By reputation, this chest is said to have been created by Kenelm Winslow. It was owned by his brother Edward and was passed down through the family.
Kenelm Winslow Home, Marshfield, Massachusetts
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George Lester Winslow came from a proud heritage stretching back to London, England, and to the year 1250. The earliest known ancestor of the Winslows who came to America is William Wyncelow, who was born in London in 1250 and died there in 1298. The name “Winslow” comes from the market town in Buckinghamshire.
The family made money in the wool industry, but some also moved to London and became prominent merchants there. The Winslow ancestral home, now known as Kerswell Green Farm, is located in Kempsey (near Worcester), England. Kenelm’s grandfather (also named Kenelm) lived at Kerswell Green and was Churchwarden in Kempsey in 1593. His eldest son Edward left to become a salt manufacturer in Droitwich.
Edward had five sons who came to America. Edward Jr. and Gilbert came on the Mayflower in 1620. They both signed the Mayflower Compact. Edward thrived in Plymouth and served as governor of the colony three times. Gilbert decided to return to England and died there. John Winslow came to the Plymouth Colony on the Fortune in 1621. Kenelm and Josiah are said to have come in 1631 on the White Angell, which landed at what is now Saco, Maine, although some speculate they may have come in 1629 on the second voyage of the Mayflower.
In any case, Kenelm (the ancestor of George Lester Winslow) first appears on official records of Plymouth in 1633, when he was on the tax list and the list of freemen.
On June 1, 1634, he married Elinor (Ellen) Worden Newton Adams. She had arrived on the Anne at Plymouth July 10, 1623. Elinor was a young widow of 25 when she emigrated. In Plymouth in 1625 she married John Adams, a carpenter, who died in 1633.
Kenelm was a trained carpenter (joiner), as well. He had apprenticed in Leyden, the Netherlands, for four years before coming to America. He was the second carpenter in Plymouth but soon proved his worth and his furniture has become greatly valued. Several pieces attributed to him are owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
He removed to Marshfield in 1641 where he had a grant of land that was considered the “Eden of the region.” He was one of the 26 original proprietors of Assonet, Mass., which land was purchased from the Indians April 2, 1659. Kenelm was a town leader but seems to have been argumentative by nature. He appears in a number of suits and spent time in jail for calling church leaders liars.
Kenelm and Elinor had eight children. Their second son, Kenelm, Jr., was born in Plymouth in 1635. Early in his life, Kenelm, Jr., moved to Cape Cod and had a homestead in what is now West Brewster. He married Mercy Worden in September 1667 in Yarmouth. The second oldest son of this union was Josiah Winslow, the great-grandfather of our George Lester Winslow. The land that Kenelm, Sr., had purchased in Assonet, Mass. (part of Freetown), was passed on to Josiah and was the land he lived on most of his life.
Information taken from various public trees on Ancestry.com, pagenweb.org/~elk/winslowgenealogy/kenelmwinslowhistory.htm, miller-aanderson.blogspot.com/2011/07/kenelm-winslow-1599-1672.html, plimoth.org/media/pdf/winslow_kenelm.pdf, Yates Publishing. U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004; Miller Anderson Histories; New England Families, Genealogical and Memorial: A Record of the…, Volume 1, edited by William Richard Cutter, page 376; and Torry, Clarence A. New England Marriages Prior to 1700. Baltimore, MD, USA: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2004, page 829.