Wednesday, February 1, 2023

Back and forth between the third and fourth generations of Siderfin

Finished the cleaning yesterday and that went well. I am getting better at it by taking good breaks during the day. I am not quite so tired at the end of the day. At 77 one must take breaks I guess.

Did do some work on the Siderfin book. Today I need to do some footnoting just to make sure I have duly noted where I obtained the information. I think some of the issues that I have encountered in James Sanders book are of a proofreading nature. There are moments when text appears to be missing rather than in error and I suspect he did not type this book himself. Being a well-trained typist at a young age (I was just twelve when I learned to type properly and continued with that type of course work through my high school days - taking Business administration instead of Latin (I have my regrets now actually but not then) and sometimes I had to take the class early in the morning before the actual school day began because that was the only time that it could be timetabled and fortunately more people than myself decided this was a good idea or I would not have been able to continue as my course load was principally heading me towards University and Science. I love Science; I love Chemistry and also Physics and did study Honours Chemistry. At 16 my thoughts were to go into Medicine but that did change when I was 20 and got married. The medicine training I wanted was to enable me to go to Africa and be a Medical Missionary. When I did not go to Africa then my thoughts changed. But that was a long time ago now and I have no regrets in actual fact. Life flows where it flows and God leads us ever onward but my not going to Africa had more to do with my parents than my own decision but at 16 one must listen to one's parents as they mean well. 

But back to the Siderfin book and my need today to complete the footnoting in the Third generation text and finally fully on to the fourth generation. James Sanders book tends to go back and forth in the family time frame for various reasons. I think he was trying to find the link between the Selworthy branch and the earlier branch and the clues were in the Minehead Parish Registers which I have on fiche but I have mostly looked at the Index created from those registers. Perhaps today I will reach into the original registers and have a look at why he might not have attempted to do that type of research. The son that he gives to Robert (second son of Robert (will 1627)) is a John at Wootton Courtney who does not actually exist rather the child born to Robert and Ursula Webber and baptized at Minehead in 1614 is their daughter Wilmot. Interesting he has him at Wootton Courtney and I will check those Parish Registers because his statement in the book was a cheery " Shewing there was a John Siderfin at Selworthy in 1641." This section belongs to the Fourth Generation in the revised edition which is why I was back and forth yesterday between the two chapters. 

I would like to add some images to this revision and have done so giving proper credit along with location of the images (quite often Archive.org and Google Books and occasionally one of the Universities Library databases). The Saffin/Saffyn family were a new item for me in my working through some of the data which James Sanders provided as at Cutcombe where one would have expected to find Thomas Siderfin at South Wheddon a farm in that town I found a Thomas Saffin and a George Saffin. Checking the Protestation Returns there was a George Saffin but a Thomas Siderfin. So interesting and I did extract the 15 records for the Saffin family from the two sets of data. I may or may not put them into the revision but I will reference them so they are readily found. 

Other than that the day is ahead of me and I must accomplish as much as I can I am now into the second of three weeks I have allotted to this work. It is minus 21 degrees celsius so a good day to be inside. Breakfast awaits. 

Finally into the Fourth Generation and moving ahead. I think I have collected up all the material that James Sanders had in his book for the Third Generation but time will tell!

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