From 1620 onward, settlers from nearby Plymouth Colony and the colony of Massachusetts Bay (established 1628) ventured into the Narragansett region to trade with indian tribes. Finally, in 1635, Rhode Island got its first white settler -- William Blackstone, an eccentric Anglican clergyman who built a home near Lonsdale on the banks of the river which came to bear his name
Rhode Island's first permanent settlement was established at Providence in 1636 by English clergyman Roger Williams and a small band of followers who had left the repressive atmosphere of the Massachusetts Bay Colony to seek freedom of worship.
The fourth original town, Warwick, was settled in 1642 by Samuel Gorton, another dissident from Portsmouth. During this initial decade two other outposts were established: Wickford (1637). by Richard Smith, and Pawtuxet (1638), by William Harris and the Arnold family.
Quakers, arrived in Aquidneck in 1657 and soon became a powerful force in the colony's political and economic life; a Jewish congregation came to Newport in 1658; and French Huguenots (Calvinists) settled in East Greenwich in 1686.
The resourceful Brown brothers -- Nicholas (1729-91). Joseph(1733-85), John (1736-1803), and Moses (1738-1836)- guided by uncles Obadiah (1712-62) and Elisha (1717-1802), laid the groundwork in this turbulant age for the remarkable commercial and industrial advances of the early national period.
Rhode Island Census Belcher
Belchers in Rhode Island
Belcher Births and Deaths in Rhode Island