Solved the mystery

 Remembering the 1200 deaths three years ago when Hamas attacked the kibbutz areas of Israel and the Music Festival where so many young people had come together to celebrate their love of music. God be ever with those murdered that day and with those who had to recover from the dreadful consequences of that act. 

Yesterday amazingly successful for a couple of items that have been on my mind for years.  A Margaret Gregorye married William Pyncombe the 26th Nov 1564 at North Molton. I have puzzled over this marriage because of the way it was recorded on Chart 1 of the original researchers in the Pincombe Pinkham study. The William Pincombe who actually married Margaret Gregorye was the son of John Pencombe and he had just buried all three of his children and his wife a year earlier and then he himself died about four months after this marriage. It was a mystery as the ages; the timing so many things just did not make sense. That corrects that glaring problem that was in the North Molton/South Molton Chart. It was purely by chance that I suddenly realized I likely had the burials of the father of William Pencombe interchanged with that of his infant son. Once fixed, it all fell into place. 

It was the son named William of William Pyncombe and Emott Snow that married Temperance Pollard and this William was a Coroner in Devon as listed on the Visitation not his grandson as shown on Chart1-2. But solving the Margaret Gregorye marriage and then the marriage of William Squire to Margaret Pyncombe was fortuitous because there isn't a Margaret Pyncombe in these families in this time period (1560s) at North Molton (but she would then have been a widow which works). There is a Margaret Pyncombe in the  early register at North Molton who married Philip Kingdon 15 Nov 1539 at North Molton and I suspect  she was the granddaughter of John Pencombe (arrived in 1486); daughter of his eldest son John. She would have been born in the early 1520s perhaps. There are few accurate dates of individuals in this time frame although on the Visitation William married to Temperance Pollard is 54 years of age in 1620 thus placing his birth in 1566. He was the second son of William and Emott Pincombe. In the will of Johanne Pencombe (mother of William married to Emott) she does not mention that William is married but does mention all other marriages of the six children she shared with Thomas Pencombe. One can perhaps assume that in 1563 (the year of her will) William did not yet have any children. It all fits together like a glove!

I completed the first 80 year search of Pencombe (including derivatives) from Find My Past. It was a very successful day and hopefully today equally promising as I continue to put together the third generation. I am in conversation with a member of the Pinkham family in the United States and an email between us revealed that Philip Pynkeham is his ancient relative - the father of the Richard Pinkham that came to the royal colony of now Maine in the 1600s. Who this Philip Pynkeham is is a mystery but not mine to solve other than putting it into my file system in case anyone asks me about him. He simply does not fit into the third generation of the Pencombe family of North Molton. He is at Tawstock on the 1543-45 Devon Lay Subsidy as an adult presumably. There remains the two other de Pencombe families that have appeared  in the records of Devon namely Roger de Pencombe at Bondleigh in the early 1300s and John de Pencomb' as an Assessor on the 1332 Devon Lay subsidy at Molland (he does not appear though in the tax list there). Are they related to this Philip Pynkeham? No ideas on that but I am not able to look at the very large Pinkham family in the United States in terms of publication; first of all I do not have that information at hand, it is too much work for me and I will stick with the smaller family of Pencombe which is my line of descent for the book publication and eventually Pyncombe and then Pincombe (although some members did use the Pinkham spelling) in Devon. John Pencombe of Northmolton is there in 1486 with John Lord Zouch who is attainted and has taken up residence with his cousin in North Molton (it was part of the la Zouche family holdings but gradually moved into a female line by 1486). 

