I am now up to the 19th Psalm in my reading and I do love the Psalms. It will take me a while to read the 150 Psalms and I shall enjoy every one so will go slow. I also love the Proverbs but then the Bible is really the pinnacle of books - its very ancient history is all part of that. Unfortunately church was cut off about half way through yesterday. I switched to the Service from England and I also enjoy these Anglican Services that remind me very much of my childhood days at Church. Sometimes it is just the accents because my grandfather lived with us although his Hampshire accent was very mild and I spent a lot of time with my grandmother with her Birmingham accent which was much stronger. With just one tiny little Canadian line and all the rest from England at least back to the 1500s where I have Huguenots from France and Scots from the Highlands being part of my lines. But my mother was born in Canada and her father was born in Canada and his mother was born in Canada (so just three Canadian born ancestors and myself born in Canada before the 1 Jan 1946 Citizenship act and so I am Canadian by right of birth in Canada at that time as were all those born in Canada prior to 1 Jan 1946).
Yesterday was reasonably good in terms of research as I gained a few new insights and solved a few interesting queries on my part which I noted in the blog yesterday. I will continue extracting from the 245 results for the Pencombe and derivatives search between 1480 and 1560. Primarily the early records link to the North Molton/South Molton Pencombe/Pyncombe families predominantly but there are a few that center in the Tawstock and Bideford area which is a short distance from Bondleigh where Roger de Pencombe received land grants in the early 1300s (one notes Richard Pencombe who lived at Bideford and was the son of Thomas Pencombe (son of John Pencombe (known to be in Northmolton from 1486 on) does appear to be the only member of the North Molton family to do so and that was after we find the Philip Pengham/Pynkeham records on the two Devon Lay Subsidies 1524-7 and 1543-45). I do plan to have a look at all the area around Bondleigh and Tawstock/Bideford/Barnstaple on the 1332 Devon Lay Subsidy. The problem is the destruction of the Exeter Record Office in 1942 during the Second World War where huge amounts of material were lost in particular the wills that had been probated by the Church in the Devon/Somerset areas. This loss is huge although in the case of the Pincombes Dr Richard Pinkham did abstract many wills before this happened and this information was placed in the keeping of the Society of Genealogists in London. It was a very valuable find and I did record all of his records there when I visited just the one time with my husband in 2013. Some of his material was missing and perhaps they have found it now I have not looked recently but my cousin in England had copies made which she sent to me earlier when she visited (I think it was 2008 when she was there) and I have published them in the Newsletters on the yDNA Pincombe/Pinkham project at FT DNA. As I mentioned at the time of publication I do not agree with particularly the oldest part of the charts but access to some records was possibly not convenient for a busy Doctor and he did rely heavily on talking to descendants in their areas in northern Devon. As well the knowledge of records available has expanded enormously as the National Archives continues to organize, scan and make available ancient information that exists in their vaults. On one of our trips to Kew in 2010 I was given a box that was quite old looking itself and the hemp perhaps ties that held the documents in their rolls sometimes disappeared as I tried to untie them. But the reward of seeing those ancient documents was wondrous and I did photocopy all of them at the time. Many of them were involving the Pyncombe family of South Molton.
Moving forward to try and do what my correspondent (I believe his line used the Pyncombe spelling but I think it was his mother's line) from Chittlehampton was unable to do going backwards from his generation as it became complex and difficult to link generations. Having one of the yDNA testers with a history from Barnstaple does give me pause to consider the family lore that discussed the South Molton (a few members perhaps) moving into the Barnstaple area early on so probably looking at the 1500s where I am reviewing the data available on Find My Past. For that reason I will pursue going through these 50,000 records that are available on Find My Past for this family which appears to have its roots in the Pencombe surname which has a number of derivatives. I shall watch the Charts which the earlier researchers used to see where they might have had that particular spelling as it is primarily Pincombe/Pyncombe/Pinkham later on.
But today is cleaning the basement day so I will be in and out looking at records plus I need to rake the front lawn to do one more bag today and then probably one bag left and the front will be completed as I shall not cut down the plants as my husband used to do in the fall but leave them to rot and enrich the ground for next year - perhaps I will move in the next year and that thought is very exciting. But I will move in three years that is for sure.
If I find anything I will return to this blog. Right off the bat a hint from FMP for Richard Pyncombe's baptism at Bideford 27 Mar 1585 and his father listed as Phillippe Pyncombe (married at Bideford to Wilmote Beare 10 Feb 1583). I have already mentioned a record for Phillippe Pynkeham 8 at Tawstock on the 1543-45 Devon Lay Subsidy and an earlier one at Tawstock for Philip Pyngham W1. The W refers to wages being earned so probably a relatively young adult or a teenager. The person above him does not share the same surname so possibly he is working for him at Tawstock and on the Tawstock Lay Subsidy just 20 years later we see him well established with a tax of 8 which was medium to perhaps a little higher. A baptism for a known individual Richard Pinkham in the earlier researcher's Chart 10 is fascinating (although the date is different but could be the date of birth which Galen Pinkham might know). I will try writing to him later. Obviously this priest has seen the surname as a different spelling than the Assessor for the Devon Lay Subsidy - it does imply that one should look carefully as one individual is seeing this as a distinct line that is different from the Pyncombe family at South Molton which is not that far away (about 35 miles so not that close actually at that time). So a good find and thank you to FMP for their hints - they can be extremely useful.
The information that my cousin in London, England had from Dr. Richard Pinkham does need to have a longer look on my part again as I have not looked at it since 2008 particularly other than more recent information. However, I am still resolved to only produce a book on the descendants of John Pencombe at North Molton but for those interested in doing more on the Pinkham family in the United States this will be very interesting.
The sad thing is my email to Galen will probably not be productive. I did not check online as I thought I might have heard that he passed and it was recent 23 March 2025. He would have been so excited at this find; I have to say that. We corresponded through the years and I did try to persuade him to come back to the project but he was a couple of years older than me and I can tell that time is making it harder for me to follow through on some of this although my health is good and I will stay away from large branches that have come down.
Rest in peace Galen and I am sorry I did not know sooner. I mention you often enough along with Dr. Richard Pinkham of Gloucester. Perhaps someone is picking up his study and I may hear back. Will wait on that. I did send a letter to the same address expressing my sadness at the passing very belatedly and added in the material that I have been writing up on the blog.
I decided to stop for the day and think about Galen and our many emails back and forth through the years.
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