Richard Dummer (158914 December 1679) was an early settler in New England.
He made his fortune as a trader, operating in the port of Southampton, England. He was a Puritan, which at times was contrary to the Established Church and the monarch. He emigrated to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, becoming a founding father there, setting up a stock company, acquiring estates, and establishing a milling business. His eldest son was slain by Indians. Another of his sons was the first American-born silversmith. His grandson William was Governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay and instrumental in bringing to an end the Indian Wars, and bequeathed his estates to trustees for the establishment of what became the Governor Dummer Academy, the first school of its kind in the province.
Early life
Dummer was born in Bishopstoke, Hampshire, the son of Thomas and Joane Dummer; as the parish registers have been lost, there is no record of his birth or baptism, although it is likely that he was born at Bishopstoke around 1589.
He trained as an attorney, and was involved with his brothers in maritime import and export from the nearby port of Southampton, becoming a competent seaman and attaining the status of "master".
The Plough Company
Dummer became closely associated with the radical Puritan malcontent Stephen Bachiler, who wanted to take his flock at Newton Stacey (near Wherwell, Hampshire) to New England. Bachiler married Helena Mason, the widow of Revd. Thomas Mason of Odiham, and Dummer married Mary Jane, the daughter of Helena and Thomas Mason.
Dummer was involved with Bachiler and others in the setting up of a joint stock company, "The Plough Company", to plant working colonists in New England. Although not a member of the religious Company of Husbandmen, Dummer was persuaded by Bachiler to help finance the enterprise. Described as "a man of breadth and ability", his connections must have been valuable to the struggling company. Accordingly, he outfitted a small ship, The Plough, which sailed for Massachusetts with 80 people in 1631. He then sailed with his new wife, Mary, for Boston on The Whale, arriving on 24 May 1632.
Upon his arrival he found that the project had collapsed; he set out to salvage the company, and through the Massachusetts courts he seized the remaining material and assets of the whole group, and eventually all the Plough Company's patents, to the anger of some of the investors back in England. In 1643, Dummer sold the patents through George Cleeve to Alexander Rigby, one of Cromwell's commanders; thus Dummer was the only person who derived a profit from the defunct Plough Company.
Roxbury
Dummer settled in Roxbury, where he took an active part in the affairs of the young colony, being made a Freeman on 6 November 1632. He and his wife Mary are listed among the founding members of the first church at Roxbury.
The next year he built a water-powered gristmill in Roxbury, the first water-powered mill built to grind corn in New England. By order of the General Court on 4 March 1634, the tax on his real estate in Roxbury and Saugus was reduced, probably because of his enterprise for the public good. The same day he contributed £30 toward a fund authorized for the construction of a moveable fort (the Sea Fort) for the defence of the colony. Dummer and several other freemen in the colony were chosen as overseers of the powder and shot and all other ammunition in the several plantations where they lived. It was ordered that Dummer and John Johnson build a bridge over the Muddy River before the next General Court, and that the towns of Boston, Roxbury, Dorchester, New Town and Watertown contribute towards it.
Later in 1634, Dummer, with Richard Saltonstall, Henry Sewall and others in England (including Richard Dummer's brother Stephen and John Winthrop the Younger), contracted for the importation of large numbers of cattle. They had settled on the territory bordering on the Parker River as a suitable place for the keeping of the cattle because of the fertility of the upland and the large quantity of salt marsh, considered of special value for the forage.
In England a great body of people from the Hampshire Avon and Test valleys of all trades assembled at Southampton and London to sail in an initial convoy of 10 ships. The fleet left in 1634, arriving later the same year. Early in 1635 the Elizabeth arrived from London with Richard's sister Sarah, now married to John Brown. Other ships carried cattle. By the end of 1635 over 100 ships had made the journey, and Dummer's stock-raising colony was in being.