Notes for Samuel Gorton, Jr.: "He came with his father to New England in 1636, was with him through all his troublesome experiences, and lived with him at Warwick on the homestead assigned to the first settlers of town. His father deeded to him all interests in the property and also his library and all papers and writings, by reason of the great assistance he had been to him in the support of the family when, as he said, his children were young and he was necessarily absent from wife, family, and home. He, like his father, early obtained the friendship and good-will of the Indian tribes about them and became proficient in speaking and writing their language, and his earliest public service appears to have been as Court Interpreter between the English and Indians. He was Captain of the military company of the town. In 1678 a member of the court at Newport engaged in the trial of Indians for depredations committed during the King Philip's War. During the eight years 1676 - 1683 he was member of the Upper House of the Assembly, an Assistant Judge. Later he filled the office for two terms, was elected for another term and declined to serve. ... In his will, made December 21, 1721, he calls himself in his ninety-second year; bequeaths to his wife Susanna all housings and lands for life, and at her decease to sons Samuel and Hezekiah and daughter Susannah Stafford. The house he had erected on the farm that he received from his father had been sold to Samuel Greene, who married his niece Mary, daughter of his brother Benjamin.
Samuel was a man after his father's heart and of whom he often wrote in terms of praise and affection. And although now in less trying times than formerly, he discharged well the obligations of citizenship, well attended to public and private duties, and lived and died, honored and respected by all who loved what was right and good. There had not been and there was not at this time any independent church in Warwick, nor was there any for many years to come. During the earlier times the people there were not only too few, but were too frequently scattered to organize any religious society; and not until after the year 1700 wee its settlers of sufficient number to gather from them a society of any one church or belief. Although Samuel, Sr. has been so over charged with trying to establish a church or religion, we do not find in his recorded words or acts, that he attempted to propagate a new church or religion. His tenets, he said he drew from his mother the church of England, and he, it appears did not deem them inconsistent with membership in any denominations that was Christian. ... The Rev. Cotton Mather, said he, could not find that the people of Warwick, the followers of Gorton were agreed upon any other principal so much as that they would not disturb one another in their worship or opinion. The name Gortonoges was not given to them by their religious opponents nor given to them to distinguish their religion. The name was given to them by the Indians .... But the name was quickly taken up by their enemies and applied to them as denominating a sect. If, however, we may with the other evidences accept for its application the so high church authority as Cotton Mather, we are grateful that they have so spread and that so extensively has prevailed, what he describes as constituting their main doctrine. (Gorton 1645, R.I. Collec ii. Hist. Warwick 23.)" from the Life and Times of Samuel Gorton, 1907 by Adelos Gorton, page 163-4.
More About Samuel Gorton, Jr. and Susanna Burton: Marriage: December 11, 1684
Children of Samuel Gorton, Jr. and Susanna Burton are:
+Samuel Gorton III, b. July 29, 1690, Warwick, RI, d. January 1784, Warwick, RI.
Samuel Gorton, Jr. (b. 1630, d. September 06, 1724)
Notes for Samuel Gorton, Jr.: