Week 39 (September 24-30) – Unusual: What is the most unusual record you’ve ever found? Or, who is the most unusual of your ancestors? (You can take that any way you want to!)
I don’t know if John Lougee is my most unusual ancestor – if you knew my family, you’d know that there were a lot of characters over the years – but John had a most unusual life story.
John is the son of Louis Fremont Lougee, born about 1650 in Jersey, Channel Islands, Great Britain.
John Lougee (1682-1771) was born on the Isle of Jersey and died in Exeter, Rockingham County, New Hampshire. He was my 6th great-grandfather. He married Mary Anne Gilman (1695-1771) in 1718 in Exeter, NH and had 5 sons and 4 daughters, John (1719-1794), Joseph (1723-1794), Anne (1725-?), Moses (1727-1785), Gilman (1729-1811), Edmund (1731-1807), Shuah (1734-?), Joanne (1735-1810), Elizabeth (1737-?)
In “History of Parsonsfield” (meaning Parsonsfield, Maine), it states “John Lougee, from the Isle of Jersey; born about 1700; settled at Exeter, N.H. His grandsons, Gilman, Samuel and John, settled in Parsonsfield early as 1779.”
In “Genealogy and History of representative citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts”: “Oscar Clough Lougee, a resident of Cambridge, was born February 27, 1850, son of Parker Morgan and Mercy Elizabeth (Clough) Lougee. He is a descendant in the sixth generation of John Lougee, a native of the Isle of Jersey, by trade a knitter, who came to New England during Queen Anne’s War, he being then eighteen years old. He settled at Exeter, NH. In 1710, he was captured by Indians and taken to Canada and thence, as stated in the History of Exeter, to England. Five or six years later he returned to Exeter. “At a town meeting held April 12, 1725, it was voted that John Lougee be granted 30 acres of land, but to wait 10 years.” He d. in Exeter at the age of seventy-seven years. He m. about 1720, Mary, daughter of Colonel Moses Gilman, of New Market, NH. Their children were John, Joseph, Moses, Edmund, Gilman, Shuah, Anna and Joanna.”
Family stories claim that John (and Louis Fremont) were Huguenots – the mention of Queen Anne’s War further supports that.
From “History of the town of Exeter, New Hampshire” – The Death of Colonel Hilton “Scarcely two weeks after the return of this scout, the enemy, who had long been on the watch for an opportunity to take their daring and dreaded enemy, Colonel Winthrop Hilton, at a disadvantage, succeeded in their purpose. He went out on the twenty-second of July with a party of seventeen men, to peel some large hemlock logs which he had cut for masts the previous season, and which were liable to be injured by worms unless stripped of their bark. They were lying at the distance of about fourteen miles to the westward of his house. The day had been stormy. While the party were employed in doing the work, a body of Indians fired upon them from an ambush and killed three, Colonel Hilton and two others. The remainder of the whites, intimidated by their loss, and finding their guns unserviceable by the wet, fled except two who were taken captive. These were Dudley Hilton, a brother of the colonel, and John Lougee, both of Exeter. The next day one hundred men marched in pursuit of the Indians, but discovered only the bodies of the fallen. The enemy in their triumph had struck their hatchets into the brain of Colonel Hilton, and left a lance sticking in his heart. His body was brought to his home, and buried with every mark of respect and honor.
Dudley Hilton was never more heard from, and probably perished in captivity. Lougee was taken to Canada and thens to England. He returned to Exeter as early as 1716, and was married and left descendants there.”
New information I’ve found says the following:
LOWGIE, or LOUGEE: — John, came at the age of
16, in the Confidence of London, from Southampton,
1638, with Grace, perhaps his sister, as servant of John
Stephens, of Caversham, Oxfordshire. This name is
still found in New Hampshire, but the tradition of the
family derives it from John, who came from the Isle of
Jersey, about 1700.
References : — Lancaster’s Gilmarton, 275 ; Runnel’s
Sanbornton, N. H., II, 466-70.
I have not yet found any information on Grace, but that will be another trail to follow.
Of Loons and Lady Slippers 