Richard Saltonstall

Sir Richard Saltonstall (baptised Halifax, England 4 April 1586 – October 1661) led a group of English settlers up the Charles River to settle in what is now Watertown, Massachusetts in 1630.

He was a nephew of the Lord Mayor of London Richard Saltonstall (1517–1600), and was admitted pensioner at Clare College, Cambridge in 1603. Before leaving England for North America, he served as a Justice of the Peace for the West Riding of Yorkshire and was Lord of the Manor of Ledsham, which he from the Harebreds and later sold to the Earl of Strafford.

Saltonstall was the eldest of eleven children by Samuel Saltonstall and Anne Ramsden.

Saltonstall married his first wife, Grace Kaye, around 1609. They had the following children: Richard, Rosamond, Grace, Robert, Samuel, and Henry. After his wife died in 1625, Saltonstall married Lady Elizabeth West, by whom he had two additional children: Anne and John.

Although Saltonstall only remained in Massachusetts for a brief time, his descendants played a major role in New England history. His son, Henry Saltonstall, graduated in the first class at Harvard in 1642.

Saltonstall was admitted as a pensioner at Clare College in 1603 and, fifteen years later, was knighted on 23 November 1618. He served as justice of the peace in the West Riding of Yorkshire in 1625–1626 and was Lord of the Manor at Ledsham.

Sir Richard became involved with the Massachusetts Bay Company in 1629, signing the original charter of Massachusetts, and was named to the emigrant committee and appointed first assistant to Governor John Winthrop. After the death of his first wife, he sold his land in England and set sail for New England with his family. They boarded the Arbella on 26 August 1629 at Yarmouth, off of the southern coast of England, with the Winthrop company and arrived in Salem, Massachusetts on 12 June 1630.

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