Sarah Johnson

Biography

Sarah Johnson married Noah Carpenter on December 3, 1700. The family record places her birth in Lynn, on the Massachusetts coast north of Boston, in 1680. Her married household was associated with Attleborough, Massachusetts, where Noah worked as a farmer and linen-wheelwright and served in clerical responsibilities for the town and proprietors.

Their son Stephen was born in 1706. The published town death records give a more difficult part of the household's history: Simon, a son of Noah and Sarah Johnson Carpenter, died on December 8, 1713; Martha, a daughter of the same parents, died on May 25, 1719. An entry for Miriam, daughter of Noah and Sarah, follows on March 1, 1725/26. The records preserve Sarah's identity as the mother of children whose lives ended at different points during her marriage.

Sarah died in September 1726, only months after Miriam's recorded death. Her memorial at the Newell burial ground is described in the material as bearing an hourglass and floral columns. The stone provides a surviving object associated with her remembrance, alongside the written entries for marriage, children and death.

Her son Stephen later established his own household with Dorothy Whittaker. Sarah did not live to see that marriage.

The family chronology records Sarah’s birth at Lynn on June 15, 1680 and places her death at Attleborough in September 1726.

The family reconstruction places Sarah under Daniel Johnson and provisionally names Martha as her mother. Martha’s surname remains disputed between Tarbox and Parker.