View Full Version : Back before the Civil War
Sorry, but I just need to celebrate this.
I've known for years that Alice Wansborough married William Rowden in1683, and that she was a spinster aged 30:
https://www.findmypast.co.uk/transcript?id=GBPRS%2FM%2F98052318%2F3
She is daughter of Thomas, proved by his will:
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/61333/images/47285_1831109331_15573-00001?treeid=&personid=&hintid=&queryId=baebd546aa58086f462086bcca051683&usePUB=true&_phsrc=Leb22819&_phstart=successSource&usePUBJs=true&pId=85076
Thomas was the son of William:
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/61187/images/45582_263021009500_1853-00018?treeid=&personid=&hintid=&queryId=3d952628f901c069f3adec2dec35dcf2&usePUB=true&_phsrc=Leb22818&_phstart=successSource&usePUBJs=true&_ga=2.80189207.1652351787.1600465796-1518776162.1531920438&pId=1261432
and William was born in 1574, son of John. I know this because he was known as William the elder and his kinsman William married Joan Hooper and was the son of yet another William (deceased):
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageviewer/collections/61187/images/45582_263021009500_1853-00038?treeid=&personid=&rc=&usePUB=true&_phsrc=Leb22832&_phstart=successSource&pId=902831581
Olde Crone
13-10-20, 20:43
Isn't it a fantastic feeling? I've been very lucky with one branch and have almost more information before the civil wr than I do afterwards, thanks largely to wills, marriage settlements and land transactions. I don't have bmds of course, but the family construction is there in all the documents.
OC
ElizabethHerts
13-10-20, 20:51
Phoenix, it's so satisfying, isn't it?
I have several branches of my Cornish ancestors back into the late 1500s and also with my Sussex ancestors. My Lincolnshire Wood family also go back to the 1500s. I have been very lucky with wills etc for these families. My Jeffcoat Quaker family we can trace back to the 1500s in Warwickshire.
It's totally amazing, OC. I have a few lines I have taken back, but not for years, and now here's a vicar who tells you the parents of the bride and groom, birthdates of the children and whether they are the first, second, third or fourth sons.
Usually, my ancestors sneer at me from the 1620s, secure in the knowledge that that generation loss of records mean I can never prove the link.
My latin isn't up to this, but he's giving the ages of old men dying. I puzzled that he only baptised one twin, but he buried both, giving full entries even for the babies who had no christian name.
Amazing!
Maybe you should be researching the vicar too, for being so helpful!
Thomas Crockford. He died in 1634, and the registers changed immediately to English and the barest of facts.
Oh, I see there are books about him!
Thank you, Merry! I've just written to the Wiltshire Record Society. (If I can buy direct from them, rather than through Amazon, I'd prefer it!)
ElizabethHerts
14-10-20, 09:39
It sounds exciting, Phoenix!
(If I can buy direct from them, rather than through Amazon, I'd prefer it!)
Excellent!
Pinefamily
14-10-20, 10:41
Congratulations, Phoenix. I agree that wills are probably the most helpful in these earlier times.
It's a pity we don't have wills for those Smyth's in Great Torrington.
Hi Pinefamily
It's a bummer that Devon wills went up in smoke in WW2, but there is a book listing lots of Smyth wills in abstracts:
Somerset Wills extracted by A.J. Monday and edited by Mary Siraut at The Family History Library, Salt Lake City. Part of the Somerset Record Society Series Call Number British 942.38 B4s Volume 89
The National Archives in England has a copy. I daresay you could either obtain a second hand copy or (when we can access such things) Australian research libraries may have copies.
ElizabethHerts
14-10-20, 12:25
Phoenix, I've always wondered - are there any abstracts of Devon wills, and, if so, where?
My ancestors from Gerrans in the beautiful Roseland Peninsula had a couple of wills proved at Exeter.
There are a surprising number of survivals, even though probably 95% or more are lost.
They are in a huge variety of places and a wonderful group of volunteers have sought out as many references as they can. Find my Past lists them (but a Genuki update has meant that locating the miscellaneous sources is much more tortuous)
ElizabethHerts
14-10-20, 12:34
I think my Quintrell ancestor listed in 1614 only had an inventory.
First name(s) George
Last name Quintrell
Sex Male
Probate year 1614
Place Gerrans
Original place Gerrans
County Cornwall
Country England
Court (Episcopal) Consistory Court of (The Bishop Of) Exeter
Source (see list) FRYB
Document type Inventory
Document form List Entry
Document references 228 Inv.
Record set Devon Wills Index, 1163-1999
After that they didn't seem to be affluent enough to leave wills until they left Gerrans and moved elsewhere.
ElizabethHerts
14-10-20, 12:36
FRYB Fry, E.A. (ed.) Calendar of Wills and Administrations relating to the counties of Devon and Cornwall, proved in the Consistory Court of the Bishop of Exeter, 1532-1800. British Record Society Index Library Vol 46 (1914) The FRYB Calendar, together with the FRYA and BECK Calendars, having been compiled before World War 2, provide the only overall record of the Exeter and Barnstaple wills that were lost through the destruction of the Exeter Probate Registry in 1942. There are of course no original wills or administrations to make copies of. However, copies of the FRYB Calendar (BRS Vol. 46) are held by a number of major reference libraries and various record offices. The volume is available on the National Wills Index as part of the British Record Society Probate Collection. Provided by Ian Galbraith, of the National Wills Index, and edited by Richard Grylls and Brian Randell
*sighs* I have been excited several times until I realised the wills were merely listed in Fry.
It's worse to know that there were wills, and had my grandfather been interested he might have looked at them. (Though remembering the hoops I had to go through to look at original records in the past, I cannot imagine that many "ordinary" people would have dared to order up old documents)
Pinefamily
15-10-20, 13:26
An amateur genealogist called Moses Taylor Pyne had access to the wills around the beginning of the 20th century for Pyne/Pine research. He turned this research into several books. This all sounds very promising for any Pyne/Pine researcher, such as myself, until you discover he cherrypicked which wills he copied information from.
Double sigh, Phoenix.
Book arrived today!
It is wonderful, with huge amount of detail. Although it is great for my personal family, it also throws fascinating lights on Stuart society.
Thank you so much, Merry. Iwould never have dreamed of finding out so much more.
Pinefamily
03-11-20, 23:42
Phoenix, I have found a copy of Monday's and Siraut's Somerset Wills. Ordered and paid for, now just have to wait for it to arrive from England.
Brilliant! It mentions lots of Great Torrington families and ties in beautifully with the PCC wills. I had intended to spend time in the National Archives, chasing down on the references, but we are in lockdown again, so it will be ages before that happens.
Pinefamily
17-11-20, 05:04
Speaking of the Civil War period, we should all offer thanks to those clergymen who continued to record baptisms, marriages and burials, against the wishes of the Puritan government.
And to the researcher who has kindly drawn a hand in the margin of some records, its forefinger pointing to the entries I'm looking for. Oh, and to the antiquarian who realised that the first few pages of baptisms had been lost, so had the register rebound and indexed the pages.
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