I do hate to appear to be separating the two studies but at 81 I can manage the Pencombe in the book I have decided to write which I am familiar with but not the very large American Pinkham family which is in good hands already. I can see now that this is the moment when I truly do cut loose the two parts of the study in terms of writing my book but the study has been together for a long time and when I retire from the Guild of one-name Studies perhaps someone else will see it differently;  no ideas on that. The yDNA results do indicate that the founder lines are not the same and it is good to just continue with my project of following down the lines of John Pencombe at North Molton. I now have a good second generation although still working on the likely years for each of the three sons. Although I will continue extracting for the entire study into my system files I will only use the Pincombe material related to North Molton in the book. I do still get requests for information from the Pinkham family in the United States but I tend to refer that to the individual who has taken a strong interest in that history as he is more knowledgeable than I am for the Pinkham family of the United States. I did invite Galen Pinkham to work with me maybe fifteen years ago but he was busy with  his own family material which I understand completely in that I have two books on the go. 

I need to do the Blake Newsletter and will move to that likely this week to complete that. I have quite a bit I can report on the Blake book as it moves forward as well. Mind a bit active and it is 3:00 a.m. I will work for a bit and then back to sleep. 

Next step, the North Molton branches appear to be sorted in the second generation, is looking at the Pencombe family in South Molton as John (eldest son of John Pencombe) is already there and well propertied with G10 on the 1524-7 Devon Lay Subsidy and his son Christopher at G5 (presumably a very young child). The other son John does not appear in the tax records until the 1543-45 Devon Lay Subsidy. On Chart 1-2 John, son of John Pencombe, is not given a year of birth but his son John is listed as born in 1501 (Christopher does not have a year of birth listed). I would propose that the father of Christopher and John was likely born in this 1501 time period rather than his son and the dating in this Chart 1-2 is out by a generation. 

Looking at Chart 1-2 prepared by the earlier researchers one can see large changes in the family of Thomas already (he was not born in 1481 as he would have been 43 then on the 1524-7 Devon Lay Subsidy where he is listed as W1 just under John Pencombe (his father) and that is very unlikely (W meaning wages). In 1543 he is at East Buckland and listed as 9 (which is the level of taxes). William Pyncombe (listed as born in 1506 on Chart 1-2 (he left his will dated 1602 so another unlikely happening) was the son of Thomas Pencombe as listed on Chart 1-2. This chart does not include William's siblings Richard, John, Alice or the unnamed youngest sister. 

William married to Emotte Snowe is part of the fourth generation and he was likely born in the early 1530s or late 1520s. I always had a problem with that section of the chart. William (married to Emotte Snowe) left his will dated in 1602 where he lists his children as Johane, John, William, Symon, Richard, Thomas, Lewis, Peter and Katherin. Thomas (father of this William) was still earning wages in 1524-7 so late teens and then by 1543-45 at East Buckland on the Devon Lay Subsidy listed as 9 on the tax roll for value. The marriage with Emotte Snowe is not in the registers thus far but it is a while since I did a thorough search and I continue pulling that data, if I missed any earlier, today. Chart 1-2 lists William and Emotte's children as John, William, Agnes, Richard, Mary, and Ann which does not fit the will of William. Interestingly an Ann Pincombe married a Christopher Rashleigh (a very well known upper class Devon family) and has been listed as part of William and Emotte's family. The blog that I published which was a reprint has this Ann as part of the South Molton Pincombe family (which is principally John rather than Thomas although William Pincombe (son of William and Emott Pincombe) married to Temperance Pollard did live in South Molton for a period of time as Coroner). 

I consider sometimes recreating these charts but they are a part of history; how people saw these things and how they explained them and so we must just move on making our additions based on the available information and the book will contain my thoughts and certainly the material that the AI brings to the table as well in terms of looking at it with the knowledge of all available history at the AI's fingertips. That was how I treated James Sander's book on the Siderfin family. It remains an important book in the history of the Siderfin family mine simply attempted to add in more information but I must fix the index and will do that and add in my new material unless someone beats me to it!

Instead I will produce a generational chart that will, hopefully, capture all the male lines coming down and the female lines for one generation to show the surnames that married into the Pincombe family of North Molton (including my line!).  

Solitaire puzzles are next and it is basement cleaning day.