Dorothy Bird Lord

I have thought about doing some blog posts on my favorite female ancestors since so much research is centered on the men.  While that is not the point of this post, if it were, Dorothy would definitely be on the list.  She is surprisingly well documented for someone who lived at her time - or at least surprising when most of your family is in the South.   She could not have had an easy life, immigrating to the early colonies, but she survived.

Dorothy was born about 1588 in England, baptised on May 25th of that year in the St. Laurence church, Towcester, Northhamptonshire.  Her parents were Robert Bird and Amy Hill.

In February 1610/11, she married Thomas Lord in the same place.  Between 1612 and 1629, they had at least 8 children, including our probable ancestor John.  In 1635, their oldest son Richard, then about 22, went to the new world.   Thomas, Dorothy, and their younger children left from London in April 1635, aboard the ship "Elizabeth and Ann".  At this point, Dorothy was 46, which was not elderly but unusually old still to leave everything behind for such an uncertain adventure and to risk her own life and those of her family on the North Atlantic voyage.   The trip back then averaged 60 days.

The family joined son Richard in Newtown, now Cambridge, Massachusetts, but they did not stay there long.  In 1637 they joined a group of approximately 100 men, women, and children, lead by Puritan minister Thomas Hooker and marched overland to the present-day site of Hartford, Connecticut.  This was yet another strenuous journey for a woman who was approaching 50.  

Dorothy died in 1676 at the age of 87, having survived numerous childbirths, an Atlantic crossing, a trek through the wilderness, and the general hardship of setting up a brand new community.  Her husband and at least two of her children predeceased her.  Her will survives and shows that she had considerable property as well as personal goods worth about $187.