Thomas Garfield

Biography

Life summary. Thomas Garfield and Agnes are identified in the published family reconstruction as parents of seven children baptized at Hillmorton between 1583 and 1596. A Thomas Garfilde also helped appraise a local estate in 1592 and may have been this man. Their son Edward’s later life extended the family’s history from Warwickshire to Massachusetts.

Thomas Garfield and Agnes established their family at Hillmorton in the closing decades of the sixteenth century. The parish-based reconstruction places them together by 1582 and identifies seven children, beginning with Edward, baptized on July 28, 1583. Thomas followed in 1585, William in 1587, Margaret in 1589 and Sara in 1591; Henry and Elizabeth were baptized in 1593 and 1596. The sequence traces a family growing over thirteen years. ^701-1

Hillmorton, now part of Rugby in Warwickshire, was a settlement of upper and lower parts, with its parish church on the lower ground. Cultivated land and a windmill documented in 1582 help place the family within a village economy concerned with producing and processing food. Milling turned harvested grain into flour, one step between cultivation and the food needed by households. Thomas’s trade is unknown, but this was the material setting around the family as successive children were baptized. ^701-2

A possible glimpse of Thomas outside his own household comes in March 1592. Richard Smyth, Thos. Garfilde and Thos. Perkins appraised the estate of Thomas Perkyns the elder of Hillmorton on 29 March, valuing it at £192 10s. The family reconstruction places Thomas as a father in Hillmorton during the 1580s, making him a plausible candidate for this adult role in the same parish. The identification is not certain: other records in the surrounding area also name men called Thomas Garfield. ^701-3701-4

If the appraiser was this Thomas, the task placed him alongside two other men in assessing another local estate. That was a practical contribution to its settlement: their valuation supplied an account of the property that those administering the estate would have to handle. It would show participation in a local responsibility, without making appraisal his occupation or establishing kinship with the deceased. ^701-3701-5

The reported baptisms of Henry and Elizabeth complete the known sequence of children in the 1590s. By 1611, the next generation was represented at Holy Trinity in Coventry, where entries record children of an Edward Garfield identified in the family reconstruction as Thomas and Agnes’s son. Edward’s later life took him to Watertown, Massachusetts. The family’s geography widened through him, while Thomas’s own traced household remained rooted in Hillmorton. ^701-1701-6

Family chronology. These are attributed baptism dates or years, not birth dates. The list does not establish that all seven children survived or lived together. ^701-1

| Child | Reported baptism |
|---|---|
| Edward | July 28, 1583 |
| Thomas | 1585 |
| William | 1587 |
| Margaret | 1589 |
| Sara | 1591 |
| Henry | 1593 |
| Elizabeth | 1596 |