Jabez and Robert Farley

Four sons of Michael and Elizabeth Farley, and other members of the Farley family fought in the Revolution

Jabez Farley (c.1755-1836) served at Prospect Hill in Cambridge and in Captain Simeon Brown’s company and Colonel Nathaniel Wade’s regiment at Providence, Rhode Island. He married Lucy Rogers, daughter of Nathaniel Rogers, who died in childbirth in 1788. His second wife was Susanna Swasey (c.1768-1843), daughter of Major Joseph Swasey (d. 1817). They had a son named Jabez born June 15, 1792 who died at age 35 in Ohio.

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Thomas Franklin Waters in Vol. II of Ipswich in the Massachusetts Bay Colony:

“Soon after the Declaration of War (Revolution), a company of Conditional Exempts was formed, which numbered about 75 men. Major Joseph Swasey was the Commander, Col. Joseph Hodgkins, 1st Lieut, Jabez Farley, 2nd Lieut. Col. Thomas Wade, Orderly Sergeant. They drilled at the Court House.

(After the war) Jabez Farley and his brother, Robert, were actively engaged in trading ventures. A bit of business correspondence has been preserved: Ipswich, January 5, 1785. Capt. Nathaniel Kinsman. Sir, Please pay Mr. Andrew Haraden the sum of three pounds when you arrive at your market in the West Indies and charge the same to the Schooner Robert. Yours Most Obedient, Jabez Farley. At the same time, Robert Farley sent an order to Capt. Kinsman. He was Master of the brigantine, “Betsey,” of 157 tons in 1793, which was sold to Boston merchants the following year.

Jabez was the father of fourteen children, two of whom died in infancy, but five sons and seven daughters grew to mature life. There is a family remembrance that he named two of his vessels, “The Five Brothers” and “The Seven Sisters.” He was of a nervous temperament and when one of his vessels was reported in the river, he sent one of his sons or a servant to find the result.

In the Town of Ipswich, Major Robert Farley was the principal merchant and owned, wholly or in part, quite a fleet of fishermen and the larger vessels, which carried the dried and salt fish and fish oil to the West Indies and European ports. He married Susanna Kendall, daughter of the old sailor and merchant, Capt. Ephraim Kendall, on Nov. 30, 1786. The bride was only nineteen, but she became the mother of fourteen children and outlived her husband by seventeen years, dying in 1840 in her seventy-third year. Major Farley named the brig “Susanna,” built to his order in Ipswich in 1804, in her honor. She was a good craft for her day, with her two decks and 173 tons measurement. She was commanded by his nephew, Michael Farley, Jr., son of his brother Jabez, a young sailor of twenty-two years who was master of the schooner “Dolphin,” at Trinidad in March 1804. The shipping news in the Salem newspapers, the principal source of information regarding the movements of Ipswich vessels, reported him at Leghorn, on April 17, 1806, sailing for Gallipoli, and at Leghorn again in September.

Capt. Farley seems to have been the owner of the brig “William.” The original parchment signed by James Monroe, President of the United States, granting a permit to the Brig “William,” Andrew Marsters, master, 200 tons burthen, navigated with eleven men, “to pass with her Company, Passengers, Goods and Merchandise without any hindrance…. or molestation,” and bearing the name, Michael Farley, on the outside, is still owned by the heirs of the late Nathaniel K. Farley.

Major Robert Farley’s five sons and seven daughters lived to mature age, two children only dying in early life. Following the fashion of the day, he named two of his ships, the “Five Brothers” and the “Seven Sisters.” Capt. Michael commanded the brig “Five Brothers,” and sailed on an ill-fated voyage in the winter of 1818-19. He died of the coast fever on the West coast of Africa at Rio Nunis, on Feb. 12, 1819. Mr. Gray, chief mate, took command but died on the passage to St Pierre, where she arrived on Oct. 22nd in charge of a seaman. Capt. Wright took command, but the brig was lost in a hurricane, which swept the West Indies while lying at anchor in the harbor, and only part of the cargo was saved. Capt. Farley had married Mary Manning, daughter of Dr. John Manning, in 1813, and she was left with four young children.”

In late December of 1838, thirty Ipswich women founded the Ipswich Female Anti-Slavery Society. The President was Rebecca Dodge Waite, wife of Joseph Waite. Their home, no longer standing was at 21 N. Main St. The Vice President was Elva Cogswell; Secretary, Mary E. Wade; Managers were Mrs. Lucy Lord Caldwell (wife of Josiah Caldwell), Mrs. Amos Dunnels, Mary Wardwell, and Mary W. Philbrook. They met in the homes of its members, including Mrs. Jabez Farley’s house on Market St.