Book Description

The town of Standish was originally named Pearsontown after Captain Moses Pearson who lead the company of soldiers to victory at the siege of Louisburg. The town was settled at the time of the French and Indian Wars in the 1750s and incorporated as a town in 1784. The first U.S. Census in 1790 lists the town with 123 families, with a total population of 717 persons. This major work is an alphabetically arranged male-line genealogical study of the early families of Standish up to about 1810 (and occasionally into the mid-1800s), with a brief introductory sketch of each family. Information includes (when known): date and place of birth, baptism, marriage, and death of the article's subject; names of spouses, with their birth and death dates and places, and parents' names; occupation; information concerning lots owned and sold in Pearstown (Standish); and occasionally a good bit more biographical information, such as manner of death, church affiliation, military service, numbers and ages of males and females in the household according to census records and tax lists, and the names of owners of adjoining lots. Descendants are often given to the third generation, but rarely to the fourth. Occasional female lines are given, listing the woman's spouse and children, and (when known) the children's' birth, marriage, and death dates and spouses' names. An attempt was made to include the place in which a settler lived before residing in Standish, and if he did not live in Standish permanently, to what location he moved. A proprietor's map of Pearsontown (Standish) and a cross-index of names are included. In preparing this genealogy, Mr. Sears started with the notes of Dr. Albion K. P. Meserve (d.1904) found among the acquisitions of the Maine Historical Society. Mr. Sears supplemented this information with that found in town and county records, town and family histories, church records, pension records, tax lists, census reports, cemetery inscriptions, and Bible records.