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/transcr...2F98052318%2F3


She is daughter of Thomas, proved by his will:



https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageview...true&pId=85076


Thomas was the son of William:

https://www.ancestry.co.uk/imageview...38&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/imageview...&pId=902831581

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

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!)

It sounds exciting, Phoenix!