Gardners and Gardners

In his book (pages 1-3 1907, pages 1-7 1933), Dr Frank (and using WikiTree) lists the Gardners who were in New England early enough to be concurrent with Thomas' life. His list is shown here (see TGS.org for images). We will collect other lists, to boot, to account for the additional information that has become available the last 100 years.

My wife is descendant from both Thomas of Salem (direct) who provides the main theme for this blog and Thomas of Roxbury. For now, we don't know the relationship (if any) between the different families. At some point, perhaps, like some families who have tried to identify commonality, sometimes via genetic matching (to wit, Graves, Frost, and more), there may be a Gardner effort.

As many people admit, it's easy to get the families mixed up. In fact, as Dr Frank mentions in his book (1907, pg 16), some have confused, in the Salem family, Thomas the son with Thomas the father (we will look at this further, later).

Gardners and Gardners, 1933 (Dr. Frank)

Gardners and their arrival.

• 1620 - Richard Gardenar of the Mayflower
• 1624 - Thomas Gardner of Cape Ann and, then, Salem
• 1630 - Sir Christopher Gardiner was in Boston for awhile, on Winthrop's list of infamy
• 1631 - Henry Gardner of Kittery, Maine
• 1635 - Edmund Gardner of Ipswich who James Savage says came on the James
• 1635 - Lion Gardiner of Saybrook, Conn and Gardiner's Island
• 1638 - Thomas Gardner of Roxbury, ancestor of Col Thomas Gardner
• 1638 - George Gardner of Rhode Island [Wikipedia]
• 1641 - Samuel Gardner of Wethersfield, CT (from 1933 book)
• 1642 - Richard Gardner of Woburn 
• 1650 - John Gardner of Hingham (related family)
• 1661 - James Gardner of Gloucester
• 1661 - Lt Thomas Gardner of Pemaquid (from 1933 book) 
• ...
• 1650+ - Thomas Noble (son of Rachel (Gardner) Noble) 
• 1687 - Thomas Gardner of New Jersey (new, 12/11/2014)
• ...
• 1600s - Gardners/Garnet/Garnett, in Maryland and south 
• ...

For each of these, we'll provide a pointer to major work that has been done for the family. And, we'll show how they might have melded over the generations.

Remarks: Modified: 10/11/2018

10/13/2010 -- Added a few links. For each of these, we'll have a separate post.

10/22/2010 -- We can add in other Gardner families who may have arrived later. An example would be Jasper Gardner.

10/27/2010 --Cyndi's List is a great resource. She has three Gardner-related links.

• Site related to George Gardner of Rhode Island (mentioned by Dr. Frank).
• Daniel Gardner (c 1750) of Virginia
• Samuel Gardner (c 1787) of New York

10/31/2010 -- There are several views to look into further: Thomas and Thomas (see above image), pedigree from Albert Meyers (pointer, page contents can change, recoverable by using the index), ...

12/23/2010 -- Would be derelict if I didn't mention, and use, this site by Roderic A. Davis, 2nd.

03/07/2011 -- Will note when I run across work being done for the other families (example pedigree for a grandson of John of Hingham).

03/30/2011 -- George E. Kimball III is a descendant of John of Hingham.

05/02/2011 -- At some point, we need to look at the ancestry of Thomas (and Margaret). There is one book that suggests a relationship between Thomas of Salem and George of Rhode Island (published 1907) without saying how.

05/05/2011 -- Did Thomas of Salem have a sister, Rachel?

05/08/2011 -- Updates will be collected in a new post.

04/23/2012 -- Conjectures are nice, if supported; in fact, we'll have an example of that shortly in regard to Thomas and Margaret. There are too many gaps, in many cases. We can't just fill these in without some thoughtful reason. Some families have on-going research that is supported by DNA analysis. One that I found to be interesting is the Gordon family's work. 
11/27/2012 -- George is written up in Wikipedia.

12/14/2012 -- This has been a popular post. Also, see Pg. 22 of A home of the olden days (1872) for an example of the two Thomases that Dr. Frank was mentioning.

01/11/2013 -- The question was first asked on 05/05/2011: Did Thomas of Salem have a sister named Rachel? Put her on the list, as she and her husband, Thomas, came over in 1630 (we need to identify female Gardners, too, who arrived early). See Gardner work being done at familytreecircles.

06/15/2013 -- John Farmer wrote that Thomas was from Scotland. Origins are, and will be, a focus.

06/15/2013 -- Was there a Thomas and a Thomas?

08/22/2013 -- The start of a look at what was what in early Salem (and New England) as far as Gardners is concerned. --- Also, added a caption to the image (which will be standard henceforth - plus edit of existing posts to make sure that images are clearly marked).

08/25/2013 -- On a site dealing with descendants of Alice Freeman, Abigail Gardner is on the list due to marrying John Wise. Hence, her father and grandfather are there, too. Thomas (before 1595 to 1638), father of Thomas and Peter. The site, by Chris Chester, is wonderful in its use of sources; too, I really like the format. We need to do something similar for the Thomas Gardners.

11/06/2014 -- Gardner Research will have this topic as one of its foci. Too, whence: general and particular.

01/03/2015 -- Benjamin Gardner of Boston/Salem (ancestor of Heather Wilkinson Rojo).

03/11/2015 -- Sourced ahnentafels (published in TEG and The Gardner Annals): Thomas Gardner of Salem descendant (Benjamin Brown Gardner - grandfather of Dr. Frank) and Thomas Gardner of Roxbury descendant (Susan Charlotte Graves Gardner - aunt of Dr. Frank).

03/12/2015 -- 1933 Gardner Book (update of Gardner list - see above). Dr. Frank's work between the first and second books is obvious from these images.

06/23/2015 -- Looking further at Rachel Gardner.

07/04/2015 -- Walter Goodwin Davis is a descendant of James Gardner of Gloucester.

05/27/2016 -- Lots more information now.

07/16/2016 -- Related work: Gardiners and Gardners.

08/01/2016 -- King Slayer's Court.

08/06/2016 -- More on All things Gardners.

10/11/2018 -- For a long time, this was our most popular post. Then, it was surpassed in readership by Marriage of Thomas and Margaret and Plus or minus the arrival. And, these are continuing research subjects. We have taken a theme of All Things Gardner, somewhat. Plus, we have to deal with whence, motivation, and a whole lot more as well as document the first five generations.