Exceprt from Paul Prindle’s genealogy down for Elizabeth Barrett Gillespie, pages 496-498:

"In his Ye Historie of Ye Town of Greenwich, Spencer P. Mead states that John Waterbury married Rose Lockwood. He makes the assertion without adducing any evidence whatever, a failing for which he had, regrettably, a well deserved reputation. "Library genealogists" have adopted this asserted identification as fact and many have convinced themselves that Rose was a daughter of Edmund Lockwood. This compiler believes that Rose was not a Lockwood, but was, perhaps, a daughter of Gregory and Achsa Taylor, for reasons given below.

The minutes of the Court of Magistrates sitting 21 October 1657 in New Haven contain this paragraph (Records of the Colony or Jurisdiction of New Haven, 1653-1665: 229, by Charles J. Hoadly):

"John Waterberey of Stamford desired advice of the court; his father in law and mother are both lately dead at Stamford, and hath left some small estate w'ch they gave to him, as himselfe and his wife can testifye…"

Edmund Lockwood was not "lately dead at Stamford." He died at Cambridge, Massachusetts Bay Colony, 3 March 1634/5, so could not have been the father-in-law referred to. As to Robert Lockwood, he died intestate at Fairfield in 1658, so both were living when John Waterbury requested advice by the New Haven courts and could not have been his parents-in-law. It should also be noted that both Edmund and Robert left children who survived well beyond 1657, so there could have been no question as to who were entitled to their estates.

An inventory of the estate of Gregory Taylor of Stamford was taken 1 October 1657? by Richard Law and Francis Bell, who appraised the estate at the value of £48:14:06. On 14 June 1662 they testified in court (Fairfield Probate Records, 2:37): "that thes goods above written were presented to them and acknowledged by John Waterberry and his wife to be the estate which the foresaid deceased Gregorye Taylor had in possession and left at the time of his Death; but the s'd Waterberry would not acknowledg that this was all, nor would he and his wife attest it upon oath to be a true Inventory of the whole estate . Whereas ther is an Inventory of Gregory Taylors amounting to 92 pounds 12 s. 6d. is [sic] Included in the above said Inventory, yf ther apears a better proprietor to the estate (within a year and a day after this date) then Waterberry, deceased, Then the above Said widdow [Mrs. Waterbury] and Children to abate, each of them, proportionable out of ther portions the Said 92 pound 12 s. 6d ...."

Gregory Taylor died at Stamford 24 September 1657 (Stamford Town Records, 1 :20), his wife, "Goodwif Taylor," having died a month earlier on 18 August 1657 (ibid., 1: 19). Little is found concerning Gregory. Savage, in 4:260, calls him an original proprietor of Watertown, 1634 and constable, 1642. He and his wife, Achsa, had a son Samuel, born in April 1632, who soon died, and perhaps another son, Seabred Taylor.

The reluctance of the court to give John Waterbury unqualified title to the Taylor estate possibly reflects a doubt as to whether Gregory had other children who might present claims to the estate. If Rose Waterbury was a daughter of Gregory and Achsa Taylor, no one could have shown "a better tytle" to his estate than she or her husband, John. Since the court left open the possibility of the appearance of "a better proprietor of the estate than Waterberry," and since the court appears to have provided that, in the event of such an appearance, John Waterbury's heirs were to "abate" the entire amount of Taylor's estate, without retention of Rose's portion, there must remain some doubt of her being Gregory's daughter. She is therefore shown herein as "Rose (Taylor?)." She was surely not Rose Lockwood. Since John testified on 21 October 1657 that "his father in law and mother are both dead lately at Stamford," and since both Gregory Taylor and his wife had died at Stamford within the prior two months, there seems to be a strong possibility they were Rose's parents, or perhaps Rose was their adopted daughter."