John Oxenbridge

son of Dan. Oxenb. sometimes Doct. of Phys. of Ch. Ch. in this University, and a Practitioner of his faculty at Daventrey commonly called Daintrey in Northamptonshire, (and afterwards in London) was born in that County, became a Communer of Linc. Coll. in 1623 aged 18 years, and thence translating himself to Magd. Hall, took the degrees in Arts, and soon after became a Tutor there: but being found guilty of a strange singular and superstitious way of dealing with his Scholars by perswading and causing some of them to subscribe, as Votaries, to several articles framed by himself, as, he pretended, for their better government, as if the Statutes of the place wherein he lived, and the authority of the then present government, were not sufficient, he was distutor’d ((*))((*)) Gesta cancellariatus Un. Ox. Gul. Laud, p. 76. in the month of May 1634. Afterward he left the Hall, and shewing himself very scismatical abroad, was forced to leave the Nation: whereupon he, with his beloved Wife called Jane Butler, went to the Islands of Bermudas, where he exercised his Ministry. At length the Long Parliament making mad work in England in 1641. &c. he, (as other Schismaticks did) returned, preached very enthusiastically in severally places in his travels to and fro, while his dear Wife preached in the house among her Gossips and others. So that he being looked upon as a zealous and forward brother for the cause, he had some spirituality bestowed on him, and at length was made Fellow of Eaton Coll. near Windsore, in the place of one Simonds deceased, who had been thrust into the place of Dr. David Stokes, in the time of the rebellion. Upon his Majesties restauration, Oxenbridge was outed of his Fellowship, and afterwards retiring to Berwick upon Twede, he held forth there till the Act of conformity silenced him an. 1662. Afterwards he went to the West Indies and continued there at Syrenham for a time in preaching and praying. At length, having received a call, he went to New England, where he finished his course. This Person was composed of a strange hodg-podg of opinions, not easily to be described, was of a roving and rambling head, spent much, and I think died but in a mean condition. And tho he was a great pretender to Saintship, and had vowed an eternal love to his Wife before mention’d, who died 22. Apr. 1655, yet before he had remained a Widower an year, he married a religious Virgin named Frances, the only Daughter of Hezekiah Woodward the scismatical Vicar of Bray near Windsore, who dying also in the first year of her Marriage (in Childbed I think) aged 25 years, he took soon after, as I have been told, a third Wife, according to the fleshly custom of the Saints of that time. He hath written,

A double Watchword: or, the duty of watching, and watching to duty; both echoed from Revel. 16.5. and Jer. 50.4.5. Lond. 1661. oct. and perhaps other things. He died at Boston in New England in sixteen hundred seventy and four, and was buried there.1674. In the Church or Chappel belonging to Eaton Coll. was a monument with a large canting inscription set up by this D. Oxenbridge for his first Wife Jane Butler, wherein ’tis said that while he preached abroad she would preach and hold forth in the House. But the said inscript. or Epitaph giving great offence to the Royallists at the restauration of K. Ch. 2, they caused it to be daub’d or covered over with paint. There was also a Monument and Inscription set up for his second Wife, the contents of which and the other I have, but this last is not defaced.