Deacon Paul Peck, Hartford Founder

Compiled by Timothy Lester Jacobs, SDFH Genealogist

PAUL¹ PECK, DEACON, HARTFORD FOUNDER was born abt. 1620 in England, and died 23 Dec 1695 in Hartford, CT. He married MARTHA HALE, daughter of JOHN HALE and MARTHA _____. She was baptized 16 Dec 1618 in Watton at Stone, Hertford, England?, and died aft. 25 Jun 1695 in Hartford, CT.

The origin of Paul Peck and when he arrived in the American colonies is unknown: he is not featured in the “Great Migration” series. But he was in Hartford, an inhabitant “onley at The Townes Courtesie”, by the time of the Hartford land inventory of 1639/40, at which time he owned: a house lot of two roods on the road from George Steele’s to the Great Swamp; three acres of upland in the Forty Acres; four acres on the east side of the Great River; one acre of swamp lying in the South Meadow in the Great Swamp; four acres of swamp on the east side of the Great River; two acres of upland; four more acres of swamp on the east side of the Great River; an additional ten acres of swamp on the east side of the Great River; three acres of woodland on the highway leading to Farmington; and eleven acres of Woodland on the highway leading to the Great Swamp.

Paul Peck married Martha Hale, sister of Samuel and Thomas Hale, both Founders of Hartford, but her date of baptism and parentage is probable, not certain, based on a TAG article in Vol. 38.

He was surveyor of highways in Hartford in 1658 and 1665, selectman in 1661 and 1668, and chimney viewer in 1667. His will was dated 25 June 1695, he died 23 December 1695, and his inventory was taken 6 January 1695/6.

Recommended genealogy: within “Hale, House and Related Families, Mainly of the Connecticut River Valley”, Donald Lines Jacobus & Edgar F. Waterman, Genealogical Publishing Company, Baltimore, 2001

Additional genealogy: “A Genealogical History of the Descendants of Joseph Peck, Who Emigrated with his Family to this Country in 1638”, Ira B. Peck, 1868 (The coverage of the earlier generations in this genealogy have been superseded by Jacobus in “Hale, House”, but Ira B. Peck’s genealogy, while dated and lacking citation, does cover generations past those presented by Jacobus & Waterman.)