Lady Rebecca Staunton Gooch
(1685-1775)
BIRTH
1685
PLACE
Hampton, Middlesex, England
DEATH
April 1775
PLACE
England
FAMILY
FATHER
William Stanton
(fl. 17th century)
HUSBAND
Sir William Gooch
(1681-1751)
HOMES
RELIGIOUS VIEWS
RELIGION NOT DOCUMENTED
DENOMINATION NOT DOCUMENTED
MEMBERSHIPS
AWARDS
Rebecca Staunton, also spelled Stanton, married William Gooch in 1714 and lived in Williamsburg during his service as Virginia’s lieutenant governor. The city of Staunton was named in her honor. After returning to England, she retained ties to Virginia through family portraits and gifts. Her 1775 will left a Bible and silver communion cup to William and Mary, where her son had studied. Her birth year and precise death month vary in published accounts.
EARLY LIFE
The exact date and place of Rebecca Staunton’s birth have not been established in the source used for this entry. The surviving biographical summary provides only limited evidence about childhood, schooling, and the daily circumstances of the household, so those details are not reconstructed here without documentation. What can be stated securely is that this person belonged to the interconnected family world from which HistoryGPS traces participants, relatives, and later descendants of the Revolutionary generation.
No distinct public profession or office for Rebecca Staunton is established by the source summary used for this entry. The surviving record is primarily genealogical and documents family identity rather than an independent public career. Additional claims about employment, public service, or accomplishments have been omitted where the consulted source did not support them.
CAREER
DEATH
Rebecca Staunton Gooch died in England in 1775 after a long widowhood. She had returned from Virginia with her husband Sir William Gooch in 1749 and remained connected to the colony through gifts and family associations. The existing record gives April 1775, while the consulted biography gives February, so the month should remain in dispute. She was buried in St Andrew's churchyard in Surrey, and her will left a Bible and a silver-gilt cup to Bruton Parish. Those documentary and memorial details do not identify a fatal disease or establish the course of her last illness. Her son's death from bloody flux in Virginia in 1742 was a different event and should not be treated as her cause. The available evidence supports her death in 1775 and English burial, with the exact month, final symptoms, treatment, and last words left qualified or unknown.
POPULAR BIOGRAPHIES
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