10 Facts About William Blaxton

William Blaxton was an early English settler in New England and the first European settler of Boston and Rhode Island.

William Blaxton was admitted to Emmanuel College, Cambridge as a sizar in 1614 and received an MA in 1621.

William Blaxton eventually arrived in Weymouth, Massachusetts later in 1623 on the ship Katherine, as a chaplain in the subsequent expedition of Robert Gorges.

William Blaxton became the first colonist to settle in what would become Boston, living on the Western end of the Shawmut Peninsula by himself for more than five years.

The Anglican William Blaxton did not get along with the Puritan leaders of the Boston church and in 1635 he moved about 35 miles south of Boston to what the Indians called the Pawtucket River and is today known as the Blackstone River in Cumberland, Rhode Island.

William Blaxton was the region's first European settler, one year before Roger Williams established Providence Plantations.

The area that William Blaxton settled was part of the Plymouth Colony until 1691, when it came under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts Bay Colony until 1741; it finally became part of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.

William Blaxton tended cattle, planted gardens, and cultivated an apple orchard, and he cultivated the first variety of American apples, the Yellow Sweeting.

William Blaxton called his home "Study Hill" and was said to have the largest library in the colonies at the time, but his library and house were burned during King Philip's War around 1675.

Roger Williams and Blaxton disagreed on many theological matters, but they remained lifelong friends.