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Benjamin Seaver (1757-1816): A Revolutionary War Soldier and Westminster Yeoman
Birth and Family Background
Benjamin Seaver was born Benjamin Sever on April 21, 1757, in Sudbury, Massachusetts. His parents were Norman Sever and Sarah his wife. We don't have details about his siblings.
Benjamin settled on his father's homestead in Westminster, Massachusetts, in 1787. As the eldest son, he was granted two-thirds of the real property and a double portion of personal property from his father’s estate in 1792.
Military Service
Benjamin Seaver was a Revolutionary War soldier. He served as a Private in Captain Edmund Bemis's company, Colonel Asa Whitcomb's 23rd Regiment, enlisting on May 13, 1775. He was later listed as a Corporal in August 1775 at Camp at Prospect Hill. In 1780, he was a Private in Captain Joseph Fox's Third company, 16th Massachusetts Regiment. He was described at age 23 as 6 feet tall with a light complexion.
Marriage and Children
Benjamin married Martha Whitney on August 19, 1783, in Westminster, Massachusetts.
Together, Benjamin and Martha had ten children, all born in Westminster:
Achsa Whitney Seaver (Born: December 30, 1784)
Abigail Seaver (Born: December 2, 1786)
Job Seaver (Born: May 1, 1789)
Benjamin Seaver (Born: November 15, 1791)
Susanna Whitney Seaver (Born: July 27, 1794)
Martha Seaver (Born: February 10, 1797)
Silas Whitney Seaver (Born: November 24, 1799)
Isaac Seaver (Born: December 20, 1802)
Mary Jane Seaver (Born: March 16, 1806)
Rozilla Seaver (Born: April 14, 1812; Died: September 18, 1825)
Life in Westminster
Benjamin was a yeoman (a property-owning farmer) and acquired substantial land in Westminster, including a total of about 157 acres and 120 perches valued at $1014 in the 1798 Direct Tax list. He bought and sold several parcels of land between 1793 and 1815. His family was enumerated in the Westminster U.S. Census records in 1790, 1800, and 1810.
Death and Estate
Benjamin Seaver died in Westminster, Massachusetts, on June 24, 1816, at age 59. His tombstone, located in Plot 641 of Woodside Cemetery in Westminster, states he died on June 20, 1816. His widow, Martha, was appointed administratrix of his estate on July 16, 1816. The inventory of his real estate, appraised at $4,626, included the Home farm (194 acres, 38 rods), the Stearns farm, the Willington pasture, a Hubbardston lot, and a Pew in the meeting house. The estate was later partitioned among Martha and the children.
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That whole process took about one minute to go from having the genealogical sketch PDF to the completed biography.
Google Gemini 2.5 Flash will bold each assertion and add a source indicator for each assertion it can find in the PDF. I asked it to not include the source indicators.
Asking for 1,000 words, or 2,000, or even more would take a bit longer, but would have more detail. Most of my recent biographies created by AI withy the prompt run about 2,000 words, unless there is a lot of family story information when it would be more.
If you read my genealogical sketch, you would see that it is semi-classical technical writing, not engaging writing that my brothers, cousins or descendants would care to read.
The genealogical sketch does not have some information that I should add to the sketch - such as the maiden name of his mother, his siblings names, his wife's parents and birth to death dates and places, his children's death years, their spouse's names/birth/death years and marriage information, etc.
The LLMs are very good at making readable biographies from sketches or notes or timelines or an AMT Fact page.
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