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The Origins of George Phelps
George Phelps, probably from Crewkerne, likely arrived aboard the Recovery in 1634. He was single and later married in Windsor.
George Phelps was long believed to be the sixth child of William Phelps of Tewkesbury, England, b. about 1606; immigrated to New England on the Mary and John, in 1630, with his elder brother William and his younger brother Richard. It has since been concluded that the William Phelps of Massachusetts and Connecticut originated in Crewkerne, Somersetshire, England and that he is not the William Phelps of Tewkesbury records. George Phelps is omitted as an immigrant on the Mary and John. DNA research has shown that the two men are not related. No evidence yet exists to show that Richard Phelps is related to either William or George, although he is present in the earliest records of Dorchester, Massachusetts.
What is known for certain is that in 1635 a George Phelps joined the emigration to New England. He was granted land at the junction of the Farmington and Connecticut Rivers, now Windsor. He married sisters: his first wife was Phillury Randall (1638-1647) with whom he had eight children, and Frances Randall (1649-1653), with whom he had three chidren. View the family tree.
About 1670 be moved to Westfield, Massachusetts with his wife Frances and their children. His chief public duties were on the juries of Hartford, Connecticut and Springfield, Massachusetts. His estate: 317 pounds.
The book The Phelps Family of America and Their English Ancestors by Phelps & Servin erroneously concluded based on nothing more than an approximate birth date for William that both he and George Phelps were from Tewkesbury, England. William and George Phelps are not brothers and are from Crewkene. For details, see Origins of William and George Phelps of Dorchester.
George Phelps is believed to be the George P__?__ aboard the Recovery of London with Gabriel Cornish as its master, sailing from Weymouth in Dorsetshire to New England March 31, 1634. The ship sailed into Massachusetts Bay in late June of July 1634, and it was very likely one of the fourteen said to have arrived that June.
One clue to George's true identity is the absence of any record of George Phelps as an immigrant on the Mary and John. There are two men named George Phillips who have been identified as immigrating before 1633.
- The first was George Phillips, minister, from Boxted, Essex, who migrated in 1630 to Watertown.
- The second is George Phillips, origins unknown, who migrated to Dorchester in 1632 and subsequently went to Windsor in 1635. This George was born by 1592 (estimated birth date based on the age of his wife) and died at Windsor, 9 Jul 1678. He had no children. Robert Anderson in The Great Migration Begins comments that the earliest record that can be assigned to George Phelps with confidence is dated 6 May 1635 when he was admitted a freeman in Dorchester.
Outstanding New England genealogist Robert Charles Anderson states the possibility that each incident refers to a different individual. [In 1637, Dorchester was renamed Windsor.] (See his book The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633 Vol. 3: 1444-1446. Possibly available in The Great Migration Begins: Immigrants to New England 1620-1633 Read an excerpt here.)