User:RWIR/Richard Waldron (Colonel)

Richard, son of the Major of the same name, maintained the position of the Waldron family in Dover and New Hampshire through intermarriage with other leading families and inheritance or purchase of many of the positions once held by his father. He was the first of his line to adopt "Waldron" as opposed to "Walderne", the spelling that his father and previous generations had utilized.

Birth and Offices
Col. Richard Waldron was born in 1650 in Dover, New Hampshire. "A son of Major Richard Waldron, [he] ... early removed to Portsmouth. He was chosen a representative in the General Assembly in 1691, and a member of the Royal Council in 1692. He was a justice of the Court of Common Pleas from 1702 until 1706; judge of Probate from 1708 to 1730, and held the commission of Colonel in the Provincial Militia. .... Col. Waldron's mercantile education was received in Charlestown, Mass., under George Willoughby."

The Dominion of New England which ruled Massachusetts and New Hampshire in about 1685 "seemed willing to cooperate with any individuals among the local elite who accepted their rule. Richard Waldron Jr., for example, purchased several offices which left him with formal authority in Dover almost as great as that previously excercised by his aging father."

Family
His first wife was Hannah, daughter of President John Cutt. He married (second) at Portsmouth, February 6 1692/3 Eleanor (or Ellenor) daughter of Major William Vaughan and grand niece of John Cutt. She was the mother of Richard Waldron (Secretary).

Contest with natives
He "was busy fighting Indians" In 1704 "a group of marauding Abenakis and Penacooks went after Richard Waldron, Jr. at his home in Dover, and although the provincial leader was not at home, killed several other colonists in the neighbourhood."

Ousted
"Very shortly after [1715] Colonel Waldron and his friends succeeded in giving the Lieutenant-Governor Usher his quietus, but in the moment of victory the colonel was dismissed from the Council for being 'very much concern'd' in stealing the king's mast timber. He retained his place as judge of common pleas, Secretary of the Province, and clerk of the Council, however, finding means to shift the duties and salary of the last to [his son]  Richard, until on January 11, 1716/17, he had him officially sworn in to that office."

He died on 3 Nov 1730 in Dover.

Richard Waldron (Secretary)
He was bom Feb 21 1693/1694 and was a resident of Dover, afterwards of Portsmouth. Grad Harvard College in 1712 and married Elizabeth daughter of Thomas Westbrook. He was Councillor from 1728 for many years and soon after Secretary of the Province and in 1737 Judge of Probate. In 1749 he was a Representative from Hampton and was unanimously chosen Speaker. He died in 1753.

Richard3 was elder brother of William3 Waldron bap Aug 4 1697 who was pastor