Samuel Wilbur, Jr..

About Samuel Wilbur, Jr.

Samuel Wilbur Jr. was an early settler of Portsmouth in the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and one of seven original purchasers of the Pettaquamscutt lands which would later become South Kingstown, Rhode Island. His father, Samuel Wilbore, had been an early settler in Boston who was dismissed from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for supporting the dissident ministers Anne Hutchinson and John Wheelwright, becoming one of the signers of the compact that established the town of Portsmouth. The subject Samuel was willed his father's Rhode Island lands, and appears to have lived in Portsmouth most of his life. He married Hannah Porter, the daughter of another signer of the Portsmouth Compact, John Porter. Beginning in 1656 Wilbur held a number of important positions within the colony, including Commissioner, Deputy to the General Assembly, Assistant to the Governor, and Captain in a Troop of Horse. He wrote his will in August 1678, though it was not probated until more than three decades later. Wilbur was held in high esteem within the colony and was one of a small group of men named in the Royal Charter of 1663, signed by King Charles II of England, and becoming the guiding document of Rhode Island's government for nearly two centuries.