NOTE: If you are descended from this couple, they were extensively researched by Clifford L. Stott and his article was published in 1993 in the New England Historic Genealogical Register 147:315-328.

OK, I had a hard time choosing an ancestor who I thought was like me in some ways, but choosing a polar opposite was very easy. The only risks I take are those greatly tipped in favor of success and I am not very adventurous if the new adventure is attached to danger. I love to take cruises – long ones – but you couldn’t have paid me enough money to make the trip that Judith Tue Knapp, her husband William and their children did on the Arbella in 1630.

Here is my idea of sailing on a ship:

Google Images: Sapphire Princess

and this is an artist’s rendering of a ship from Judith’s time:

Google Images

You have to admit, sailing on these vessels would not produce exactly the same kind of experiences and that is without even considering the dangers of life facing them if they survived the voyage.

That is exactly what Judith Tue Knapp did and she was not particularly young when the family set out. She and her husband, William, also had to consider the risk to their young family.

Judith Tue was baptized on 31 May 1589 in Wormingford, Essex, England, the youngest of the four known children of John and Cicily Tue. She married William Knapp on 11 January 1606/07 in Wormingford. He was baptized on 1 January 1580/81 in Bures St. Mary, Suffolk, England, the fourth of eight children of Thomas Knopp and his wife, Alice Howlett.

The two towns are about 3 1/2 miles apart and about 70 miles from London.

William and Judith Knapp had seven children born to them, all in England:

1. Elizabeth, bp. 10 July 1608, Wormingford; married Mr. Buttery. They did not sail for Massachusetts with the rest of her family. She was buried in Bures St. Mary on 23 February 1661/62.
2. William, bp. 3 February 1610/11, Wormingford; died 25 September 1676, Watertown, Suffolk, MA
3. Mary, bp. 19 August 1613, Wormingford; married Thomas Smith in MA.
4. Anne, bp. 24 December 1618, Wormingford; married John Philbrick about 1649 in MA; died at sea with her husband and daughter sailing from Hampton to Boston on 20 October 1657 when their ship sank.
5. John, bp. 20 January 1622/23, Bures St. Mary; died before 9 April 1696, Watertown, MA; married Sarah Young, 21 May 1660, Watertown, MA.
6. James, bp. 30 April 1626, Wormingford; died before 11 November 1700, Watertown, MA; married Elizabeth Warren about 1654.
7. Judith, bp. 16 July 1629, Bures St. Mary; married Nicholas Cady about 1650 in MA.

Eldest daughter Elizabeth was likely recently married at the time her family emigrated, as she would have been about 22 years old. She remained behind in England with her husband and likely never saw her parents and siblings again.

I can’t imagine leaving the only home I had ever known, in that time period, aged about 40 years old, with my husband and children ranging from 19 to a very young one year old, hoping against hope that we would all survive and have a better life in Massachusetts.

Judith Tue Knapp is definitely my polar opposite.