What is the Bunker Family Association’s ID numbering system?

As a surname society, the BFA was organized to compile and preserve the Bunker lineage, back in 1913. Originally, membership was open only to descendants from the three main branches from Charlestown (Bunker Hill), Nantucket and Dover, New Hampshire. The bylaws were changed several times, the latest opens membership to all Bunker, or anyone related to a Bunker. Several members trace their connection back over 8-10 generations before they find an ancestor named “Bunker,” so just about everybody is eligible.

However, we still remain a surname society and our primary function is to record Bunkers. The numbering system set up ages ago, reflects this ideal. As there were three main Bunkers who came to the colonies in the mid-1600s, the organizers of the BFA assumed all Bunker were related to them, thus the first George of Nantucket became N1; the first George of Charlestown became C1 and James of Dover became D1. All the children, grandchildren, great grandchildren etc, were numbered in the order of their birth. All children received their father’s ID # plus their birth order number. Thus D1-III is the third child of D1. If and when a son married and had children he would receive a new number, different than his father’s. When a daughter married, she still carried her father’s # and her spousal information was added to the file. We did not record the children of these marriages, because we would then stop being a surname society. In certain instances female Bunkers were given separate #s, i.e. one married, had children, then divorced, and reverted back to her maiden name of Bunker, legally changing her and the children’s names. Adoptions and some intermarriages of cousins necessitated different #s for clarity. Today we have many Bunkers not directly descended from these main branches and these have U or unconnected #s.

If you receive a number and it is your great great-grandmother’s #, it is because she is your closet ancestor with the Bunker name. Example: your gr gr grandmother Bunker marries Smith. She would retain her father’s ID# plus her birth order #, thus if you are descended from Smith, your # is identical to your great great-grandmother.

A few years ago, our historian thought it would be nice to add the lineage of all the female Bunkers, however that task remains beyond the scope of a surname society function. We are collecting information on the female Bunkers, making footnotes of the files and storing the hardcopies for future researchers reference material.

This page was intended to solve the puzzle of the BFA numbering system. If you have questions, please contact the BFA President, Gil Bunker.

Bunker Hill was the site of the first of the famous battles of the Revolutionary War. No history of the Bunker family would be complete without mention of this battle, which occurred on June 17, 1775. This battle was a great significance to the American colonists but also recorded the Bunker name for posterity all over the eastern part of the country.

To the best of our current knowledge, no Bunker took part in the battle on either side, but there were no formal American regiments and no rosters of soldiers, only scattered records pieced together from individual sources. In any event, George Bunker gave the hill its name, as he and his descendants owned its land many years before the battle. A 1931 typed volume of Bunker genealogy states: “The land assigned to George Bunker extended from Main Street in the south, over the hill back of it to the north to Mystic River. One lost (pasture land) ran over the summit of Bunker Hill, and hence this name, given by early and common consent to two connected ridges of elevated ground in the peninsula.”

George and his descendants had left Charlestown several years before the battle. The American colonists originally expected to fortify Bunker Hill and actually started work, when it was decided to move forward and down to Breed’s Hill. There were 11 English light infantry companies in the attacking army. During the battle the city of Charlestown was destroyed by cannon fire from British war ships supporting their troops.

Bunker Hill Flag

According to Henry Bunker III, at least two versions of the flag used by the American patriots in the battle of Bunker Hill are depicted in paintings made long after the battle. Henry Bunker’s conclusion was that possibly both were actually used. One version, used in New England before 1737, had a blue field with a white union quartered by a red cross. This flag, with the addition of a green pine tree in the upper inner quarter of the union, was carried at the battle of Bunker Hill as depicted in early paintings. More recent flag research states the flag was red, with the New Englander’s pine tree on a white cannon. The cross of St. George in use on earlier New England flags was omitted as Americans took up arms against the British (see Bunker Family History, p. 99}.

Bunker Hill Monument

The Bunker Hill monument on Breed’s Hill is still an important part of the Boston skyline. The Marquis de Lafayette laid the cornerstone in 1825 for the 220-foot tall structure of granite, quarried at Quincy, Massachusetts. The dressed stones were transported on our country’s first railroad, constructed specifically for that purpose, from the quarry to barges on the Neponset River for transfer to Charlestown.

The above information is summarized from Henry L. Bunker III’s 1984 Bunker Family History, pp. 69-70, 72, and 99-100.