Capt. John Underhill

Capt. John Underhill was reportedly born in Bagington, Warwickshire, England, on Oct. 5, 1597, according to the 1908 monument in Underhill Cemetery. Other sources suggest he was an Englishman born in 1609 in Holland. He "landed in Boston May 18, 1630, from the vessel over which he had command named John and Mary from his father and mother." His son John and wife, Helena (Kruger), a Dutch woman, came with him. He was banished from the Puritan Colony in 1638 and moved to New Hampshire where he was made governor for a short time. From there he went to Stamford, Connecticut, and by 1644 he was in Southold, Long Island, New York. Helena died there in 1658 and soon after, John sold his property to Thomas Moore and moved to Oyster Bay, Long Island. He was made High Sheriff of the North Riding on Long Island in 1665. He purchased land from the Matinecock Indians in 1667. The Underhill Cemetery was made on his property.

He married, second, to Elizabeth Feake (or Feke), daughter of Robert Feake and Elizabeth Fones. She was born in Watertown, Massachusetts, in 1633 and died in 1674-75. Copies of their children's births are recorded in the Fifteenth Street Meeting House, New York City.

Notable descendants of Capt. John Underhill include Amelia Earhart, Tom Selleck, Johnny Depp, and U.S. Secretary of State, John F. Kerry.