Lydia S. Cody's "The Cody Family Massachusetts 1698" lists Joseph 49 as the second child of Philip 18 and Abigail (Emerson). His parents had married at age 25 and 22 in 1754 and lived in the family's Hopkinton home. Philip 18's father, Joseph 3, died in 1756 and his estate was divided between the 6 living children. Philip 18's mother, Mary, lived till November 23, 1782.

In the Hopkinton Vital Records, John 48, born 1755, and Joseph 49, born 1757 are recorded with their surnames spelled as "Coady". Abigail 51, born in 1760 is recorded under "Cody".

About that time Joseph 49's elderly grandfather, James Emerson (Jr.), was failing so Philip 18 and Abigail moved their family 12 miles south to her father's farm on Emerson Brook in Uxbridge to care for him.

There Joseph 49's younger brother, James 51 was born in 1763 as Philip 18 and Abigail's fourth child.

After James Emerson (Jr.)'s demise and feeling his nieces berift, Uncle John Emerson prevailed upon the survivors to settle the estate with a covenant and cash money. Abigail finally got her inheritance and Joseph 49's parents moved 18 miles west to Dudley where sister Jerusha 52 was born in 1766.

Family tradition recalls that in 1765, at age 9 going on 10, Joseph 49 was apprenticed to a blacksmith back in Hopkinton where he served out the usual term. There he could be schooled in the family hometown and meet people. As Joseph 49 turned 16 in '73, his apprenticeship concluded and he rejoined his pioneering family. The revolutionary fervor was strong in the neighborhood and after the Tea Party in December, everybody knew there would be trouble.

On April 19, 1775 violence erupted at Lexington and Concord and the news spread like wildfire. Captain Nathaniel Healey summoned his Dudley Minutemen, and 18-year old Private Joseph 49 marched the 60 miles from Dudley to muster with Colonel Ebenezer Learned's 4th Regiment at Cambridge on the 23rd.

Learned's, Warren's and Prescott's Regiments were assigned to the Roxbury Camp under General Thomas, to man the lines at Boston Neck. The Massachusetts Provincial Militia controlled the countyside, trapping the British at the end of a penninsula connected by a mile-long strip of sand to the mainland.

Night raiders on both sides battled to a standstill and the Siege endured. General Washington fortified Dorchester Heights, smallpox broke out in Boston and the British evacuated March 17. In April 1776, Washington led his army south to New York, camping one night at Dudley on the way.

Joseph 49 rejoined the 3rd Continental in January, ’78 and served at Monmouth NJ, Providence RI and the Hudson Highlands. Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown in 1781 and the Treaty of Paris brought peace in 1783. Joseph returned home, he had enlisted at 17 and was discharged at 25, after 6 long years of war.

His father, Philip 18 was getting ready to sell his Charlton farm. Some of his relatives had married and moved west to Partridgefield, at the highest point of the road to Albany and the Military Tract of New York.

How Joseph 49 met Sarah Payne is unknown to us. Maybe it was while he was a Continental soldier in the Hudson Highlands. All we know is that they married in New York state where Milla 128 was born in 1786 and Joseph 129 in 1788.

Hearing of cheap land, Joseph 49 and Sarah immigrated to Upper Canada in 1799, settling 28 miles up Yonge Street in the wilderness of King Township. His brothers James 51 and Philip 55, with their wives, had taken parcels nearby. Together, they established their claims by clearing the land, building homes and improving the rutted path. Easy access to markets was crucial to their economic success.

Joseph 49 died at age 53 in 1810 on his farm near Newmarket. The US federal government denied Aaron 131’s application for his father’s military pension. Joseph 49’s wife, Sarah, died March 12, 1842 and was buried next to her husband in the Religious Society of Friends Burying Ground at Newmarket. Imagine, the rebel Minuteman who swore a loyalist's oath to a king, was buried by pacifists in colonial soil!