William Blaxton
Reverend William Blaxton (also spelled William Blackstone) (1595–1675) was an early British settler in New England and the first European settler of modern-day Boston and Rhode Island.
Blaxton was born in Horncastle, Lincolnshire, England and attended Cambridge University, earning a bachelor's degree in 1617 and a master's in 1621. He then became an Anglican priest, although he had several disagreements with the church. This led to his decision to join the failed Gorges expedition to America in 1623.
He arrived in modern-day Weymouth, Massachusetts in 1623 as a chaplain in the Robert Gorges expedition. Most of his fellow travelers returned to England in 1625, and he became the first European to settle in Boston, living alone on what became Boston Common and Beacon Hill.
The Puritans landed in nearby Charlestown in 1629, and in 1630 Blackstone invited them to settle on his land in Boston after they had problems finding potable water. The Puritans then granted him 50 acres (200,000 m2) of his own land, which he promptly sold back to them.
According to Louise Lind, author of William Blackstone: Sage of the Wilderness (1993):
While the Puritans also disagreed with leaders of the established Church, they proved to be quite intolerant of anyone who disagreed with them. Blackstone soon tired of their intolerance, and moved about 35 miles (56 km) south of Boston, to a hill overlooking a wide bend in what the Indians then called the Patucket (sic) River and what is today known as the Blackstone River.
Blackstone was the first European settler in Rhode Island in 1635, before Roger Williams established Providence Plantation the next year. The area that Blackstone settled was part of the Plymouth Colony until 1691, came under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts Bay Colony until 1741, and finally became part of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations.
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