Personal Life
Jonathan Norcross was the second son of a clergyman, Jesse Norcross, of Charlestown, Kennebec, ME, b. abt. 1778; married 4 Mar. 1804 Nancy, Dresden, Maine. He was born and raised in Orono, Maine, along with six other siblings, including his equally industrious older bros. Nicholas Gaubert Norcross (see below), in what could be described as a devout and pious upbringing given his later positions on issues of vice and as a practicing Baptist; evoking the Protestant Work Ethic of his forefathers. His younger siblings include: Livonia (b. Jan. 1810), Jesse (b. 3 Jun. 1812), Nancy Gaubert (b. 2 Mar. 1816); who married Moses M. Swan, of Augustus, ME; Maria (b. Feb. 1818), and Louisa (b. Oct. 1823).
Jonathan Norcross is a descendant of Jeremiah Norcross, the English progenitor of the Norcross family who settled upon Watertown, the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1638); a land proprietor of Cambridge before 1642; who was an admitted freeman of that town in 1652.
The Mayors' lineage stems from Richard Norcross, Sr. and Mary Brooks, the second son and his wife, of the family's pilgrim; and Norcross' great-great-great grandparents. Nathaniel Norcross; their respective third son; sixth child of seven, married, ca. 1691, second (given the death of his first wife, Mehitbale, who died 5 Apr. 1691; leaving one daughter, Mehitbale Norcross) Susanna Shattuck; she was the daughter of Dr. Philip Shattuck of Watertown, MA; and great-great grandparents of the mayor.
From this same line, he is the distant fourth cousin of the Hon. Otis Norcross, 19th Mayor of Boston (1867), whose great-great grandfather Richard Norcross, Jr. is the older brother of Nathaniel Norcross (noted above).
Nathaniel's second son, Philip Norcross; great grandfather of Hon. Jonathan Norcross; married 1721 Sarah of Watertown, MA; they removed to Sudbury, MA. Philip's third son Jonathan Norcross, the fifth of nine children; the Mayor's paternal grandfather, was born in Newton, MA, who along with his wife Martha, whom he married in 1760, removed to Livermore, Androscoggin, ME, after the birth of Jonathan's father Jesse, suggesting substantial migration of the family over time for various purposes.
Hon. Jonathan Norcross' first cousin Jesse Springer Norcross of this bloodline was proprietor of Norcross Mills.
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