The plaque on the stone in Hampton's
Founder's Park commemorating the
founding of the town in 1638.

The Reverend Stephen Bachiler founded the town of Hampton in 1638-9 at the age of about 77 years. He probably died in London in 1656 (not in Hackney in 1660 as is so often reported). Although his origins in England are unknown, he led a long and colorful life. Much has been written about him, a lot of which is untrue or inaccurate. Several short biographies of him can be found on this website through the links below. For the latest up-to-date and authoritative information, read the section on him in "The Great Migration Begins : immigrants to New England, 1620-1633" by Robert Charles Anderson and published by the New England Historic Genealogical Society in Boston in 1995. All references that may be found in various places on the Internet to his "father" Philip Bachiler are incorrect and should be ignored or, preferably, corrected. Much research has been done to search for his parentage in England, but to date there has been no success.

• Stephen Bachiler entry from the book "Piscataqua Pioneers : Selected Biographies of Early Settlers in Northern New England" published in 2000 by the Piscataqua Pioneers organization of the Seacoast.
• "Our Fascinating Ancestor Stephen Bachiler" by Eleanor Campbell Schoen, 1999.
• "Reverend Stephen Bachiler of Hampton: Some Additional Information", by George Freeman Sanborn, Jr., 1991.
• "The Reverend Stephen Bachiler - Saint or Sinner?", by Philip Mason Marston, 1961.
• "An Unforgiven Puritan", by Victor C. Sanborn, 1917.
• "The Hard Case of the Founder of Old Hampton : Wrongs of Rev. Stephen Bachiler", by Frank B. Sanborn, 1900.
• "Rev. Stephen Bachiler", an earlier article by Victor C. Sanborn, 1898.
• Rev. Stephen Bachiler by Charles E. Batchelder, 1892.
• "Father and Founder of the Town", from Joseph Dow's History of Hampton, 1892.
• The Dalton and Batcheller Pedigree, by William H. Whitmroe, 1863.
• Excerpts on the Rev. Stephen Bachiler from the History of Lynn by Alonzo Lewis, 1829.
• Stephen Bachiler's Coat of Arms
• A Red-hot 'A' and a Lusting Divine: Sources For The Scarlet Letter, New England Quarterly article from 1987 which examines the possibility that Bachiler's fourth wife was the inspiration for Hester Prynne in Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter.
• Batchelder genealogy titles at Lane Library by Pierce, Batchelder, and Greene.

  One of these titles (Batchelder, Charles H. Batchelder/Bachilder genealogy through Rev. Stephen Bachiler's son Stephen Bachilder : (A correction of the work on this family by Pierce) [manuscript] / Compiled by Charles Batchelder through 1936 ; edited and prepared by Carl W. Brage, 1985) is available online on the library's website.

• The Sanborn Genealogy by V.C. Sanborn has a long section on Rev. Bachiler.
• Locate other Batchelder researchers and post queries on the Internet message boards at Rootsweb and Genforum
• Also be sure to check our genealogy section for genealogical data on the Rev. Bachiler and his descendants.
• Click below for a new short biography of Stephen Bachiler by Mark Bailey, referencing his early life in England and explusion to the colonies.