Oliver Partridge (1712-1792) was born in Hatfield, Massachusetts, one of three children born to Edward and Martha (Williams) Partridge. He graduated from Yale College in 1730 and became a highly accomplished and respected surveyor. Oliver was a prominent resident who solidified his connection to the influential Williams family when he married Anna Williams of Westfield, Massachusetts, in 1734. The couple would have 13 children. As the town history of Hatfield puts it, "His [Partridge's] alliance with such influential families, in addition to the renown of his grandfather, Col. Samuel Partridge, who took especial interest in him , gave him as a very young man a commanding position." (David White Wells and Reuben Field Wells, A History of Hatfield, Massachusetts 1660-1910 (Springfield, MA: F.C.H. Gibbons, 1910), p. 173.
Partridge held several town offices and attained the rank of colonel in the French and Indian War (1754-1763.) He played an important role in settling the western part of the state, where he owned many acres of real estate in present-day Berkshire County. During the Amertican Revolution, Partridge's Loyalist sentiments were evident but unlike other, more outspoken Tories in town, he successfully weathered the conflict without loss of property or permanent damage to his local reputation. Oliver Partridge died in Hatfield, Massachusetts, in 1792, aged 80.
Colonel Partridge enslaved a man named Calab Sharp (c1729-1799) (also known as Sharp Caleb) who was then briefly enslaved by Colonel William Williams of Deerfield, Massachusetts, before gaining his freedom and settling in a part of Deerfield that later became the town of Conway.
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