WALKER, RICHARD, deputy governor of Nova Scotia or Acadia, under Sir Thomas Temple, in 1670; fl. 1637–80.

He was an early New England settler, and was a member both of the Honourable Artillery Company of London and of the Ancient and Honourable Artillery Company of Boston. He held the rank of ensign when he was surveyor of arms for Saugus in 1637. By 1640 he was a deputy in the General Court of Massachusetts Bay. By 1648 he held the rank of lieutenant and represented Reading in the General Court. By 1652 he had been promoted to captain.

At Boston on 7 July 1670, Sir Thomas Temple wrote a letter to Capt. Richard Walker, then in Nova Scotia, directing him, in accordance with orders from His Majesty dated 8 March 1668/69 and 6 Aug. 1669, to deliver Acadia (“namely the forts and habitations of Pentagouet, St. John [Jemseg], Port Royal, La Have, and Cape Sable”) to Andigné de Grandfontaine. Pursuant to these instructions, Walker handed over Pentagouet on 17 July 1670 to Andigné, Jemseg on 27 August and Port-Royal and Fort La Tour on 2 Sept. 1670 to Joybert de Soulanges.

By 1677 Capt. Richard Walker was living in Lynn, Mass., with his wife Sarah, the widow of Obediah Walker. He represented Lynn in the General Court in 1679–80.

C. Bruce Fergusson

On the surrender of the Acadian forts see: AE, Corr. pol., Angleterre, 91, 93, 94, 96; Mém. et doc., Amérique, 5, ff.2, 6, 7, 277–79. AN, Col., C^11D, 1, ff. 135–36, 139, etc.; Marine, B², 9, 10. “Mass. Archives.”. ...      Charlevoix, History (Shea), III, 138. Collection de manuscrits relatifs à la Nouv.-France, I, 201–2. Mémoires des commissaires, I xxj, 50–51; II, 316–23, 325–26; IV, 304; and Memorials of the English and French commissaries, I, 24–25, 122, 421, 604–13, et passim. PRO, CSP, Col., 1669–74, nos. 32, 95, 384. Records of the Massachusetts Bay (Shurtleff), I; II; IV, pts. I and II; V. Suffolk deeds.. ...      John Farmer, A genealogical register of the first settlers of New-England (Lancaster, Mass., 1829). F. C. Lowell, “Memoir of Francis A. Walker, LL.D.,” Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc., 2d ser., XIII (1900), 303.