Daughter of Robert Mullett and Elizabeth Gibbons Mullett, from Milton Abbas, England (see contra in note below)*

Wife of John Farrar (1793-1874)

Children included:
Francis Mullett Farrar
Chilion Cushman Mullett Farrar of Buffalo, NY
Huldah Mullett Farrer, wife of Jerome B. Starring of Detroit, MI
Harriet Mullett Farrar of Detroit
John Perry Farrar of Chicago, IL

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JOHN FARRAR, of Detroit, traced the family ancestry to John Farrar, of Lancashire. England, who, with his younger brother Jacob, settled at and were among the first proprietors of Lancaster, Massachusetts, which town was incorporated on May 18, 1653. On the twenty-fourth of September, 1653, they were leaders and signers of what was called "a covenant for the better preserving of the purity of religion and themselves from the infection of error, and for the exclusion of excommunicants or otherwise profane and scandalous persons, or anyone notoriously erring against the doctrine and discipline of the churches and the State ar)d the government of the commonwealth." During King Phillip's War, on February 10, 1675, the town was nearly destroyed by the Indians and several of the family were killed by them. The Farrars of Lancashire, England, are descended from the Farrars or Farrers of Eawood Hall, Halifax, Lords of the Manor Wortley, in Yorkshire, of which family the head in 1863 was James Farrar, of Ingleborough County, York, Deputy Lieutenant for West Riders and County Durham, and formerly Member of Parliament of South Durham. From this Yorkshire family came Robert Farrar or Farrers, Bishop of St. David and Canon of St. Mary's, who was martyred in the reign of Queen Mary. They were descended from Henry de Ferrers, son of Walchelin de Ferriers, who was a Norman Knight, and a conspicuous leader in the army of William the Conqueror in 1066; his name is on the roll of Battle Abbey and in the Doomsday book. The Lordship of Etingdon was given him in Normandy after the conquest. He was created Lord of Tutbury, County of Stafford, and his son Robert, Earl of Derby, by King William.

The family originally took its name from Ferriers, a town in the Gastenois, France, celebrated for its iron mines. Arms, crests and mottoes are numerous in the early history of the family. The descendants of John and Jacob Farrar have been in all the wars incident to the United States; have served as judges and filled various professorships at Dartmouth, Andover and Cambridge.

John Farrar, of Lancaster, Massachusetts, died November 3, 1669. His son John was born in England between 1640 and 1650 and had a son John who was born about 1670, who left a son also named John, born about 1700. He married Anna Chandler. In 1758 he joined the British Army under General Braddock and is supposed to have been killed at the taking of Quebec in 1759. His son John, born about 1732, married Anna Whitney; he was in the War of 1776. His son, Captain Asa Farrar of Rush, now Avon, New York, formerly of Lancaster, Worcester County, Massachusetts, was born in Northfield, Massachusetts, June 16, 1760, died at Avon, January 18, 1829. He married Dorinda Pearsons, a relative of Rev. Abram Pearsons, first President of Yale College. In May, 1777, at the age of seventeen, he joined the Continental Army and was three years in Captain Hodskin's company, under Colonel Timothy Bigelow, and three years in Colonel Crane's regiment of Massachusetts Artillery, and for his services received a pension.

His son, John Farrar, of Detroit, was born June 27th, 1793, in Rutland, Massachusetts, but spent his childhood with his parents on their farm at Rush, New York. His education, which included private instruction in surveying and architecture, was completed at Canandaigua, New York. On July 1, 1812, when nineteen years old, he entered the American Army and served in Captain James McNair's company of Colonel Philetus Swift's regiment of volunteers. He was stationed at Black Rock, on the Niagara frontier, most of the time during the summer and autumn of that year. On the sixteenth of October, the sailors, under the command of Lieutenant Elliott, boarded and cut loose the brig " Adams " and the schooner "Caledonia," then lying at anchor at Fort Erie, to send them over Niagara Falls. The "Adams" grounded on Squaw Island and was burned and the " Caledonia" landed off Long Battery. In this affair John Farrar took a prominent part. While serving under General Scott he participated in and was wounded at the battle of Lundy's Lane and at the close of the campaign was among the troops left to guard the Niagara frontier and remained there through the winter of 1813. For these services he received a pension and a grant of land.

On June 15, 1815, at Canandaigua, New York, he became a member of the Masonic body. In the two following years, business called him to Canada, where he gained many friends through his connection with that society. He received the degree of Master Mason on November 6, 1820, at Ontario Lodge, No. 23. He subsequently became a member of Zion Lodge, No. 1, at Detroit; filled all the offices and was one of the founders of Detroit Lodge, No. 2. The petition for the charter of this last Lodge was signed by John Farrar, Levi Cook, John Mullett, Marshall Chapin, Jeremiah Moors, Charles Jackson and three others. During the anti-Masonic excitement their lodge meetings were discontinued, but after a lull of fourteen years they aided in re-establishing Masonry and administered the Royal Arch degree from memory, each one recalling a part of the ceremony. John Farrar was High Priest of Monroe Chapter in 1825-26, a Knight Templar and a member of Monroe Council, R. A. S. M., and various other bodies of the order and Senior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of Michigan. At the time of his death he was one of the oldest members in the United States, and a year before was received with honors-at the Grand Chapter.

