 Elizabeths

Imagine a young father in the early 1600s, born in Wiltshire, England but hearing exciting stories of being able to own land!  John Ball was just that father. He and his wife Joanna King gathered up their three young sons 11-year-old Francis, 10-year-old John, and Nathaniel, just 5, and set off to the New World in 1630 – the same year that Boston and nearby Watertown on the Charles River were formed.

By 1643, my ancestor John, the middle son, had become a tailor and wanted to start his own family in the newly formed Middlesex County.

Meanwhile, weaver John and Elizabeth Trull Pierce had the same yearnings in Norwich, Norfolk, England.  In 1637 they bundled their four children still at home - Judith, Barbara, John, and my ancestor, 13-year-old Elizabeth (born 11 April 1624) and sailed to Massachusetts like hundreds of others since the Pilgrims landed in 1620.

In 1643 when John was 23 and Elizabeth was 19, they married in Watertown, Massachusetts Colony.  The next year, Elizabeth gave birth to John (my ancestor), Mary was born in 1651, and Sarah was born about 1654, Esther was born and died in 1655.

While pregnant with their fifth child, Abigail, on 3 February 1656, Elizabeth was officially ordered by the local town council or select men to card two skeins of cotton or sheep’s wool (plus young Mary must spin it) every day or else she would be sent to the house of correction!

On 8 December 1656, John was called before the select men to explain the condition of his household.  Apparently, Elizabeth was showing signs of mental illness. Three days later, John put their first two children into the care of his in-laws, “Brother and Sister Pearce,” to learn trades (weaving and spinning) – 12-year-old John until he was 21 and 5-year-old Mary until she was 18. They were also to be taught to “read the English tongue and be instructed in the knowledge of God.” He gave the in-laws two oxen and two cows to cover the children’s living costs.

Three weeks later on 3 January 1657, John agreed to give 2-year-old Sarah to local farmer Richard and his wife Mary Gale to keep for 4 years. John would pay them 6 pounds a year plus provide Sarah’s clothes for 3 years. (It is likely that she would be apprenticed after that time.)  But things didn’t work out.  On 20 September 1658, it was agreed that Joseph and Esther Pierce Morse would take Sarah. Esther was Elizabeth’s older sister and they had at least two grown sons. John signed the agreement by mark (X) and Joseph signed his name.  (Sarah grew up, married Benjamin Chamberlain, had 7 children, and lived to be 69.)

Abigail was born 20 April 1658. When she was only 6 months old, she was placed with neighbors Anthony and Grace White for one year (likely until she was weaned). Unfortunately, Abigail died when she was only 10.  No explanation about how or where.

By 1660, Elizabeth became “violently insane”. In March, John put his wife into the care of his in-laws, John and Elizabeth (Trull) Pierce; payment to care for her was the use of his house and lands for as long as Elizabeth continued to stay there.  He said that if God took her (she died) before she returned to a normal mind, the property would go to their children. The deed was recorded 31 October 1664, so Elizabeth probably died about then.  Her father and caretaker Brother Pierce died in 1661 when young John was 17 and Mary was 11. Sister Pierce died 12 Mar 1668 when Mary was 18. John married Sarah Bullard when he was 20, they had at least 12 children, and he lived to be 77.  Mary married William Munroe of Scotland when she was 21, had 9 children, and lived to be 78.

After Elizabeth died, John now 45, was free to marry his second wife Elizabeth Fox on 3 October 1665 in Concord, Middlesex, Massachusetts. She was about 23 years old and the daughter of Thomas and Rebecca Wheate Fox of Concord.

Three weeks later, John sold his farm in Watertown to William Perry and went to settle Lancaster, Mass., a town on the western frontier. It was originally called Nashaway Plantation when Sholan, chief of the Nashaway Indians, deeded an 8- by 10-mile tract to Henry Symonds and Thomas King, if they would build a trading house on the land and trade with the Indians. The General Court confirmed the deed, and the trading house was built in 1642 on the southeast side of George Hill. Now, 20 years later, John and Elizabeth went to run a second trading house in the south part of Lancaster. John's lands were never described in the town's Book of Lands although he was one of the first inhabitants.

Luckily, it doesn’t look like his older children went with them. However, during the next 11 years Elizabeth gave birth to Joseph and another boy and girl whose names were not recorded.

Lancaster was isolated making it a target for Wampanoag Indian attacks during King Phillip’s War. Phillip was Wampanoag chief Metacomet, son of Massasoit who helped the Pilgrims during that bitter first winter.  Phillip was peaceful but as expansion continued, he vowed to annihilate all the settlers which triggered the war. The new leader Shosanin followed in Phillip’s goal to exterminate the colonists.  Based on nearby attacks, on 10 February 1676, Rev. Joseph Rowlandson and two others went to Boston to get the General Court to send soldiers to defend the town. The townspeople had fortified five of the houses into garrisons including the house of Rev. Rowlandson.

However, that same morning 1,500 Indians attacked the town in five different places. The Rowlandson garrison came under strong attack and was the only one overrun. Mary, wife of Rev. Rowlandson and their children were taken prisoner.  Eleven weeks later women from Boston raised 20 pounds to pay the ransom to get her back. Years later she wrote about it in Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson, the first best seller in America.

She wrote, "Quickly it was the dolefullest day that ever mine eyes saw." After several hours and multiple attempts, the garrison was finally set on fire with forty-two people inside. Those women and children who got out alive were herded into the woods to be offered for ransom, but most either died from their wounds or were killed for traveling too slowly.

Very early in the attack, John and Elizabeth Ball’s house was overrun by the Indians before they could get to the garrison. Mrs. Rowlandson wrote, "There were five persons taken in one house. The father and the mother and a sucking child they knocked on the head [and killed]; the other two they took and carried away alive."  The children were never seen again and apparently died at the hands of their captors.

Two years later, John Ball's estate was administered by his eldest son John on 1 February 1678. His lands were sold in 1682 to Thomas Harris.