John GREENE

  General Notes:

"The Greene Family and it's Branches"; by Lora S. LaMance; Mayflower Publishing Company, Floral Park, New York, 1904, p 47,48.

"John Greene the Surgeon"

John Greene emigrated from Salisbury, Wiltshire, England to Salem, Massachusetts on board the ship "James" 3 June 1635, a surgeon. He followed Roger Williams to Rhode Island in 1637 and was one of the original proprietors of Providence RI. With Samuel Gorton he was one of the founders of Warwick RI. in 1643. He was a commissioner to England in 1644 when England granted Rhode Island it's first charter. In 1652 Surgeon John Greene came from Salisbury, England in the next company following Roger Williams and with his wife settled in Warwick, Kent Co., Rhode Island, where the Warwick branch of the Greene family was founded.

FIRST GENERATION.
1. JOHN GREENE, surgeon, the progenitor of the Warwick Greenes, was the son of Richard and Mary (Hooker) Greene, and was born on his father's estate at Bowridge Hill in the parish of Gillingham, County Dorset, England. about I590. ' Though not so recorded, dates before and after him would seem to determine this is the year of his birth.(1)

The mother of John Greene, surgeon, Mary Hooker, was the daughter of John Hooker (alias Vowell), who was born at Exeter, England, about I524, his father, Robert Hooker, having been mayor of that city in 1520. His parents died when he was about ten years old. His early education was acquired under Dr. Moseman, Vicar of Menhussin in Cornwall, and he afterward studied law at Oxford. Later he traveled in Germany and resided some time in Cologne and Strasburg, where he was the guest of Peter Martyne and attended the divinity lectures of that learned Reformer. He returned to England and after a short stay went to France, intending to extend his travels to Spain and Italy, but was prevented by the war. Returning to his native country he settled in Exeter, and was chosen first chamberlain of that city, 1555. He devoted himself after this to the study of history and antiquities. In 1568 was a member of the Irish Parliament, and in 1571 was one of the members of the English Parliament from Exeter (Wood). Price says he died 1601 (?), when about eighty years of age, and was buried in Exeter Cathedral, but had no monument. He was the author of several works, among them: "State of Ireland and Order of keeping a Parliament in that Country," the same being found in the British Museum under title, "Order and Usage of keeping Parliament in England" (MS. Harl., II73, vol. I9). (From History of Devonshire, by Rev. Thomas Moore, vol. ii. p. I 25)

John Hooker was uncle to the celebrated divine, Richard Hooker, Rector of Bascombe, County Wilts, 1591, and Prebendary of Sarum. John Greene removed early to Sarum (Salisbury), the county town of Wiltshire, (2) [IT:(2)((Leland's Itinerary (pp. 7-8, 31)gives the following: 'The city of Old Saresbyri standing on a hill is distant from the New a mile by north weste and d is incompace half a mile and mo. This city has been ancient and exceeding strong but syns the building of New Saresbyri it went totally to ruin. . . . In times of civil wars--insomuch as the castellanes of Old Saresbyri and the chanons could not agree, whereupon the bishop and they consulting together at the last began a church on their own proper soyle and then the people resorted strangers to New Saresbyrie and builded there and in continuance were a great number of the houses of old Saresbyri pulled down and set up at New Saresbyri."

Thomas's Church was built as a Chapel of Ease to the Cathedral by Bishop Bingham in the Year (?). It was dedicated to St. Thomas a Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, who was martyred in the reign of King Henry II., and is said to be in some respects more beautiful than the Cathedral.

John married Joanne TATERSHALL, daughter of Richard TATERSHALL and Margaret FOX. (Joanne TATERSHALL was born in 1598 in Gillingham, Dorset, England and died in 1636.)