Mary Slater

***Please do NOT merge with Mary Slaughter G86R-TPZ until we have a consensus that this is the correct Mary, second wife of John Orton*** Mary Slater born in 5 May 1733 in Simsbury, Hartford, Connecticut is the most likely candidate for John Orton's second wife. They married on 11 Dec 1755 in Simsbury. Although the Orton Family Genealogy Book calls her "Mary Slaughter", note that there are no Slaughter families in Simsbury. There are Slater families, however, and this is the only Mary Slater who appears to be the correct age (making her roughly 43 when her youngest child was born). Mary Slater is the daughter of John Slater Jr. We have yet to determine her mother. She is the granddaughter of John Slater Sr. and Elizabeth Holcombe. Mary's mother died and widower John Slater Jr. remarried a divorcee - Sarah (Pengilley) Poisson - in 1759. There is some speculation that John Slater Jr. may have fathered Sarah Poisson's son John Poisson as Sarah was estranged from her ex-husband for many months before her son's birth, John Slater was her neighbor for many years, and John Slater mentions John Poisson in his will. In his will, John Slater mentions land that he brought from his Uncle Elias Slater (thereby giving us evidence that he is the son of John Slater and Elizabeth Holcombe). He mentions his only surviving son John Slater Jun-r and his four daughters Abigail, Mary, Elizabeth, and Sarah. He doesn't state whether or not they are married nor give their surnames. Most likely, they are all the daughters of his first wife as he was widowed for a number of years and, by the time that he married Mrs. Sarah Poisson, she was about 42 years old. If Mary Slaughter, wife of John Orton, was this Mary Slater, then she would have been alive at the time of her father's will (1778) - two years after her youngest child was born. Also note that Mary's brother Amos Slater (who died prior to his father's will) provides a namesake for Mary Slaughter/Slater Orton's son Amos Orton.