The next twelve months were spent checking and double checking every name on the pedigree and wierd as it may seem we found no mistakes. What we did find were families such as the Staffords, Dukes of Buckingham, the Vernons of Haddon Hall, Derbyshire, Mary Boleyn, Queen Anne's sister or if you have read the book "The Other Bolyn Girl" . The list goes on.
During this time I sent off for as many birth, death and marriage certs as I could find and baptismal records from various libraries, where I found the Archivists were really helpful. I managed to get proof of the family as far back as Timothy Spencer b.1748, my 3rd great grandfather. What I really needed was the proof that his grandfather has married Mary Archer descendant of the Archers, Barons of Umberslade Hall, Warwickshire because by this time my little history for the twins was growing at an alarming rate and I had decided to write a book incorporating each generation of Archer and the families (with pedigrees) they married into.
It took another two years of slogging research to confirm with no doubts the names I wanted to write about as I was by no means a trained researcher although I'm pretty good at it now. One of the best find I made was Dugdale' Antiquities of Warwickshire 1656 which contained the pedigree of the Archer family and had been given to Dugdale by Sir Simon Archer, himself an Antiquarian.
Wednesday, 11 November 2009
Tuesday, 10 November 2009
How Lucky Can I Get
I have young twin nephews who are interested in history so for a bit of fun I started to write a short history about my grandparents, who by the way I thought were publicans and miners from Staffordshire. Wrong!!
My paternal grandfather was always called Archie so I assumed his name was Archibald, no it wasn't. His name was Richard but with the middle name Archer. Bit of an unusual name so I posted a message on the net and within a couple of weeks had a reply from a distant cousin who told me I would be amazed when I found out who my ancestors were and the family could trace it's linear descendants back to the 1100's - OH RIGHT.
My cousin lived some distance away but said she would come to see me, as you can imagine I was a bit nervous and my husband was almost ready to hide behind the nearest pillar at the railway station in case I was about to be abducted by some sort of nutcase.
As it turned out she was a genuinely lovely person and the information she had was the original pedigree written out by a relative of hers some hundred years previously. Although I must admit when she said told me who some of my ancestors were my thoughts must have shown on my face because she burst out laughing and said that had been her exact reaction in the beginning.
My paternal grandfather was always called Archie so I assumed his name was Archibald, no it wasn't. His name was Richard but with the middle name Archer. Bit of an unusual name so I posted a message on the net and within a couple of weeks had a reply from a distant cousin who told me I would be amazed when I found out who my ancestors were and the family could trace it's linear descendants back to the 1100's - OH RIGHT.
My cousin lived some distance away but said she would come to see me, as you can imagine I was a bit nervous and my husband was almost ready to hide behind the nearest pillar at the railway station in case I was about to be abducted by some sort of nutcase.
As it turned out she was a genuinely lovely person and the information she had was the original pedigree written out by a relative of hers some hundred years previously. Although I must admit when she said told me who some of my ancestors were my thoughts must have shown on my face because she burst out laughing and said that had been her exact reaction in the beginning.
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