Comfort Starr

Comfort Starr
Starr's headstone in Boston
Born	(1589-07-06)6 July 1589 Cranbrook, Kent Kingdom of England
Died	2 January 1659(1659-01-02) (aged 69) Boston, Massachusetts Bay Colony
Resting place	King's Chapel Burying Ground Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.
Nationality	English
Occupation	Physician
Spouse	Elizabeth Watts ​ ​ (m. 1613; died 1658)​

Comfort Starr (6 July 1589 – 2 January 1659) was a 17th-century English physician who emigrated to the Thirteen Colonies. He was one of the founders of Harvard College, serving as a member of the earliest incarnation of the President and Fellows of Harvard College.

Early life

Starr was born in Cranbrook, Kent,[1] on 6 July 1589.[2] He was one of the seventeen children of Thomas Starr.[3]

Emigration

In 1635, aged 45, Starr left the Kingdom of England aboard the Hercules, which launched from Sandwich, Kent. He settled in Cambridge, Colony of Massachusetts Bay,[4] where he was a founder of Harvard College the following year.[2][5] He came with three of his children and three servants; his wife followed with most of the other children.[1] One of his daughters did not emigrate until after his death.[6]

His sister, Suretrust, also emigrated, and lived in Charlestown, Colony of Massachusetts Bay, with her husband Faithful Rouse.[7]

Personal life

Prior to his family's emigration, Starr was a warden at St Mary's Parish Church in Ashford, Kent, where he also had a surgery.[3][7]

Starr married Elizabeth Watts on 4 October 1614. They had nine children: Thomas (1615–1658), Judith (1617–1622), Mary (1620), Elizabeth (1621–1704), Comfort (1624–1711), John (1626–1704), Samuel (1628–1633), Hannah (1632–1662) and Lydia (1634–1653).[8] Mary married John Maynard in 1640.[9] Calvin Coolidge, the 30th president of the United States, was a descendant of John.[10]

After arriving in the Massachusetts Bay, in 1635 he purchased the homestead of William Peyntree in Duxbury.[6] The family moved to Boston just over a decade later.[6]

Their grandson, Comfort Starr (1666–1743), built the Comfort Starr House in Guilford, Connecticut Colony, in 1695.[11]

Death

Starr died on 2 January 1659, aged 69, just over six months after the death of his wife.[10] They are buried in King's Chapel Burying Ground in Boston.[2] A memorial plaque to Starr was installed in St Dunstan's Church in Cranbrook, Kent, where he was baptised.[8][12]

References

1. Ancestry of Lawrence Williams, Cornelia Bartow Williams (1915), p. 273
2. Anderson, Robert Charles (2009). "The Great Migration: Immigrants to New England 1634–1635, Volume VI, R–S". Archived from the original on 5 March 2022.
3. Comfort Starr – Family Search^[unreliable source?]
4. Starr, Burgis Pratt (1879). A history of the Starr family of New England, from the ancestor, Dr. Comfort Starr of Ashford, County of Kent, England, who emigrated to Boston, Mass., in 1635 ; ... Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center. Hartford, Conn. : Case, Lockwood & Brainard.
5. Memoirs of the Harvard Dead in the War Against Germany, Volume 2, Mark Antony De Wolfe Howe, 1921, p. 268
6. Ancestry of Lawrence Williams, Cornelia Bartow Williams (1915), p. 274
7. New England Families, Genealogical and Memorial: A Record of the Achievements of Her People in the Making of Commonwealths and the Founding of a Nation, Volume 3 (1913), p. 1099
8. Ancestry of Lawrence Williams, Cornelia Bartow Williams (1915), p. 275
9. John Maynard of Sudbury, Mass. and Some of His Descendants (1914)
10. Some Colonial Families: Avery, Brewster, Mills, Morgan, Smith, Starr, Stewart, Tracey (1926), p. 61
11. "Using Tree Rings to Date Historic Guilford Buildings". Guilford, CT Patch. 19 October 2016. Retrieved 9 May 2020.
12. Cranbrook Church, St Dunstan, Kent Dr Comfort Starr – johnevigar, flickr^[unreliable source?]