BINGHAM, Edwin H.,
Vice-President of Jewell Belting Company, Hartford.
Deacon Thomas Bingham, progenitor of the Bingham family of Connecticut,
was baptized in Sheffield, Yorkshire, England, June I, 1642, and came to
this country when about eighteen years old with his widowed mother, Anne
Bingham, locating in Saybrook, Connecticut, about
1658. He also lived for a time at New London, but eventually settled with
his mother and her second husband, Mr. Backus, at Norwich, Connecticut.
He was one of the original proprietors of that town in 1660. His grant of
four acres for a home lot extended from the meeting house to Bean Hill and
from the road to the river. He married, December 12, 1666, Mary Rudd, believed
to have been a daughter of Lieutenant Jonathan Rudd, of Saybrook,and his
wife, the celebrated "Bride of Bride Brook (see "Caulkins' History
of New Haven," p.48). In 1693 he removed to Windham, Connecticut, where
be became prominent in civil and church affairs; selectman, deacon of the
church and sergeant of the military company. His original homestead was
near the Windham Center burial ground, which was originally a part of it.
He died
January 16, 1729-30, aged eighty-eight years.
(II) Thomas (2) Bingham, son of Deacon Thomas (i) Bingham, was born in Norwich,
Connecticut, December 11, 1667, and died April 1, 1710, the eldest of eleven
children. He succeeded his father as proprietor of the town. He married,
February 17, 1691-92, Hannah Backus, daughter
of Lieutenant William Backus.
(III) Nathaniel Bingham, son of Thomas (2) Bingham, was born in Norwich,
Connecticut, June 30, 1704, and died in 1756. He married, about 1724, Margaret
Elderkin, who was born in November, 1700, a daughter of John and Abigail
Elderkin. He sold his house and fifty acres of land, September 22, 1752,
and removed to Mansfield, Connecticut, where he bought two hundred and fifty
acres in three tracts.
(IV) John Bingham, son of Nathaniel Bingham, was born in Norwich, Connecticut,
April 1, 1727, died December 20, 1804. He married, December 13, 1750, Susanna
Burnham, who was born in Norwich, June 20, 1731, and died April 15, 1795,
daughter of Benjamin and Mary
Burnham. John Bingham owned a farm of two hundred and three acres in Lisbon.
(V) Captain John (2) Bingham, son of John (i) Bingham, was born in Norwich,
Connecticut, February 2, 1756. He was a soldier in the Revolution, responding
with his company to the Lexington Alarm of April 19, 1775. His father deeded
to him the homestead in Lisbon, Connecticut, January 2, 1794. He died March
6, 1835. He married, December 10, 1778, Talitha Waldo, who was born in Windham,
August 5, 1760, and died April 5, 1852, a daughter of Zaccheus and Talitha
Waldo.
(VI) Ezra Bingham, son of Captain John (2) Bingham, was born in Lisbon,
Connecticut, October 13, 1797. In early life he went to Ohio, but soon returned
to the old homestead, which his father conveyed to him, February 13, 1832.
He married, in Mansfield, September 29, 1830, Eliza Adams, who was born
in Mansfield, April 23, 1805, daughter of Dr. Jabez and Lucy Adams, and
the seventh generation from John and Elinor (Newton) Adams. She died December
12, 1879, at Orange New Jersey. Ezra Bingham sold the homestead, April I,
1864, and moved to Hanover village, where he spent his last years and died
May 25, 1879. Lydia Fitch, maternal grandmother of Eliza (Adams) Bingham,
was a great-grand-daughter of Major William Bradford, mentioned elsewhere
in this work, a son of Governor William Bradford, who came in the "Mayflower"
to Plymouth. Through her mother Eliza Adams was descended also from Richard
Warren, who came in the "Mayflower." Her mother, Lucy (Swift)
Adams, was a granddaughter of Rowland Swift, whose mother, Abigail (Gibbs)
Swift, was a daughter of Thomas and Alice (Warren) Gibbs, and Alice was
a daughter of Nathaniel Warren, son of Richard Warren.
