Canoeing

Yesterday, we decided to take the canoe out and for me this was the first time I have been out canoeing in seven years. A little stiff today but we had a good trip around the bayou at Pelee Island.

My accomplishments yesterday on family tree research were very low although I had a response from my query on the Sproxton family to a member of Genes Reunited and Ancestry (I believe it was the same person). She is descended from the brother of Ann (both children of Richard Sproxton and Ann Harland Sproxton). That would make us sixth cousins. It is the first time that I have tried to locate descendants of that line (especially as the spelling I had for Ann's surname was Sprowston (incorrectly transcribed from the register). Having read the register I can see how the error occurred!

I did not start the wills transcription but will do so either today or tomorrow. I need to read away at them for a couple of days before I start to transcribe if they are a bit faint or blurry. Sometimes I can directly read one as soon as I download it but usually they are very old copy and have areas of lightness and blurriness.

We are still busy watching JAG and All Creatures Great and Small. We are into the 7th season of JAG and the 3rd season of All Creatures Great and Small. We managed to watch for nearly 4 hours yesterday. I guess we were tired of working away on our family trees and my husband has been putting together his two journals.

Today I shall read on the wills and perhaps do some more extracting of Sproxton from the various databases. It is a most interesting family and they are primarily found in Yorkshire well into the 1800s. My branch (Elizabeth Cobb daughter of John Cobb and Ann Sproxton Cobb was the mother of Robert Gray junior) emigrated to Canada in 1832 from Yorkshire where Robert Gray junior had been a farmer but was having problems renting farmland and so decided to try his luck in Canada. He farmed here successfully until his death in 1876 and the farm that he was on still continues to be farmed by Gray descendants here in Middlesex County (London Township) although the City of London is growing outwards creeping forward towards the farm lands of my Gray and Routledge ancestors. It has already absorbed the farmland that my Pincombe family was on although it is still farmland but very much part of the City of London. The Gray family is interesting and three sons emigrated, two sons stayed as did the two daughters. One son became a clergyman and I need to glance at the others once again but they were all quite successful in their vocation. I think perhaps farming was just difficult with enclosure.