Was a Quaker in Sandwich and was fined and removed to Barnstable. Referred to as Thomas Jr. Was a tailor.
Source: "Sandwich, A Cape Cod Town" by R.A. Lovell, Jr. 3rd ed.
Respecting the family of Thomas Ewer, 2d, little is known. He removed to Sandwich early. In 1659 he had a family and resided near Spring Hill. He was a Quaker; and for refusing to take the oath of fidelity, and for attending Quaker meetings, was fined £20,l0, which with expenses amounted to £25,8. In payment the Marshall seized a debt due him from Richard Chadwell for labor, £7,13 In money taken out of his house, 6,17 Clothing, new cloth, with other goods particularly named, 10,18 £‘25,8
From the new cloth taken (four yards of Kersey) George Barlow, the Marshall, had a coat made, and which he wore at Court. Ewer, seeing him have it on, asked the Magistrates, "Whether they owned George Barlow in wearing his cloth." To this question Gov. Prence replied: "That if he could prove that George Barlow had wronged him, he might seek his satisfaction." For this question he was sentenced "to be laid neck and heels together." Which, says Bishop, was the injustice he received at their hands.
The Court records give a different reason of the matter. He was sentenced to lye neck and heels together during the pleasure of the Court, "for his tumultuous and seditious carriages and speeches in Court." The Magistrates being informed that he was an infirm man, and was troubled with a rupture, the sentence was not executed.
Bishop is usually accurate, but in this case he omits a material fact and leaves a wrong impression on the mind of his reader. He adds that Ewer's axe, with which he wrought, worth three shillings, was taken for a tax of ten pence to the country, and that at another time, half a bushel of grain, out of his bag at the mill, for a similar tax, for the same amount.
These were assessments legally made to pay the current expenses of the Colony. Ewer was abundantly able to pay, he resisted the execution of a law, to which no constitutional objection was made, and if his axe or his grain was taken to pay, neither he nor his apologist, Mr. Bishop, had a right to complain.
The Quakers had right and justice on their side, when they refused to pay fines imposed for not taking the oath of fidelity, or
362 GENEALOGICAL NOTES OF BARNSTABLE FAMILIES.
for attending meetings of their own society; but when they refused to pay their proportion of the public expensed, they were clearly in the wrong, and those of their number who resisted, were not only guilty of doing wrong to their country, but to their religious associates; because by thus resisting they prejudiced their claim for sympathy as sufferers for conscience sake.
In 1658..Thomas..Ewer and most of the leading members of the Society of Friends in Sandwich were disfranchised and ordered to leave the town. Ewer continued to reside there till 1660. In 1661 he is spoken of as of Barnstable. In that year he bought a part of the farm and meadows on the west of the Crocker land, then owned by .Mr. Dimmock, originally laid out, I think, to Thomas Hatch. This small farm his descendants have continued to own till recently.
The goods seized by the Marshall were such as a tailor usually keeps, and I infer from this that he learned the trade of his father. He died in 1687, aged 34, leaving a widow Hannah and a family of children. I find no record of their names. Thomas Lothrop, the father-in-law of the deceased, and Shubael Linnell, his uncle, were appointed guardians of the children. Thomas Ewer, 3d, afterwards owned the Ewer farm, and the facts and circumstances above stated make it probable, if not certain, that he was the son of Thomas Ewer, 2d, and his wife Hannah.
Source: "Genealogical Notes of Barnstable Families" vol. 1, by C.F. Swift
