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Tristram Dodge, To the best of our knowledge, Tristram went from England to Newfoundland and later to Massachusetts. A court record is found for him in Taunton, Massachusetts. He sailed from there with about 15 other men to Block Island, Rhode Island. DNA results for descendants of Tristram |
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The following text is taken from: Genealogies of Rhode Island Families, Vol. II, N-W,New England Historical & Genealogical Register, Genealogical Pub. Co., Inc., Baltimore,1989, page 334-335 , found at the Rogue Valley Gen. Soc., Medford, Oregon : "In 1684, a list of the Freemen of new Shoreham was entered on the town records, which shows a considerable augmentation of the population by the arrival of certain new comers. This list was printed in 1859 in The Register [vol.XIII, p 37] by J.D. Champlin, Jr., Esq., of Stonington. " The list while containing numerous repetitions, does contain names of several Dodge members, namely: John Dodge, Tristram Dodge Sr., William Dodge, Tristram Dodge Jr, as well as others who intermarried with the DODGE families: Edward BALL, John Rathbone, Samuel George,Tormet Rose, Alexander Enos [misread by Mr Champlin as "Alexander Junior" pg 335.] pg. 343: States that the early settlers of Block Island were landsmen, except for Tristram Dodge, however over the next 2 generations developed a race of seamen and fishermen. pg. 330: Tristram Dodge, the ancestor of the well-known Dodge family of New Shoreham and of the Dodges of Connecticut, was beyond all doubt from Devonshire, where the name Tristram Dodge occurs at a somewhat earlier period. He was evidently one of the Devon captains who were engaged in the Newfoundland fisheries, and in 1647 he was residing at Ferryland in that Island [cf. Aspinwall, pp. 126, 127] . He was engaged by the first settlers to come from Newfoundland to the Island, in order "to teach them the art of fishing", the town records state. The Island Dodge descend from his three sons John, Tristram, and William. A fourth son, Israel, removed to New London and was the ancestor of the Connecticut Dodges. he may have had also another son, Thomas, who appears in the New Shoresham records in 1680. He probably died young, leaving no issue [cf. Austin, op.cit. and "The Dodge Genealogly"]. The following account of the Dodge family is based on T. R. Woodward's Dodge Genealogy, but has been corrected and revised extensively as a result of seven years of research on the earlier generations, and the work of Gwendolyn E. Monroe Bohlier of 888 Fairgrounds .Avenue, Space 8, Prescott, Arizona 86301, who contributed extensive notes on Jeremiah5 Dodge's descendants. No attempt has been made to trace the English ancestry, although the name is found in southern England as early as 1306.1. Sergeant TRISTRAM(l) DODGE, born in England, perhaps about 1607 [gs], died on Block Island, Rhode Island, before 6 Dec. 1683. His wife's name was .Anne Moriarty cited Aspinwall's .Votarial Records [126-127] as the source of documents first mentioning Tristram Dodge, who witnessed a deed at Ferryland, Newfoundland, 26 Sept. 1647. He was named in the records as being there about 24 ,March 1648, when Valentine Hill gave power of attorney to Joseph Grafton to make recovery from Tristram Dodge and others. L. E. F. English of the Department of Provincial Affairs, St. John's, Newfoundland, wrote to the compiler on 12 Sept. 1956, "I am sorry to say that there are no records existent in Newfoundland [from 1647 to 1661]. However the name Dodge is a common surname even at present in our province. Quite a few families in the New England states owe their origin to emigrants from Newfoundland. I should say that literally thousands of young English fishermen came over from the mother country each summer during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Many of these did remain in Newfoundland after the fishery concluded and found their way to the .American colonies in ships from Boston which awaited until the departure of the British convey ships. The American vessels then took the eager emigrants off to the mainland. I do not think that the Historical Society or any other source of information can furnish any help." Some suggest he was a Devonshire fisherman, while others cite 'records held by descendants of David Britain Dodge" (son of John(2)) that he was from the North, near the River Tweed. One source [Holmes] states that he came from Suffolk, while Mrs. Bohlier has a manuscript claiming his ancestry was French Huguenot. He sailed to Block Island in April 1661 from Taunton, Plymouth Colony, with the original fifteen settlers [Robert Dodge]. Although he was not among the original purchasers [S. T. Livermore, 17, 327], he was granted three acres in the first division of lands, according to testimony dated 28 Feb. 1718/9 [Woodward, 5], and was eventually granted a total of sixty acres, evidently as payment for teaching the inhabitants the art of fishing" [Boston Evening Transcript, 30 Nov. 1932:3588]. He was made freeman 4 May 1664 and Sergeant in 1676, during King Philip's War. On 14 April 1665 he had a license from the government of New York which had jurisdiction at that time, to purchase the island called No Man's Land, 500 acres in size, southwest of Martha's Vineyard [Robert Dodge, 34]. He went before the Warden's Court at New Shoreham, the town on Block Island, on 13 Dec. 1681 and 31 August 1682 with Nathaniel Briggs, on charges of stealing. He declared he was of "very brittle memory," and, as Moriarty put it, the case was settled [TAG, 26:228, cites New Shoreham records, 1:90-93]. Moriarty, again citing New Shoreham records [1:450], wrote that on 6 Dec. 1683 John Williams of Newport agreed with John, Tristram, William and Israel Dodge that he would deliver the land of "their late father, Tristram Dodge deceased" to them after the death of their mother, Anne Dodge, who was probably still living on 27 Feb. 1685/6. The town of New Shoreham, organized on Block Island in October 1672 [Potter, 76], was apparently prosperous, for in October 1684 it paid 13 pounds 4 shillings of a total 160 pounds tax levied in Rhode Island! Children, birthplaces probably in England and Massachusetts or Plymouth Colony: DNA results We have DNA results from several of the Tristram descendant lines. We also have 4 DNA participants who have ancestry back to Offerton, Stockport, England. The DNA results show that there is a definite relationship between these two Dodge lines, but that relationship goes back much earlier than any genealogy that we have been able to acquire. It may go back as far as the Domesday book. In our on-line World Data base, we have records for Dodges in Offerton and Stockport, that go as far back as |