Grandparents-in-law: the Quaker connection

While researching my historical novel on William and Mary Barrett Dyer, I came across the description of this document in the Massachusetts Archive. I ordered a photocopy of the original holograph housed in their vault.
Two of the signatures on this petition were made by my ancestors, Robert Harper and Deborah Perry Harper, who petitioned for their release from prison on Christmas Eve, 1660.

Discovering character in a stained, mouse-chewed document from 1660. 

Click this link (to my other blog) for the story:  http://bit.ly/MTXswV 


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Christy K Robinson is the author of five-star nonfiction and fiction historical books, as well as author of Rooting for Ancestors and William and Mary Barrett Dyer websites. You will find her books at http://bit.ly/RobinsonAuthor.

·          We Shall Be Changed (2010)
·          Mary Dyer Illuminated (2013)
·          Mary Dyer: For Such a Time as This (2014)
·          The Dyers of London, Boston, & Newport (2014)
·          Effigy Hunter (2015)
·          Anne Marbury Hutchinson: American Founding Mother (2018)

A peek at Mary Dyer's handwriting

Transcript below of this fragmentary image of Mary Dyer's letter to the Boston court, 26 October 1659.

from marie dire to the generall court now this present 26th of the 8 moth 59

assembled in the towne of boston in new Ingland greetings of grace mercy

and peace to every soul that doth well : tribulation anguish and wrath to all that doth evell. 

Whereas it is said by many of you that I am guilty of mine owne death by my

coming as you cal it voluntarily to boston: I therefore declare unto every one

that hath an eare to hear: that in the fear peace and love of god I came and in weldoing

did and stil doth commit my soul and body to him as unto a faithful creator

and for this very end hath preserved my life until now through many trialls and

temptations having held out his royal scepter unto mee by wch I have accesse

into his presence and have found such favoure in his sight as to offer up my

life freely for his truth and peoples sakes : whom the enimie hath moved you against...

I have the scan of the entire document, front and back, which I'll be transcribing in my historical novel (in process of being written). I may use the image as a background in the book's cover image, so it's best not to blast it all over the internet at this time. 

Mary Dyer (a Quaker executed by Puritans for civil disobedience in Boston, in 1660) came to the end of the large sheet of textured paper, and turned it over to write six more lines, the ghost image you see behind the words in the middle of this fragment. On the right vertical edge of the paper are water stains which smeared the ink. Perhaps it was raining when the messenger carried her letter from the jail to the Massachusetts General Court, presided over by Governor John Endecott. The letter was folded at some point, and the paper has flaked away at some folds and edges, but for the most part, it's legible, even after more than 350 years!


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MARY DYER ILLUMINATED, a fact-based novel by Christy K Robinson, is now available: amzn.to/1bHFWtW