The Fourth Generation of Siderfin is now fitting in for the most part with the available records and now to move to the Fifth Generation where I am definitely missing people (have people I can not quite place assuredly) and it is the linking generation between Selworthy and Luxborough and Minehead and Timberscombe for Siderfin families.I found a book on brasses of Somerset that has some interesting details on the Siderfin and Blackford family. In James Sander's book he is incorrect in the wife of the Robert Siderfin baptized 23 Aug 1658 at Selworthy. The will of Augustine Question (father of Elizabeth and this will has fortunately survived) clarifies that this Robert Siderfin married his daughter Elizabeth Question (circa early 1680s) and Augustine names his grandchildren making that a good solid three generation connection. Robert's mother is Thomasin Siderfin who leaves her will in 1709, which, unfortunately is lost except for an abstract, but she does mention the children of Robert Siderfin and Elizabeth (Question) Siderfin once again giving a three generation picture of this family from the paternal side.
I believe that reading the book on brasses led James Sanders a bit astray as indeed a Robert Siderfin does marry an Elizabeth Blackford I do believe with the brasses clearly saying that the Robert Siderfin buried 1714 aged twenty-five years was the son of Robert Siderfin and Elizabeth. I am toying with the idea that Richard Blackford married the Elizabeth Siderfin daughter of Robert and Elizabeth Siderfin and baptized 1656 at Timberscombe according to the Somerset Burial Index. I do have the fiche for Timberscombe and will check once again but I have not yet found that baptism. It is possible that the burial Index for Somerset that has an Elizabeth Siderfin buried at Selworthy in 1691 may be the Elizabeth Blackford that James Sanders has marrying Robert Siderfin. So I shall work on the Minehead, Timberscombe and Selworthy Registers while working on the FMP 2,424 hits for Siderfin (on Page 21 of those hits). Using the Protestation Returns and the Subsidies may yet yield an answer to the linkage of these families back to Robert Siderfin (William 2, John 1).
The Fifth Generation into the Sixth Generation is also a stumbling block in the Chart that James Sanders created. One needs to get all of these relationships organized to see the families as they move out from Luxborough and keep them organized. The Robert Siderfin-Elizabeth Question marriage appears to be part of the Sixth Generation and I need to collect as much data as I can. Finding the forename of the husband of Thomasin Siderfin would be a quick answer but there are seldom really quick answers in an old genealogical question (James Sanders himself was not sure enough to put that tiny tick on the chart linking Robert back to his father). Again the loss of wills does make this much more difficult but there are a few documents (on the Discovery search engine of the National Archives of the United Kingdom) that may prove to help with that. Anything that had to go through the London Courts is on this site and I shall see what is available in the time frame needed principally the early to mid 1600s to the early 1700s. There are several hundred of them and again my mind wonders if I could do a research week at Kew once again. Time will tell. I am not yet ready to travel so far from home. When one weighs up the cost of travel against the cost of having documents scanned and I think generally the scanning does win out with the big plus that one can magnify the result as large as you may want in order to easily transcribe these old documents. Seeing the documents though is an experience that one should never pass up having been there several times now. It is perhaps the gift of the United Kingdom to their peoples around the world who have traveled far from home and made new homes in other places. The records contain factual accounts of those other places as well so in return the Commonwealth benefits. It is truly amazing to be so but other countries also have extensive archives which can show the past to so many of the peoples of the world. The Commonwealth, where we are all partners at equal levels, is the dream and baby of King George VI and passed on to his daughter Queen Elizabeth II and the torch moves on to King Charles III and may the Commonwealth survive for many centuries to come.
I must get back to the French Canadian research of my son-in-law's family. With thirty or more of his ancestors being in Quebec in those very early years (the early 1600s) their roots are very deep there but they, some of his ancestors, traveled an entire continent in those early days as I have found them as far as what is now New Orleans and west into Wisconsin and beyond. My days are full; there is so much to do.
Knowing our past can protect our future; blessed are the peacemakers. May the peacemakers continue to help in our world.
Lent 3 and the Lent without borders keeps us looking back over the past; it is in knowing our past that we can find a peaceful fruitful future for all. Interesting it was our family doctor who stimulated my interest in other books when I was just six years old (he lived beside the Bookmobile stop of our Public Library) and I used to go every Saturday for the four books that I was permitted to borrow. I was looking for something more interesting than picture books as I had learned to read when I was only three years of age (my grandmother had taught me). He showed me the history/geography section of the Bookmobile and that very day I took home four books that were really too heavy for me to carry but I managed. That opened up a world to me of events and happenings stretching far back into the past; it was an exciting trip that I was about to lead and built in me a love of history/geography that stayed with me even though my academic love was certainly science and mathematics. I think as a child I did not understand fun and play but rather found great interest and satisfaction in learning. I do not think I have changed a lot actually.
On to the day; it will be a busy one. Church on Youtube at 10:30 a.m. EDT.
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