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"Nathaniel Byfield, first judge of the Court of
Vice-Admiralty, was born in 1653, at Long Ditton, Surrey, England, the
twenty-first child of Richard Byfield, rector there, and grandson of the
vicar of Stratford-on-Avon. His father, as a member of the Westminster
Assembly, helped to prepare the 'Westminster Shorter Catechism' [Protestant
Doctrinal Statement]. His mother, Sarah Juxon, was, like many early New
Englanders, 'nearly related' to an Archbishop of Canterbury.
Byfield arrived in Boston in 1674, and the next year married Deborah,
daughter of Captain Thomas Clarke. Having been drafted to fight the Indians,
he based a claim for exemption on XXIV Deuteronomy 5. At the close of
King
Philip's War he invested heavily in Rhode Island lands, becoming a settler
at Bristol, Rhode Island, and living part of the time at Pappoosquaws Point
better known in connection with Nathanael Herreshoff, the famous yacht
builder.
Byfield joined the Ancient and Honorable Artillery
Company in 1679, was a member of the General Court in 1696 and 1697, and
served as speaker in 1698. He was commissioner for forming the excise, and
judge of probate for Bristol County, as well as of the Inferior Court of
Common Pleas in Bristol and Suffolk. In June, 1710, he was suspended from
the office of judge of probate 'for unmannerly and rude behaviour,' but
resumed office in December, 1715. He was the first judge of the Court of
Vice-Admiralty from 9 June, 1699, to 20 May, 1700, when Wait Winthrop
obtained the place. Byfield threatened Winthrop and succeeded, through
Governor Dudley, in securing his removal in 1701; he obtained the office for
himself in December, 1703, holding it until 1715, and a third time from 1728
to 1733.
In earlier years the judge exercised much influence
through his political alliance with Dudley and his marriage, in 1718, to
Governor Leverett's daughter Sarah, following the death of his first wife.
Cotton Mather, in February, 1702 or 3, received a visit from Governor
Dudley, whom Mather advised to allow no people to say that the governor's
policies were dictated by Byfield and Leverett. Mather continues:
'The Wretch went unto those Men, and told them, that I
had advised him, to be no ways advised by them: and inflamed them into an
implacable Rage against me.'
Byfield was a man of positive traits, dictatorial and
overbearing, ambitious and revengeful, yet so sound that no decision of his
was ever, upon appeal, reversed by a higher court. He printed and gave away
thousands of copies of the 'Shorter Catechism;' he strenuously opposed the
witchcraft delusion, gave hundreds of pounds yearly in charity, and devoted
his eloquence freely to public affairs.
He died between the hours of one and two of the morning
of the 6th of June, 1733, at Boston, and was buried in the Granary Burying
Ground. Two of his five children grew to maturity, one the wife of
Lieutenant Governor William Tailer, another the wife of Edward Lyde, whose
son, Byfield Lyde (son-in-law of Governor Belcher), was his chief heir.
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