43rd Wedding Anniversary

We just celebrated our 43rd Wedding Anniversary. We were married on a rainy day where the sun suddenly shone as we were exiting the Church. Consequently our pictures show a slightly gray sky. It is hard to believe that in just 7 years we could be married to 50 years. I will be 70 years old. My husband and I put together a binder to commemorate my parent's 50th wedding anniversary. It was my first foray into genealogy and the only until I decided to research my ancestors after a trip to England in November 2001. Being on "home" turf stirred up in my an interest in my ancestors that hasn't waned in the ensuing eight years.

I started my first courses in genealogy in July 2003 and 42 courses later I have completed my PLCGS (Professional Learning Certificate in Genealogical Studies - Methodology, English Records and Canadian Records) as of May 2007. During that time I also completed my DNA study of my mtDNA and our yDNA (one of my brothers tested our line). I am heavily involved in several DNA projects as co-investigator and we are in the stages of writing up our information. I am also giving my last lecture on Genealogy (a DNA Case Study) looking at my own family lines as well as a couple of my husband's lines. I have the lecture running around in my head at the moment and shall be quite happy to have given it so that it ceases to run about! I tend to do it without notes so necessitates my committing certain aspects to memory and adding in the details in between as they come to my brain whilst I am speaking. It is a 75 minute talk with about 10 minutes of questions at the end. I shall be quite exhausted - my days of giving long talks are going to be in the past. I would rather spend my time transcribing and publishing.

Yesterday a marvelous indenture from 1630 was circulated to the Routledge group. I input the information into an Excel file and now have a neat list of Routledge land occupiers at Bewcastle - 19 Routledge occupiers are listed (Alexander, Allan, Christopher, Cuthbert, Edward, Elizabeth, George, John, Richard, Robert (2), Rowland, Thomas (5), William (2)). Several gave relationships - Thomas was the son of George, Elizabeth the sister of William. In 1604 there were 51 Routledge names on the 1604 Land Survey (Adam (3), Alexander, Andrew (2), Anthony, Archibald, Clement, Cuthbert (3), Edward (3), Francis, George (3), James (4), Jenkin, Jerrat (2), Jock, John (5), Quintain (2), Richard (4), Simon (2), Thomas (6), and William (6)) and 23 on the 1641-42 Protestation Returns (Adam, Bartholomew, Christopher, Edward (3), Francis,
George (2), Gilbert, James, Michael, Nicholas, Quinton, Richard, Rowland, Thomas (4), and William (3)). Finding 19 in 1630 is very interesting. The variety in names is also interesting - on the 1604 Land Survey fathers are listed as: Adam, Allan, Andrew, Archibald, George, James, Jarret, Jeffrey, John, Martin, Nicholas, Quintin, Quintaine, Richard, Robert, Rowland, Thomas, and William (total of 18 different names (there may be two men of the same forename as fathers - impossible to tell at this point)). The 1630 lists the men at Oakshaw which would appear to be my line certainly in the latter part of the 1600s and from the naming of location in the Parish Registers.

There was also a will for James Routledge (son of George) who lived at Ashes in the Bailey. He lists his sons as Francis, James and George, daughter as Ellner, brothers as Thomas and Richard, sister Elizabeth married to Foster. His wife is named Eleanor (no maiden name given). He has friends Thomas, Archibald and Cuthbert Routledge, Edward Routledge is a witness. This will was proved in 1617 thus giving us some more relationships to work into the chart. I will draw up a large Routledge chart today.

I always say it is somewhat perplexing to be able to trace so many lines - it is easier not to be able to trace some of them! My mother left me with a lot of verbal stories about her ancestors that had been told to her. Her father died when she was only eight years old and likely attending various family events as a child after that left a great impression on her mind so that she retained many of the stories that she heard about family members.

Today we freeze tomatoes and clean house. Probably I will get back to genealogy later!