Henry Wakeley, Hartford Founder

Compiled by Timothy Lester Jacobs, SDFH Genealogist

HENRY² WAKELEY, HARTFORD FOUNDER (JAMES¹) was born abt. 1624 in England, and died bef. 08 Nov 1690 in Stratford, CT (will exhibited). He married SARAH BURT 04 Sep 1649 in Springfield, MA, daughter of HENRY BURT and ULALIA MARCH. She was baptized 14 Jan 1620/21 in Haberton, Devonshire, England, and died aft. 1711 in Stratford, CT.

Henry Wakeley was the son of Hartford founder James Wakeley. He served in the Pequot War of 1637, so he was in Hartford by at least that date. He was voted an inhabitant “onley at The Townes Courtesie wth liberty to fetch wood & keepe Swine or Cowes By proportion on the Common”. In May 1669 he received a Colonial grant of fifty acres for his Pequot War service, and was granted two hundred acres for services in or about Mattebeck (later Waterbury) 1 May 1681, probably for his participation in a punitive expedition of one hundred men in August 1639, as a sequel to the Pequot War.

Nonetheless, he does not have a listing in the land inventory of February 1639/40, probably because he had removed to Stratford about 1650, and the land inventory was actually written up years after 1640. It is only through examination of mentions of his land in the inventories of other founders that an extrapolation of his holdings can be made: two roods on which stood his dwelling house, located on the west side of the road from George Steele’s to the Great Swamp; a parcel of Upland of undetermined size, a parcel in the Great Swamp; and a parcel on the east side of the Great River.

Hinman claimed him to be the Colony’s first lawyer, but no evidence can be found of this, except when his father James had given Henry power of attorney regarding James’ flight from Wethersfield, which duty Henry requested leave of, and which leave was granted. On the other hand, James¹ served as an attorney for others multiple times.v.).

His will was made 11 July 1689, a codicil was added 5 April 1690, and the will was exhibited 8 November 1690.

Genealogy: “The History of the Wakelee Family Since They Were Known in America”, Gregory R. Cunningham, 2004 (Does nothing to add to the early three or four generations)