James Hobbs

Biography

James Hobbs made his home at Little River, in the Hampton area on the New Hampshire coast, on the property remembered in Hampton's history as the old Hobbs place. Born on May 16, 1691 to Morris Hobbs and Sarah Swett, he married Lucy Dow on New Year's Day in 1720. Their daughter Esther was born that October, the first of nine children recorded between 1720 and 1736.

The household produced several different paths into adult life. Their son James graduated from Harvard, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1748 and became the first pastor of the church at Pelham, in southern New Hampshire, in 1751. Their daughter Patience married Simon Lamprey, and Lucy married into the Sanborn family. Their daughter Sarah died unmarried in 1749, at twenty-five.

James's final weeks brought several deaths close together. Lucy died on December 27, 1755. Their son Jonathan died on January 3, 1756, and James himself died on January 16. The dates place three losses within twenty days, closing a marriage of nearly thirty-six years and a long chapter of family life at Little River.