Notes
The well known Beecher family (Henry Ward Beecher and Harriet Beecher
Stowe, being two of the clan) descend from Hannah's son Isaac Beecher.
Donald Lines Jacobus, in The American Genealogist, Vol XX, #2, Oct.
1943,pp 122-125, notes the finding of some records relating to Isaac and
Hannah:
"[Kept in a locked cabinet in the Town Clerk's Office is a small old book
which was used in the period between 1660 and 1700 for miscellaneous
puposes. It seems to have been little used by genealogists. A digest of
a few of the records is given below. The Beecher entry is of interest
because it bears on the question of whether Isaac Beecher was actual son
of the Widow Hannah Beecher, formerly Potter, as the present writer has
always believed, or only a step-son, a theory favored by other students
of the family....]"
The entries below this quotation deal with Isaac's possession of land
that were first his mother's and others which came to Isaac from his
brother William that had "belonged at first to his mother Beecher".
"Nathaniell Potter son of Wm Potter appeared the 9th day of June 1684: &
acknowledged those lands mentioned before that did belong to his sd
father Wm Potter were passed over to his unkle the sd Isaac Beecher...."
My opinion would be to go with Jacobus's opinion that Isaac was indeed
Hannah's son and truly a half-brother to William.
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