(VII) Henry Adams Bingham, son of Ezra Bingham, was born at Lisbon, Connecticut,
July 13, 1833, and lived with his father on the homestead until he enlisted
in the Civil War, August 11, 1862. He was a private in Company C, Eighteenth
Regiment, Connecticut Volunteer Infantry. In June, 1863, during the engagement
at Winchester, Virginia, he was taken prisoner. The rebels were on their
way to Gettysburg and he was detailed as a nurse. While in the hospital
he was taken with varioloid and sent to the pest house, thereby escaping
imprisonment at
Andersonville. In the course of time he was exchanged and returned to his
regiment, serving in the campaigns in Virginia and Maryland. He was commissioned
lieutenant of the Thirtieth Regiment, Connecticut Volunteer Colored Troops,
March 14, 1864, and as lieutenant of the Thirty-first United States Colored
Troops, January 27, 1865, and afterward located with his command in Kentucky
and at Petersburg, Virginia. At the close of the war his regiment was sent
to the Mexican border, where he served from May, 1865, until he was mustered
out, November 7, 1865. He returned to Lisbon, in March, 1866, leased the
homestead of Andrew Burnham, and died August 30, 1866, of tetanus. He married,
November 7, 1860, Nancy L. Standish, born May 12, 1842, a daughter of Thomas
Fitch Standish, granddaughter of Amos Standish, and a descendant through
his father, Amasa, Israel, Samuel, Captain Josiah, from Captain Miles Standish,
who came in the "Mayflower" and whose fame has been celebrated
in Longfellow's poem, "The Courtship of Miles Standish." The wife
of Amos Standish,
Clarissa (Fitch) Standish, was a descendant of Elder William Brewster, also
of the "Mayflower." Samuel Fitch, born at Saybrook, April, 1665,
son of the famous minister, Rev. James Fitch, married the daughter of Elder
Brewster.
(VIII) Edwin Henry Bingham, son of Henry Adams Bingham, was born at Lisbon,
in Hanover parish, Connecticut, on the old Bingham homestead, May 30, 1862.
After the death of his father, when be was but four years old, he went with
his mother to live with his grandparents
in Hanover, town of Sprague, and attended the public schools there until
1876, when he came with his mother to Hartford, Connecticut. He graduated
from the Hartford High School in the class of 1880. His business career
began soon afterward. He entered the employ of the
Jewell Belting Company of Hartford, March 14, 1881, as office boy, and he
has continued with that concern to the present time. From time to time he
was promoted to positions of more responsibility, and for a number of years
has been in charge of the tannery. Since 1911 he has been vice-president
of the company. He is a member of Lafayette Lodge, Ancient Free and Accepted
Masons, of Hartford; of the Republican Club of that city; of the Hartford
Golf Club, and the Congregational Club of Hartford. In politics he is a
Republican; in religion a Congregationalist, a member and deacon of the
South Congregational Church. He married, October 26, 1899, Mary Elizabeth
Goodwin, daughter of Charles S. Goodwin, of Hartford. Her father, Charles
S. Goodwin, was born January 8, 1819, on the old Goodwin homestead, Pearl
street, Hartford, the site of which is now occupied by the building of the
Phoenix Mutual Life Insurance Company.
After completing his public school training, he became a clerk in his father's
shoe store, then conducted by his brother, John H. Goodwin, with whom he
was afterward in partnership under the firm name of John H. Goodwin &
Company. In 1866 his brother retired, leaving him the sole proprietor, and
he conducted it until 1884, when he admitted his son to partnership under
the firm name of Charles S. Goodwin & Son. He died March 23, 1898. For
many years Mr. Goodwin was a deacon of the South Congregational Church.
Of him a contemporary wrote: "He was a man of gentle spirit and kind
nature, of sterling integrity, a lover of quiet ways, but ready at the call
of duty, and faithful in every position which he accepted. His religious
convictions were deeply rooted and his life was regulated in accordance
with them. He was respected and beloved by all who knew him." He was
a director of the Phoenix Mutual Life Insurance Company. Mr. Goodwin married,
October 12, 1852, Mary Elizabeth Lincoln, born August 17, 1827, daughter
of Levi and Malinda (Miles) Lincoln.
Children: I. Anna Malinda Goodwin, born July 25, 1853. 2. Mary Elizabeth
Goodwin, born May 18, 1855, married Edwin Henry Bingham, mentioned above.
3. Charles Lincoln Goodwin, born September 29, 1858. 4. George Russell Goodwin,
born December 18, 1863. John
Goodwin, father of Charles B. Goodwin, was born in East Hartford, Connecticut,
April 7, 1772, died March 14, 1828. He married, December 16, 1807, Anna
Belden, who died April 11, 1849, his widow, a daughter of Nathan Belden.
(See sketch of James Lester Goodwin for the Good-
win ancestry.)
In addition to the ancestry described in the foregoing account, Edwin Henry
Bingham is descended from the following founders of Norwich: Rev. James
Fitch, Robert Allyn, William Backus, Sr., William Backus, Jr., Thomas Bingham,
John Gager, Thomas Lefflngwell, Josiah Reed, Nehemiah Smith, Richard Bushnell,
John Downs, Thomas Gates, Robert Roath, Josiah Rockwell, Josiah Standish,
Richard Adams and Benjamin Burnham.
Through the Fitch line he is also descended from Rev. Henry Whitfield, who
was the father of the wife of Rev. James Fitch.
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