Adrienne Foster wrote: >I can see my 9×great grandpa George Martin left a highly unusual will by >leaving the bulk of his estate to his wife. This was rarely done during >most of the 19th century, much less the 17th. William Morse left almost all of his estate to his wife Elizabeth and named her executor. This was despite her having been convicted of witchcraft and setenced to house arrest for the remainder of her life. I don't know what happened to the estate. There doesn't seem to have been any effort to confiscate property, despite her having been in jail for almost a year, so I assume her husband was paying her jail bills. I've often wondered why he named her executor. Perhaps it was because his sons moved to another county that was not within commuting distance. Or perhaps there were family rifts that were never documented. I've often wondered, too, whether Elizabeth was the mother of all of William's children, especially the sons, but I have no proof one way or the other. >If I remember what my mother told me correctly, he had a falling out with >his eldest son and it looks like the father cut George Jr. out completely. I read somewhere that the failure to mention a child in a will didn't necessarily mean there was a rift. Often, according to what I read, the older children had received substantial gifts when they reached maturity. The bulk of the estate was left to the child with whom the surviving spouse would probably be living. >Maybe this was why the Martins didn't put more effort into having their >property reinstated after Susannah was executed. With the Martin family >situation being so complicated, her persecutors probably saw her as easy >prey for confiscation. Unless someone in the family had the means and will to do so, they may not have thought it was worth it. Did any of the families who sued actually get much for their efforts? Francine Nicholson _________________________________________________________________ STOP MORE SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail