These four Mayflower passengers are John Tilley, his wife Joan and his daughter Elizabeth, plus Elizabeth’s husband, John Howland. Shown below are three lines of descent from all four. To further complicate things, there are two lines of descent from Desire Howland (daughter of John and Elizabeth) and her husband, John Gorham, plus another line of descent from Desire’s sister, Hope Howland, who wed John Chipman.
Sarah Palin’s First Howland/Tilly Mayflower Line:
- Passengers John Tilley (bapt. 1571, Henlow, England) and his wife, the former Joan (Hurst) Rogers, died during that first devastating winter at Plymouth, MA, never realizing they would have millions of descendants with multiple, tangled, Mayflower lines.
- Elizabeth Tilley, born ca. 1607, came aboard the Mayflower with her parents and was about 17 when she married Mayflower passenger John Howland, who was about 15 years older. He died ca. 1672 at Plymouth ; she died in 1687 at Swansea, MA.
- Desire Howland married John Gorham. He was buried at Swansea, MA, in 1675/6 and she died at Barnstable, MA, in 1683.
- Desire Gorham married John Hawes in 1661 and died in 1700.
- Ebenezer Hawes (1678-1727) married Sarah Norton.
- Ebenezer Hawes, born in 1705 at Yarmouth, MA, married Sarah Hedge, born in 1709.
- Ebenezer Hawes (1735-1809) married Temperance Taylor in 1770; she was born in 1744. Both descend from John and Desire (Howland) Gorham; see Line 2, below.
- Isaiah Hawes, born in 1777, married Desire Collins in 1808 at Yarmouth, MA. Both parents are Howland descendants, giving him and all his descendants a double line.
- Abigail Hawes, born in 1813 at Augusta, ME, married Cornelius Norton Gower, born in 1810 at Industry, Maine. He shares her Howland/Tilley ancestry; see Line 3, below.
- Arthur Collins Gower was born at Abbot, ME, in 1852 and died in 1943. He married in Cook Co., IL in 1880, Mary Schmolz, born 1860 in Germany.
- James “Carl” Gower (1882-1954), born in Wisconsin and died at Pocatello, ID; married ca. 1904/5, Cora Strong, born 1886, Chippewa Co., WI.
- Helen Louise Gower (1907-1985) was born in Wisconsin and married in 1929 at Pocatello, ID, Washington native Clement J. “Clem” Sheeran (1907-1992); both died in Richland Co., WA.
- Sarah “Sally” Sheeran, born 1940 in Richland, WA; she married Charles “Chuck” Richard Heath, born 1938, Los Angeles, CA. They are parents of Alaska Gov. Sarah Louise (Heath) Palin (b. 1964).
Sarah Palin’s Second Howland/Tilly Mayflower Line:
- Desire Howland married John Gorham. He was buried at Swansea, MA, in 1675/6 and she died at Barnstable, MA, in 1683.
- James Gorham (1650-1707) of Marshfield, MA, in 1673/4 married Hannah Huckins (1653-1727) of Barnstable, MA.
- John Gorham, born in 1680, married Anne Brown in 1705/6.
- Anne Gorham (1716/7-1792) in 1741 married William Taylor (1717-1808).
- Temperance Taylor, born in 1744, married in 1770 Ebenezer Hawes (1735-1809). Both descend from John and Desire (Howland) Gorham; see them in Line 1, above.
Sarah Palin’s Third Howland/Tilly Mayflower Line:
- Elizabeth Tilley and John Howland
- Hope Howland married John Chipman
- Hope Chipman married John Huckins
- Mary Huckins married Nathan Bassett
- Samuel Bassett married Mary Pease
- Sarah Bassett (1720-1804) in 1740 married Maj. Peter Norton (1718-1792) of Edgartown, MA
- Cornelius Norton married Lydia Claghorn at Edgartown, MA in 1765
- Susan(na) Norton married James Gower of Topsham, Maine in 1800
- Cornelius Norton Gower, born in 1810, who married Abigail Hawes. See her in Line 1 above.
At last count, Sarah Palin had 10 Mayflower lines. There is the possibility of at least one more.
Sources:
Presented by William Addams Reitwiesner, a Library of Congress staff member, from data primarily compiled by genealogists Robert Battle and Michael Hurdle; arranged in this form by the current author, who has also used information from her personal files. The Pilgrim Hall Museum, Plymouth, MA
John Howland Gravestone
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Burial Hill, Old Plymouth Cemetery
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1921 Photo of Howland Home, Built 1666
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