Records of the Town of Plymouth, Volume 1 1636-1705

These volumes contain a complete, verbatim transcription of the town records of Plymouth, Massachusetts for the years 1636 to 1783. They record all the formal business of the town, such as town meetings, elections, laying out of roads, and land grants by the town; vital records were kept in separate books and are not included here. These records begin early in the life of the town and continue down through the end of the American Revolution. They provide a quite detailed picture of life at the time. Here you will find the local residents registering their cattle marks, being elected hog-reeve, or to some other minor town post, receiving permission to set up fishing stages or erect a fence, listed as voting at the town meeting, receiving a grant of land or cattle, assisting in the care of widows and orphans, having a road laid out past their property, and all manner of other interesting things. These records can be very helpful because they name a great many people, some of whom probably do not show up in many other records. There is a complete index in each volume.