Notes on Admiralty House by The Bermuda National Trust state that William died childless in 1790. My records indicate the administration of the estate of William Dunscomb in 1813. The following from the Dec. 31, 1808 Bermuda Royal gazette places a death date of about 1808:
Bermuda Royla Gazette, Dec. 31, 1808:
Notice: Wheras the mercantile connexion hitherto exilting and condufted under thr Firm of W and J Dunscomb has expired by the death of Mr. Williaim Dunscomb. The subscriber requests all persons having open accounts wirh saiid firm to furnish the same for adjustment ; and moft earneftly requefts fuch persons as are indebted to make as speedy payment as possible. He notifies such as have demands that he is prepared to liquidate the same. ' John dunscomb December 30 1808.
Register of Rev. John Moore (Bermuda Archives) shows a wedding. Mrs. Hallett cites as: ?1773, March 2, Love Godfrey. I am not sure whether Mrs. Hallett is questioning the date or the marriage.
Posting on Bermuda Gen Forum by Mitchell Hagerstrom Feb 12, 2009:
William Williams of Pembroke, Bermuda was the husband of Sarah Martha Dunscombe (d.1876 Pitts Bay, Bermuda). She was the dau of Edward & Christian Godfrey Dunscombe.
William Williams is mentioned in the wills of Christian Godfrey Dunscombe and William Dunscombe (brother of Edward).
William Dunscombe and Sam Williams were among the "loyal ten" who protested in 1786 the neglect of the investigation into the powder theft. [in 1775 and group of Bermudians stole the island's powder and gave it to the American rebels] The committe investigating this theft (in 1786) were told by Ben Williams (related?)who was a justice of Devonshire that his wife's father, Joseph Jennings, had been asked by one of the suspected powder theives (James Tucker) to borrow a boat to aid in the robbery.
Info in the above paragraph is from Bermuda and the American Revolution: 1760-1783 by Wilfred Benton Kerr (pub.1960).
William was a mariner. In 1773 he owned a ship, the 50-ton Francis (Bernhard, Virginia. Slaves and slaveholders in Bermuda. Columbia : Univ. of Missouri Press, c1999, pg. 267].
The book "Slaves and slaveholders in Bermuda 1616-1782 by Virginia Bernhard (c1999, Uinversity of Missouri Press) makes numerous references to the Dunscomb family, including Edward and his brother William (note I disagree with the author's assertion that Edward and William were sons of Thomas Dunscomb and Prudence. I corresponded with her in 2009 and she seems to base this opinion on the fact that Edward and William were brothers (1790 will of Edward Dunscomb), that they shared a pew at St. John's Church and lived on the same Pembroke property in 1789, and that Thomas and Prudence had a child named William. However I find no record they also had a son named Edward; whereas the 1733 will of another Edward Dunscomb notes surviving sons Edward and William):
pg. 242 in discussing seating assignments at St. John's Church, Pembroke: "A surviving record of the pews for 1781 lists the following names, which include the parish's most prominent men: Cornelius Hinson, Samuel Saltus, Joseph Wood, John Blackbourn, Nicholas Albouy, Nathaniel Numan, William Leaycraft, William Dunscomb, Edward Dunscomb, Peter Godfrey, Horace Wood, George Darrell, Benjamin Pitt, David Eve, Joseph Stowe, Henry Butterfield, John Beck, Benjamin Dunscomb, William Morris, John Wainwright, and Thomas Whitney."
pg. 245 discussing the 1773 Pembroke Parish census: "... there were four Dunscombs, including Edward, the owner of the 60-ton sloop Peggy, and William, who owned the 50-ton Jean."
pg. 267: "The Dunscomb family, whose matriarch, Hannah Dunscomb, had owned 50 acres in 1663, by 1773 had only two acres - but they owned two ships: Edward Dunscombe had the 60-ton Peggy, the largest of Pembroke's 11 vessels; his brother William owned one of the next largest, the 50-ton Francis. The Dunscomb brothers both married into the family of Pembroke shipwright Peter Godfrey, who lived near the Dunscombs at Spanish Point. Edward Married Christiana Godfrey in 1768; William married Love Godfrey in 1773. Christiana and Love Godfrey were sisters of John Blackbourne's wife, Susanna. Edward and William were the sons of Thomas Dunscomb and Prudence Waterman, whose 1717 marriage had united two longtime Pembroke landowning families. Both Dunscomb brothers made their living from the sea, and both kept what was, by Bermuda standards, a substantial number of slaves. Edward was listed in 1773 as having 10 slaves: three men, three women, two girls, and two boys - presumably three family groups. The three men, plus one white sailor, were crew members of the Peggy. William Dunscomb had eight slaves - three men, two women, a boy, and two girls. No doubt William, as owner of the Francis, also had sailors, but that part of his listing in the survey is damaged and unreadable.
Besides the Dunscombs, Stowes, and Woods, all of whom lived within a half-mile radius of each other at the west end of the parish..." (Note the Bermuda National Trust article on the Admiralty House (see notes under John Dunscomb (1777-1847) state Edward Dunscomb's 1733 will states he has seven acres, and that in 1815 John Dunscomb has nine acres).
Composite volume of Deeds, etc., Vols. 14, p. 220 lists a William Dunscomb, March 5, 1771, master of sloop "William," en route from Port Royal, South Carolina, for Barbados, protests registered at Bermuda.