In 1783 he was one of the fifty-five who petitioned for extensive grants of lands in Nova Scotia, out of which was erected the province of New Brunswick, of which province he was appointed Solicitor-General and continually afterwards bore a conspicuous part, and attained the highest honors. He was a member of the House of Assembly and Advocate at the Bar, a Member of his Majesty's Council, a Judge of the Supreme Court, Agent for the settling of disputed points of boundary with the United States until he closed his mortal career while administering the Government of the Colony as President, and Commander in Chief, during a vacancy in the office of Lieut. Governor. His remains were conveyed from Fredericton to St. John where a tablet, adds to above quoted statement, the following: "Distinguished during the whole of his varied and active life, for his superior abilities and unweariable zeal, for genuine integrity and singular humanity and benevolence, his loss was universally deplored; and this frail tribute from his nearest connection affords but a feeble expression of the affectionate respect with which they cherished the memory of his virtues."
Hon. Ward Chipman married Elizabeth, daughter of Hon. William Hazen of Haverhill, Mass., and his wife, the only daughter of Dr. Joseph LeBaron of Plymouth, Mass. She died at St. John in 1852 in her eighty-sixth year. The wife of Hon. William Gray of Boston was his sister. Ward, his only child, was born July 21, 1787, graduated at Harvard College in 1805, where so many of his ancestors had before him. He held many places of honor and trust; was finally chief justice of New Brunswick, and died at St. John in 1851 in his sixty-fifth year. While the Prince of Wales, now King Edward VII., was in that city in August, 1860, he occupied the Chipman mansion.
GOVERNOR EDWARD WINSLOW.
Edward Winslow was born at Droitwich, Worcestershire, England, 19 October, 1595. He appears to have been a well educated and accomplished man. In the course of his travels on the continent of Europe he went to Leyden and there became acquainted with Mr. John Robinson, and the church under his pastoral charge, which he joined in 1617. He married the 16th of May, 1618, and settled in that city till the church removed to America in 1620. In his "Brief Narration" he says: And when the ship was ready to carry us away the bretheren that stayed feasted us that were to go at our pastor's home. After tears and singing of psalms they accompanied us to Delph's Haven, where we were to embark, and there feasted us again. But we, going aboard ship lying at the quay ready to sail, the wind fair, we gave them a volley of small shot and three pieces of ordnance, and so lifting up our hands to each other and our hearts to the Lord we departed, etc.
Winslow's name is third on the list of those who subscribed to the Covenant, or compact, before the disembarkation at Cape Cod. He was one of the first who came on shore to seek out the most eligible place for founding a settlement in this wild and unknown land. He was a gentleman of the best family of any of the Pilgrims, his father, Edward Winslow, Esq., being a person of importance in Droitwich. In all the initiatory labor for establishing this little colony, the nucleus of a great nation, he was ever active and influential in promoting the welfare of the Pilgrims, who on account of the respectability of his family, and the excellent qualities of his mind and heart appear to have regarded him with more than ordinary respect and confidence, which was never misplaced.
At the annual election in 1624 Mr. Winslow was elected Assistant and in 1644 Governor of Plymouth Colony.
In 1655 Oliver Cromwell appointed three commissioners, of which number Winslow was the chief, to go with an expedition against the Spaniards in the West Indies under Admiral Penn and General Venables. The three commissioners to direct their operations. After an unsuccessful attack on St. Domingo, the fleet sailed for Jamaica, which surrendered without any resistance. But Mr. Winslow, who partook of the chagrin of defeat, did not live to enjoy the pleasure of victory. In the passage between Hispaniola and Jamaica the heat of the climate threw him into a fever, which put an end to his life on May 8, 1655, in the sixty-first year of his age. His body was committed to the deep, with the honors of war, forty-two guns being fired by the fleet on that occasion.
After Bradford, Plymouth Colony owed to no man so much as to Edward Winslow. Always intelligent, generous, confident, and indefatigable, he was undoubtingly trusted for any service at home or abroad which the infant settlement required.
Josiah Winslow, the only surviving son of Governor Edward Winslow, was born at Plymouth in 1629 and died on the family estate, Careswell, Marshfield, Dec. 18, 1680, in the 52nd year of his age. He was buried at the expense of the colony "in testimony of the colony's endeared love and affection for him." He married Penelope, daughter of Herbert Pelham, Esq., who came to Boston in 1645.