Mrs. Rhoda Taylor, was a widow when she married John Taylor. They settled at Windsor, Connecticut, in 1639, and had five children but three died, leaving John and Thomas as the surviving members of the family. In 1646 their father sailed for England, leaving the family at Windsor, but the vessel was lost at sea. The legend concerning this lost ship was afterward put in poetic form by Henry W. Longfellow under the title The Phantom Ship. The widow and her two sons, John and Thomas, aged six and four years at the time of the father's death, continued in Windsor for some time, but in 1655 Mrs. Taylor became the wife of Mr. Hoyt and removed to Norwalk, Connecticut. When Thomas Taylor was fourteen years of age the town of Norwalk granted him land as "one of the children of the town." He was married February 14, 1668, to Rebecca, a daughter of Edward Ketchum, of Stratford, and on the 14th of October, 1669, his name was presented as one who desired to be made a "freeman." In the same year he was made a member of the general court from Norwalk. In 1685 he became one of the first eight settlers of Danbury, Connecticut, and was chosen ensign of the military company. He was also the first representative to the general court from Danbury, serving in 1697, 1701 and 1706. He died January 17, 1735, aged ninety-two years.
His fifth son, Nathan Taylor, was born at Norwalk, February 7, 1682, and in 1706 married Hannah, a daughter of Lieutenant Daniel and Mary Benedict. He enlisted in Colonel Waterbury's regiment and served in the Revolutionary war as sergeant from May until October, 1775. He died in 1781, at the age of ninety-nine years, leaving four sons. He had acted as color bearer in the Revolutionary war at the remarkable age of eighty-nine years and nine months, while his grandson John Taylor, who was born at Danbury, Connecticut, June 12, 1754, marched by his side carrying a musket. Nathan Taylor received an honorable discharge at the expiration of his term of enlistment. He preached his farewell sermon as a minister of the Congregational church when ninety-six years of age and died in Connecticut at the notable old age of ninety-nine years. The family is noted for longevity. In 1755 Thomas Taylor, the great-great-grandfather of Charles Taylor of this review, was killed at Lake George, New York, while fighting for the British in the French and Indian war. Various ancestors of Charles E. Taylor bore arms in the different wars in which the country has been engaged. His grandfather, Abraham Taylor, served in the Revolution under command of Captain Camp and Colonel Canfield. The great-grandfather, Lieutenant Perrin Ross, was one of the heroes in the war for independence and was killed in the Wyoming massacre. Another great-grandfather, Brigadier General Samuel Fletcher, of Vermont, was in the Revolution and still another, Elinas Brister, who served as a private. In another ancestral line is found the record of Ithel Stone, of Hartford, Connecticut, who was a great-great-grandfather of Charles E. Taylor and served as a colonel in the Revolutionary war.