Encyclopedia of Connecticut biography, genealogical-memorial ...

has almost lost the leavening influence of
its original settlers, but a canvass of that
part of the country will show an amazing
number of the descendants of that hardyrace,
with which is included the "May-
flower" stock that aids materially in the
forefront of its enterprise and character-
izes its citizenship.
Among the many prominent men in
Connecticut who hark back to the founders
of the land in ancestry is John M.
Otis, president of the Mechanics and
Farmers' Bank of Bridgeport. Mr. Otis
has all his adult life been connected with
that bank and banking interests generally.
He comes of Revolutionary stock, and is
a great-great-grandson of Stephen Otis,
who was one of the minute men of Con-
cord, Massachusetts, and Lexington, the
very vital engagements which preceded
the battle of Bunker Hill—men whose
deeds even today thrill Americans. Later
this Revolutionary hero took part in the
battle of Long Island, where he was cap-
tured by the British, dying when still held
by them. John M. Otis' line is traced
down through Robert, Richard and Marshall
Otis, but its anterior history is very
interesting.
The family name of Otis, Otes, Ottys,
is derived from the old Anglo-Norman
Christian name Oto, Odo, Oto de Bayley,
and is on record as early as about 1300.
Andreas Otes is in the Hundred Rolls of
County Norfolk, A. D. 1273, and Otes de
Howorth in the poll-tax of Yorkshire,
1379. The coat-of-arms of Otis (Ottys) is
Arms—Azure, a cross engrailed argent between
four crosslets fitchee, or.
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ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BIOGRAPHY
Robert Otis, born in England in 1696,
appears in Lyme, Connecticut, before
1737. He is said to have served as a
wagoner in the Revolution, but the mili-
tary record given is probably that of
Robert, Jr. "He died at Lyme, 181 1, aged
one hundred and fifteen years." (See
Robert, Jr.) Robert, Sr., married, in 1737,
Margaret Sabin. His diary has for Sun-
day, November 15, 1741
and Mary Daton publisht." This entry
perhaps referred to a second wife. "Rob-
: "Robert Otis
ert," his son, over sixteen, and his wife,
are in the census of 1780. A partial list
of his children born at Lyme : Robert, Jr.,
born 1740; enlisted May i, 1777, in the
Connecticut Line, Captain Ely's company,
for three years ; reenlisted in Captain
Richard Douglass' company, serving from
January i to May 4, 1781, and he was
among those drafted from the Fifth Connecticut
Regiment to serve under Marquis
de la Fayette in Virgfinia at the end
of the war, in October, 1781. He married
Lydia , and had a son, John. He
and his wife may have been the subjects
of the diary entry of "Robert" quoted
above, in 1790. Stephen (2) Otis, son
of Robert and (Mary Daton?) Otis, bom
at Lyme, 1738, died at Halifax, Vermont,
in 1831. The lineage book of the
Daughters of the American Revolution
says that he served from Lyme for twen-
ty-nine days in Captain Joseph Jewett's
company at the Lexington Alarm, beginning
in April, 1775. He was at the battle
of Long Island, August 27, 1776, but in
the roll after the battle this was recorded
"Sergeant Stephen Ottis missing." He
married, about 1760, Lucy Chandler. He
was representative of Halifax, Vermont,
140
1812-17. Partial list of children born at
Lyme : Arannah, served in Colonel Sam-
uel Canfield's regiment at West Point,
New York, September, 1781, enlisting
from East Haddam ; he appeared as
"Arime" in the roll, and married Eliza-
beth Adams. His second child was Caro-
line, born in 1764, died 1834. Robert (3)
said to be the son of Stephen and Lucy
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