New Brunswick Families
SHAW, John
1738 - 1814 (76 years)-
Name SHAW, John Birth 31 Jan 1737/38 Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA 
Gender Male Death 1 Jul 1814 Lower Wakefield, Carleton County, New Brunswick, CANADA Notes - [from Wayne Delong http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/d/e/l/Wayne-A-Delong-rothesay/index.html ]
John helped survey the Maugerville township in 1762.
John, Mary and their children came to the Saint John River in 1763 with the first permanent
English-speaking settlers. The Shaw family lived first in the town of Maugerville [pronounced
"Major-ville"]. They received their land grant on 31 Oct 1765 from the Nova Scotia government.
By July 1783, the Shaws had moved across the river to Oromocto. According to the Studholm
Report, they had 6 children, a log house and approximately 6 acres of land cleared. John had been
in possession about 5 years.
During the American Revolution, the elder John SHAW is said to have supported the colonists.
Many of his neighbors knew him as a patriot, but he was known as a rebel to the arriving Loyalists.
It is unknown whether this had an impact on John?s decision to move, but about 1802/1803 he & his
family left Oromocto and settled in Old Wakefield.
Another source states they moved to Wakefield "...in 1800 to live with their son Henry A. Shaw,
who had come up the river...three years before"
- Vital Records of Abington, Mass., to the year 1850, Births, p. 205: Shaw, John, son of John and Lydia, Jan. 31,
1737/38.
Vital Records of Abington, Mass., to the year 1850, Marriages, p. 190: Shaw, John 3rd and Mary Burrill, Nov.
22, 1759.
John and Mary removed from Abington, Mass., to the Yarmouth, Maine, area and in 1763 from Yarmouth to the
St. John River in New Brunswick. Dr. Daniel Turner, in his Shaw book, said: To better understand why they might
have made this migration it should be kept in mind that both the Shaw and Burrell families had been in the
Weymouth-Abington area of Massachusetts for several generations and their numbers had multiplied to the point
where the land owned by the families probably would not support all of them, and in the late 1760s they started
to leave.
Four of Mary's brothers, John, Bela, Nathaniel and Ziba Burrell, came to the Kennebec River, which empties into
the Atlantic Ocean at Bath, Maine, a few miles up the coast from Yarmouth. John, Bela and Ziba Burrell were
living in Clinton, Maine, about ten miles up the Sebasticook River, a tributary of the Kennebec, from Waterville,
Maine, in 1790. Nathaniel Burrell lived at Georgetown, about ten miles south east of Bath, Maine, and removed
before 1790 to Caanan, on Rte. 2 nine miles east of Skowhegan, Maine. Other Burrell relatives were in China and
Norridgewock, Maine. [Ruth Burrell-Brown, "The Burrell/Burrill Genealogy" (Baltimore, Maryland: Gateway
Press, Inc., 1990.]
Mary's sister, Anna Burrell, came to Maine also for she married Samuel Nevers in Brunswick in 1763. So this
was not a migration by an individual family. Several related families moved from Abington to Maine, and some
of them joined the Capt. Francis Peabody expedition that was going to the St. John River from Massachusetts in
1763. Many of those settlers were disbanded soldiers from the Colonial Army that had been at the siege of
Louisbourg, the Battle of Quebec, or had been stationed in Nova Scotia during the period England and France had
been at war, and Mary's father, Sgt. John Burrell, her grandfather, Capt. John Burrell, and her husband were
probably acquainted with many of them.
John and Mary Shaw are said to have settled first in Maugerville, Sunbury Co., N.B. If so, very shortly thereafter
they moved across the St. John River to the Parish of Burton where he was granted Lot 5, 117 acres, 22 Jun 1786.
They lived there until about 1800, when they, in their early 60s, moved with seven of their sons to Carleton Co.,
N.B., about 75 miles up the St. John River. They lived there with or near their youngest son, Henry Shaw, the
remainder of their lives, and most if not all Shaws who have roots in that area are descended from them.
Darius Shaw, in his Feb. 8, 1864 Notebook, said John Shaw Sr. died July 1, 1814 [Darius' son Claron Shaw said
July 5, 1814], in the 76th year of his age.
John Shaw served in the Colonial Army during the English-French war, and may have visited Nova Scotia (which
included New Brunswick until 1784) prior to or during the second siege of Fortress Louisbourg in 1758 (when he
was 20) and the Battle of Quebec in 1759. In N.B. during the Revolutionary War he espoused the patriot cause,
and there is a tradition among his descendants that he was a pre-Loyalist "rebel."
