1. Gregory Belcher was born about 1606 in Wardend, Ashton Parish, Warwickshire, England. He came to Boston in America in 1634 on a ship in John Winslow’s fleet accompanied by his wife Catherine and some or all of their living children. He settled in Mount Wollaston about 1637 where he had been granted a lot of 52 acres and was declared a freeman. Historian Belcher believed Gregory married a Catherine James and had some children who were perhaps born in England. The first born in America at Braintree in 1637 was named Samuel. Gregory and Catherine had 7 children but it is not clear if these were born in America and others in England. Gregory died in Braintree in 1674. He was one of the signers of the covenants at the first church in Quincy Square. His house was located approximately on the lot occupied in 1975 by a retail store named Bargain Center. Gregory is buried in Hancock Cemetery, probably in the old Crosby tomb that was vandalized long before 1975 and no stone or writing exists to confirm this.

2. Samuel Belcher, son of Gregory, was born in Braintree, Massachusetts in 1637 and died there in 1679. He married Mary Billings of Dorchester, Massachusetts and they had 8 children. No gravestone remains to confirm his burial site.

3. Samuel Belcher, son of Samuel, was born in Braintree on September 21, 1666 and died there December 19, 1714. Samuel was a farmer who married Comfort Harbour in 1688 and they had 10 children.

4. Nathaniel Belcher, son of Samuel, was born in Braintree on July 25, 1700 and died at the home of one of his sons, Joseph, in Randolph, Massachusetts during the winter of 1780. He married three times and had all 6 of his children by his first wife, Hannah Holbrook who he married on November 18, 1731. She died on February 3 in 1754 or 1755 and is buried in the Hancock Cemetery in Quincy Square. Nathaniel married his second wife, Sarah Wild, in November 1756. She died on June 24, 1761 and is also buried in the Hancock Cemetery. The third wife was Bethia Bass and they married May 6, 1768. Nathaniel was a lieutenant in the Braintree Militia of the King’s Army from 1749 to 1756. He was also a Braintree selectman in 1759. No gravestone remains for him but he is probably buried with his son, Joseph, in Union Street Cemetery in East Randolph because he spent his last years with Joseph in that town. Note that East Randolph eventually became incorporated as the town of Holbrook.

5. Nathaniel Belcher, son of Nathaniel, was born in Braintree on September 19, 1732 and died in East Randolph on May 1 in 1786 or 1787. He built a home on North Franklin Street in East Randolph in 1754 and married Lydia Brackett of Braintree on December 10, 1755. They had 11 children. Nathaniel was a sergeant and lieutenant during the French and Indian Wars. He was a captain during the Revolutionary War, serving in the Jonathan Bass Regiment from 1776 through 1779. Nathaniel is buried in the Union Cemetery at Holbrook and there is a slate stone marker in the front section near the street.

6. Billy Belcher, son of Nathaniel, was born in Braintree on September 27, 1767 and died in East Randolph on November 13, 1857. He was a stone cutter and farmer who married three times. He married Joanna Joy on April 19, 1787 and they had 2 children. He had 3 children by his second wife, Polly Wood. He married for the third time on June 11, 1801 to Deborah Belcher, his first cousin and they had 6 children. Billy was in Captain Simeon White’s militia company in the War of 1812, during which they answered an alarm at Hull. He is buried with his third wife in the Union Cemetery at Holbrook, just below the hill in the front center where the slates end and marked by a marble obelisk. Historian Harry C. Belcher noted that the name Billy appears on all town records and on the grave but “undoubtedly he was intent to be William.”

7. Eliphalet Belcher, son of Billy and Joanna Joy, was born in Randolph on September 20, 1787 and died from a lung abscess in South Weymouth, Massachusetts on May 25, 1867. He married Sarah Damon of South Weymouth in 1814 and they had 6 children.. Sarah died at age 82 on November 4, 1870. Eliphalet was a farmer and bootmaker who came “down in Weymouth to ’back of the pond’.” He built a farmhouse on what became Randolph Street and started the Weymouth Belchers from there. (Note that ‘back of the pond’ refers to Weymouth Great Pond located off Randolph Street near Forest Street. Eliphalet’s property was probably on Randolph Street after it turns sharply south just west of Tamburlane Road.)

