Silence Hickock (1713-1795)

Silence Hickock was born on 19 Sep 1713 in Waterbury, New Haven, Connecticut as the tenth and youngest child of Samuel Hickock and Elizabeth Plumb. She had nine siblings, namely: daughter, Ebenezer, Samuel, John, Hannah, Elizabeth, son, Gideon, and Sarah. Two of her siblings, a unnamed sister and an unnamed brother, died at birth.

The Hickock surname has been spelled a variety of ways such as Hickock, Hickocks, Hicox, and, in the case of Silence’s famous 2nd cousin 4x removed “Wild Bill,” it can be spelled Hickok.

When she was 23, Silence married Abraham Bennett Sr., son of James Bennett and Deborah Adams, on 12 Mar 1737 in Connecticut.

Abraham Bennett Sr. and Silence Hickock had the following children:

1. Hannah Bennett was born about 1740 in Connecticut.  She married Jonathan Rockwell on 01 Jan 1760 in Ridgefield, Fairfield, Connecticut. She died in 1819 in Elmira, Chemung, New York.
2. Benjamin Bennett was born in 1741 in Connecticut. He married Mary Springsteen about 1761. He died on 22 Jul 1779 in Minisink Ford, Highland, Sullivan, New York.
3. Abraham Bennett Jr. was born in Apr 1742 in Ridgefield, Fairfield, Connecticut. He married Jerusha Wanzer about 1770. He died on 14 Sep 1795 in Warwick, Orange, New York.
4. Justus Bennett Sr. was born in 1743. He married Nancy Pitman about 1766. He died on 30 Jan 1831 in Wayne, Schuyler, New York.
5. Mitchell Bennett was born about 1746. He married Elizabeth. He died in 1809.
6. Nathaniel Bennett was born about 1747 in Ridgefield, Fairfield, Connecticut. He married Mercy Wanzer in 1772 in Fairfield, Fairfield, Connecticut.
7. Gersham Bennett.
8. Thadeus Bennett.

We don’t know exactly when, but sometime between the birth of their son Nathaniel in about 1747 and taxes being assessed in 1775, Silence and Abraham Bennett moved about 60 miles straight west, from Ridgefield, Fairfield, Connecticut to Warwick, Orange, New York. The town of Warwick wasn’t officially created until 1788, but Warwick Village was settled in 1764. During the Revolutionary War, Warwick was the site of a Continental Army encampment.

During the Revolutionary War, which occurred between 19 Apr 1775 and 3 Sep 1783, Silence became a widow. Her husband, Abraham Bennett, Sr. died in 1777 at Warwick, Orange, New York. Silence was in her 60s during the Revolutionary War. She lived to see independence for the United States and the election of a President. George Washington took office in 1789 and was the only U.S. President to serve during her lifetime.

Silence Hickock Bennett died in 1795 in Orange, New York at age 81.

Where is she in the tree?

Silence Hickock was the mother to both Abraham Bennett Jr. and Hannah Bennett who were ancestors of Floyd Boyce Phillips. John Bennett and Sarah Rockwell were cousins, both grandchildren of Silence, who married.

Selected Sources:

“A Short History of the Warwick Valley: Extracted from Dr. Richard Hull’s History of Warwick and Other Local History Sources,” Web, 5 Sep 2017, http://www.albertwisnerlibrary.org/Factsandhistory/History/Shorthistory.htm.

Ancestry.com, Connecticut Town Birth Records, pre-1870 (Barbour Collection) (Provo, UT, USA, Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006), www.ancestry.com.

Ancestry.com, North America, Family Histories, 1500-2000 (Provo, UT, USA, Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016), ancestry.com, Book Title: The Baldwin Genealogy, from 1500 to 1881.

Charles Nelson Hickok, Hickok Genealogy: descendants of William Hickoks of Farmington, Connecticut [database on-line] (Rutland, Vt.: The Tuttle Publishing Company, 1938), ancestry.com, pp. 21, 338.

Waterbury, CT, Waterbury: The town and city of Waterbury, Connecticut: from the aboriginal period to the year eighteen hundred and ninety-five [database on-line] (New Haven: Price & Lee, 1896), ancestry.com, pp. 1_ap64, 496.