John Adams Vinton, in "The Vinton Memorial" (Boston, Mass.: S.K. Whipple and Company, 1858), p. 88,
records that Mary, daughter of John and Anna (Vinton) Burrell, married Er Cushing of Weymouth, Mass., in 1774
(fifteen years after she married John Shaw, and when she was 33 years old), that they lived in Weymouth, and had
children: Warren, b 9 Dec 1777; Mary, b. 31 Aug 1780; Betsey, b. 5 Dec 1781; and Billey (William), b. 20 Mar
1784. This is at variance with other sources, and is believed to be incorrect.
Fort Fairfield Review (Fort Fairfield, Maine), October 26, 1938: "Necrology of Carleton County": John Shaw,
b. Jan. 31, 1738, d. July 1, 1814. First settler at Lower Wakefield. Sons: John, Ziba, Daniel, Elisha, Ammi,
Jonathan, Advardis, and Henry. Henry mar. Abigail H. Kinney June 10, 1807 and had children: Lydia, m. Stephen
Britton; Advardis, Jonathan, Sophonia, m. Henry Sipprell; Darius, William, Elizabeth, Henry, Randolph and
Abigail m. Dennis Hale. Darius A. Shaw m. Elizabeth Burtt, children: Bela B., Norris L., Ursula L., John Byron,
Moses L., Clarence H., Moses L. m. Fanny Brownlow Aug. 3, 1872, children: Elmer F. m. Elizabeth Fulton, lives
at Knoxford; John, Burtt L., live on homestead, Lower Wakefield; Kenneth, Gordon, Alice and Inez. [Contributed
by Linda Shaw.]
Fort Fairfield Review (Fort Fairfield, Maine), June 2, 1937: "New Brunswick History" by Clark A. McBride:
"About 1797 John Shaw made the first land improvement and started the first homestead in the parish of
Wakefield. He was a native of Abington, Mass. and came first to Maugerville, Sunbury County and took up a lot
of land in 1762. He served under Col. Rogers in the Indian and French Wars from 1757 to 1759. His great
grandson, Moses Shaw, aged 85, is still living on the old homestead at Lower Wakefield". [Contributed by LindaShaw.]
When Henry A. Shaw died in 1865, his obituary in the Religious Intelligencer (Saint John, N.B.) said he was the
youngest son of a family of ten children, 8 sons and two daughters. I have nine sons, including Ziba who was lost
at sea and perhaps not remembered in 1865, but I have not found a record of the two daughters. In fact, a land
petition submitted by John Shaw in 1785 said he had a family consisting of a wife and eight sons. He did not
mention daughters. His wife Mary was about 44 years old in 1785. Although it is possible, it seems a bit unlikely
to me that she would have had two daughters after 1785.
Provincial Archives of N.B., RS108, Land Petitions, microfilm F1028, John Shaw, 1785.
To His Excellency Thomas Carleton, Esq., Captain General and Governor of His Majesty's Province of New
Brunswick, Chancellor and Vice Admiral of the same, &c. &c. &c.
The Memorial of John Shaw of Burton.
Humbly Sheweth:
That whereas your Memorialist having served his Majesty four years in the last French War and came into this
Province for a settlement where he hath lived twenty years and never has been benefited by His Majesty's
donations of lands or otherwise.
That your Memorialist has seated himself on a tract of land within an hundred and fifty rods of the upper end of
Burton whereon he has built and improved for seven years having a family consisting of a wife and eight sons.
Therefore your Memorialist thinks it hard to be removed; as he knows not of its being granted to any person;
Humbly prays Your Excellency to confirm it unto him.
And your Memorialist as in duty bound shall ever pray.
John Shaw
[1]
Person ID I000889 Kyle and Related Families Last Modified 18 Dec 2010
Father SHAW, John, b. 1718, Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA d. Abt 1788, Maugerville, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA (Age 70 years) Mother SHAW, Lydia, b. 5 Jan 1719/20, Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA d. 7 Feb 1737/38, Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA (Age 18 years) Marriage 14 Apr 1737 Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA Family ID F00245 Group Sheet | Family Chart
Family BURRELL, Mary, b. 22 Feb 1740/41, Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA d. 29 Nov 1820, Lower Wakefield, Carleton County, New Brunswick, CANADA (Age 79 years) Marriage 22 Nov 1759 Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA 
Children 1. SHAW, John, b. 26 Jun 1761, Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA d. Clinton, Maine, USA 2. SHAW, Ziba, b. 1763, Abington, Plymouth County, Massachusetts, USA 3. SHAW, Elijah, b. 1764, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA 4. SHAW, Daniel, b. 1765, Maugerville, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA d. 12 Nov 1850, Northampton, Carleton County, New Brunswick, CANADA (Age 85 years)+ 5. SHAW, Elisha, b. 7 May 1771, Maugerville, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA d. 15 Jul 1841, Wakefield, Carleton County, New Brunswick, CANADA (Age 70 years)+ 6. SHAW, Ammi, b. 1775, Maugerville, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA d. 2 Aug 1826, Lower Wakefield, Carleton County, New Brunswick, CANADA (Age 51 years) [Father: Natural] [Mother: Natural]+ 7. SHAW, Reverend Jonathan, b. May 1777, Maugerville, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA d. 18 Mar 1855, Lower Wakefield, Carleton County, New Brunswick, CANADA (Age 77 years)+ 8. SHAW, Advardus, b. 1781, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA [Father: Natural] [Mother: Natural]+ 9. SHAW, Henry A, b. Abt 1782, Oromocto, Sunbury County, New Brunswick, CANADA d. Abt 1857, Wakefield, Carleton County, New Brunswick, CANADA (Age 75 years) [Father: Natural] [Mother: Natural]Family ID F00271 Group Sheet | Family Chart Last Modified 18 Dec 2010
- [from Wayne Delong http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/d/e/l/Wayne-A-Delong-rothesay/index.html ]
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Sources - [S0241] George H. Hayward, Shaws of New Brunswick and Maine, 15-16.
- [S0241] George H. Hayward, Shaws of New Brunswick and Maine, 15-16.