8. William Balcomb Belcher, son of Eliphalet, was born in South Weymouth April 21, 1822 and died in East Randolph on March 23, 1901. He married Almira Churchill June 2, 1840 in South Weymouth. She was the daughter of Isaac and Mary (Grozier) Churchill born February 21, 1825 and died in Abington, Massachusetts November 5, 1892. She gave birth at least 13 times, but several infants died within a few days or weeks of birth and are buried in the old Belcher Cemetery on Randolph Street without grave markers. Six children including only 1 son are known to have lived to maturity. Another son who was adopted, (probably his second wife’s born in Ireland), also lived to maturity. The second wife, Mary E. Connell or Connors, was an Irish housekeeper who had come to take care of him as a domestic. She was previously married or widowed and came to the United States with 2 small children who were officially adopted as Belchers following the wedding. William is buried in the Union Cemetery in Holbrook. (Note that historian Belcher’s report on William Balcomb Belcher is a little misleading. Its chronology suggests that the 13 children were by the second wife, which seems unlikely as William would have been about 70 years old at the time of his second marriage.)

9. William Balcomb Belcher, Jr., son of William Balcomb, was born in East Randolph October 1, 1847 and died accidently on June 4, 1914 in Holbrook. (Note that the word ‘accidently’ is marked with a double asterisk in historian Belcher’s notes but there is no footnote. Family lore has it that William was shot dead when discovered stealing a chicken.) He married Laura E. Blanchard, daughter of Elisha and Emeline (Holbrook) Blanchard on November 13, 1867 at East Randolph. They had 6 children. William and Laura are buried together in the Union Cemetery in Holbrook. As you enter on the right driveway go all the way across to the left into what was a newer section in 1975. The grave is near the front row.

10. William Burton Belcher, son of William Balcomb, Jr., was born in East Randolph April 18, 1870 and died in Brockton, Massachusetts May 5, 1942. He married Mary Louise Hayden of Scituate, Massachusetts February 13, 1889 at Weymouth. They had 11 children. Mary was born in 1874 and died in 1940. William inherited from his father considerable acreage along the westerly shore of Weymouth Great Pond. The property was taken by eminent domain in 1925 for Weymouth’s water supply. (Note that not all of the Belcher property may have been taken at that time because William’s sons Weston and Henry showed the ‘Belcher property’ and a cabin maintained for duck hunting to Philip Shepherd sometime around 1950.) William is buried in Melrose Cemetery at Brockton on Lot #2278SG. The gravestone may have his birth and death dates incorrectly inscribed.

11. Weston Burton Belcher, son of William Burton, was born February 10, 1894 in Weymouth and died September 14, 1969 in Rockland, Massachusetts. He first married Lottie E. Brooks who was born in 1887 and died in 1925. He then married Esther Torrey who was born in 1907 and died in 1983 in Rockland. They had 6 children. Weston worked as piano salesman and eventually received a degree from Bentley College. He went on to work at the First National Bank of Boston and retired as a senior vice president of the bank and chief trust officer of the bank’s subsidiary, the Old Colony Trust Company. Numbered among his estate clients were Sherman Adams, former governor of New Hampshire and chief of staff to President Dwight Eisenhower and Pearl Mesta, a Washington and New York socialite who was immortalized in a Broadway musical and it’s featured song, ‘The Hostess With the Mostest’. Weston’s favorite pastime was ocean fishing.

12. Marilyn Florence Belcher, daughter of Weston Burton Belcher, was born May 22, 1930 at the South Shore Hospital in South Weymouth. She grew up in the family home at 336 Webster Street in Rockland, Massachusetts. She was a Pro Merito Honors Society graduate from Rockland High School in June 1947. She attended Simmons College and graduated from the Chandler School for Women. Marilyn worked at the Federal Reserve Bank in Boston as an administrative assistant to the Administrator for Regulation X, a Federal mortgage regulation. She married Philip B. Shepherd in Rockland on June 27, 1952, when they moved to New Jersey and had two children, Lisa and Barry. Marilyn was active in the Congregational Church, Brownies, vocal music, and was a Middlesex County Republican Committee woman. The Shepherd family moved to Sedalia, Colorado when Philip’s employer, the Johns Manville Corporation, moved its headquarters from New York City to Denver. Marilyn operated a business of needlepoint supplies and miniatures in partnership with two friends for many years. She enjoyed and was highly skilled in the art of needlepoint.