Posted on 12/09/2022 7:43:17 PM PST by daniel1212
When the War of 1812 broke out, the Town of Billerica, Mass., was in the middle of an extraordinary baby boom.
Twelve other families in the town had 13 children. Five had 14 offspring and one had 15. Twenty-six families each had 10 children, 20 families had 11 children and 24 families had 12 children. The largest family had 21 children by two wives. That meant 90 families accounted for 1,043 children.
The average Billerica family had an average of 11.6 children per family. The town’s population grew almost exclusively because of its fecundity. In 1810, the population of the entire town grew to 1,289.
The large families of Billerica were typical of early New England. The region had the world’s lowest annual death rate, less than one percent. And its birth rate exceeded 3 percent...
Cotton Mather mentioned one woman who had at least 22 children and another who had at least 23 — by one husband. Of those, 19 survived to adulthood. Mather also mentioned a third woman who had 27 children...
Rev. John Sherman, the first minister of Watertown, had 26 children by two wives, included 20 by his last wife. Rev. Samuel Willard, a minister in Groton, Mass., and Boston who served as vice president of Harvard college, had 20 children...
The high birth rate accounted for the uniquely Yankee character of the region. Between 1640 and 1845, immigration to the New England colonies only reached about one percent.
Nice life! I figured with all those siblings there would be some friction...obviously perfectly normal.
LOL! Right?
“MOM!! He’s looking at me!’’.
“If you kids DON”T Stop I’ll turn this car around so HELP ME!’’ You just WAIT till your father gets home!’’
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