Rev. Adam Blakeman (10 June 1596 – 7 September 1665) was an English

Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britai ...

clergyman who was an early migrant to

New England New England is a region comprising six states in the Northeastern United States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Vermont. It is bordered by the state of New York to the west and by the Canadian province ...

and a founder of

Stratford, Connecticut Stratford is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States. It is situated on Long Island Sound at the mouth of the Housatonic River. Stratford is in the Bridgeport–Stamford–Norwalk Metropolitan Statistical Area. It was settled b ...

. Blakeman was born in Gnosall, Staffordshire,

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

on 10 June 1596. His birthplace is frequently misspelled in websites due to transcription errors from old records. Blakeman matriculated (entered college) at Christ Church, Oxford on 28 May 1617. He was a preacher for some years in Great Bowden, Leicestershire, and in

Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southern end of the Pennine range of hills and part of the National Forest. It borders Greater Manchester to the no ...

, and in 1638 went to

Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its cap ...

. In 1639 he led the original settlers of

, and served as the first minister of the church until his death on 7 September 1665.Sibley, John Langdon. ''Biographical Sketches of Graduates of Harvard University, in Cambridge, Massachusetts''. Charles William Sever (1881), Vol. II, p. 140. Stratford, like a number of other

towns of the 1630s, was founded as a

Utopian A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book '' Utopia'', describing a fictional island socie ...

community by

Puritans The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Catholic Church, Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become m ...

fleeing persecution in England. The town's minister was also its political leader, and ruled both his flock and his town as the unquestioned representative of God. During the 17th century (and until well into the 19th century) consistent spelling of names was not enforced, due to lower literacy levels and the absence of the standardization required by government bureaucracies. By 1800 Blakeman's descendants most often used the ''Blackman'' spelling of the name, although in the 18th century some alternated between the two spellings three times in successive generations. Records of Christ Church, Oxford use the Blakeman spelling and the name Blakeman is still common in

Coventry Coventry ( or ) is a city in the West Midlands, England. It is on the River Sherbourne. Coventry has been a large settlement for centuries, although it was not founded and given its city status until the Middle Ages. The city is governed ...

, England. (

Office for National Statistics The Office for National Statistics (ONS; cy, Swyddfa Ystadegau Gwladol) is the executive office of the UK Statistics Authority, a non-ministerial department which reports directly to the UK Parliament. Overview The ONS is responsible for ...

, UK Census 2001)

References

1596 births 1665 deaths People from the Borough of Stafford Alumni of Christ Church, Oxford People from Stratford, Connecticut People from Great Bowden {{England-reli-bio-stub