Stanton, Thomas, 1638 - 1718

The son of Thomas Stanton, Sr. and Ann Lord, Thomas Stanton, Jr. was born 1638 at the Hartford settlement shortly after the Pequot War, and subsequently married Sarah Denison, daughter of Capt. George Dension.  In September 1654, the Commissioners of the United Colonies, recognizing his and his younger brother John's facility in understanding and speaking the Indian language, ordered that the two Stantons be trained at Harvard "for future service ... in Teaching such Indian Children as shalbe taken into the Colledge for that end." When the Thomas, Sr. was absent from the home, Thomas, Jr. assumed the family's trading post business and became involved in the West Indies trade.  He died April 11, 1718 at Stonington.  Acts of the Commissioners of the United Colonies; Richard A. Wheeler, History of the Town of Stonington, County of New London, Connecticut (New London: Press of The Day, 1900); William A. Stanton, A Record, Genealogical, Biographical, Statistical, of Thomas Stanton of  Connecticut, and His Descendants, 1635-1891 (Albany, J. Munsell's Sons, 1891) p. 77. Williams Haynes, Stonington Chronology (Chester, Ct.: Pequot Press, 1976) p.32.