He arrived at Detroit, May 22, 1817, and became a useful citizen and merchant. During territorial times he was an intimate friend of General Cass and was chosen by him to represent the territory in the erection of the Court House or Capitol, which duties he performed from October 1, 1826, to July 1, 1827. Prior to this he had given most of his time to building and surveying and was frequently called upon to pass judgment on structures for the city, territory or State. He was alderman at large in 1828, '31 and '36, assessor and collector of the Second Ward in 1843-44; was collector in 1832, '38 and '48. He was one of the first projectors of the Detroit Mechanics' Society and was their bondsman for the construction of their first building on Griswold Street. He was President and Secretary of that society in 1836, and 1841 to 1853, and from 1854 to 1860, and librarian for the thirty years preceding his death. He favored education; was one of the committee who selected the University grounds at Ann Arbor, and in 1834 was one of the committee that established the first district school in Detroit; it was conducted by Charles Wells in the old academy on Bates Street. He was commiss1oned to the second lieutenancy in the militia by acting Governor Stephen T. Mason, on May 23, 1832, and was first lieutenant in Captain Charles Jackson's Dragoons in the Black Hawk War of 1832, under General John R. Williams, and one of the escort that accompanied Colonel Edward Brook, Major Charles W. Whipple and Major M. Wilson, to Chicago, to assist in the protection of that town from the Indians. The command escaped conflict but were voted thanks by the corporation of Chicago for the prompt response to their call for help. They remained some weeks awaiting developments of the war, and during the time made a reconnaissance of Napier settlement, a point then threatened by the Indians. After the capture of Black Hawk they returned. For his services in this war, Mr. Farrar received a grant of land.

After his return he purchased a building on the corner of Bates and Atwater Streets, the last named street then being the chief business thoroughfare, and in 1836 opened a general store with dry goods, hardware and groceries, doing what was then considered a thriving business. At the great fire of April 27, 1837, the store and all its contents were burned.

Mr. Farrar was brought up a rigid Puritan but became a more liberal thinker and in 1831, with two others, purchased the First Presbyterian Church and removed it to the corner of Bates Street and Michigan Grand Avenue, with the expectation of its being used as a Universalist Church, but the project failed and the building was sold to and occupied by the Trinity Catholic Church. He was thoughtful of the needs of others, a liberal giver to charities and a great entertainer, and many families emigrating to Western homes found an asylum with him. His homestead was at the corner of Bates and Farrar Streets, which latter street perpetuates his name.

He had a very retentive memory, possessed a fund of information on matters connected with the military and political history of the United States, and took great delight in relating incidents connected with his personal and ancestral history, to relatives and intimate friends. He was naturally of a retiring disposition and although importuned to become a candidate for prominent positions, he steadfastly refused, yet he filled several municipal offices with honor and trust and with a zeal that was eminently characteristic. He was a Whig in politics and when that party ceased, became a Republican.

He married his first wife, Mrs. Hannah Mack, on March 27, 1822. She died at Avon, New York, November 6, 1824. They had one daughter, Delecta Ann, who married Rev. Jackson Stebbins, of Iowa On May 29, 1825. He married Anna Mullett, of Darien Centre, New York. She was born at Halifax, Vermont, September 4, 1792, and died at Detroit, July 18,1872. She was a sister of the late James Mullett of Fredonia, and Buffalo, New York, and of John Mullett, one of the pioneers of Detroit, from whom the Mullett farm and street take their names. Their parents, Robert and Elizabeth Gibbons Mullett were from Milton Abbas, England, and descendants of William Malet de Graville, whose name appears on the roll of Battle Abbey.

John Farrar died at Detroit, January 14, 1874, aged 80 years. He was buried in Elmwood Cemetery with Masonic honors. The children of John and Anna Farrar were Francis Mullett Farrar and Chileon Cushman Mullett Farrar, of Buffalo, New York; Huldah Mullett Farrar, wife of Jerome B. Starring, of Detroit; Harriet Mullett Farrar, of Detroit, and John Perry Farrar, of Chicago, 111.

Excerpt, History of Detroit and Wayne County and Early Michigan, by Silas Farmer, Township and Biographical Edition, Silas Farmer & Co., publisher, Detroit, Michigan, 1890, pp 1141-1143

*An unidentified visitor states that the parents noted above for Anna Farra were, in fact, her grandparents. The visitor identified her parents as James Mullett (1752-1829) and Sylvina Perry (1765-1851).