Basement cleaning day

 Yesterday the  main floor did get cleaned a little later in the day than usual but it is complete except for washing the floors that are linoleum and the stairs which are wooden. Today it is the basement and the Robot is doing its chore. I always check it first now to ensure it is fully charged. That is our duty as the caretaker of robots; to maintain them and keep them well appointed to do the task they are assigned. 

I did glance at the next of the last two matches to do and it is an interesting one mostly because of what is not there.  It only matches my sister and is a good Rawlings matches including at X match at FT DNA but it should also have myself in the one length (there are three interesting lengths in this match). Why am I missing, that is very unusual with FT DNA. Both are original kits with FT DNA Family Finder testing two years apart. But the interesting part is that my kit uploaded from Ancestry does match my sister so it does tell me that there is a difference in the two years with the chip used to test in those time frames. So I do match as proven with the Ancestry (taken into Gedmatch by the owner)  matching the FT DNA result. I will likely complete those two matches today and as I approach the end of the month I will start to think about using CoPilot from my new Microsoft purchase of Microsoft yearly software as I move on from Microsoft 2016. I meant to upgrade it many times but just never got to it. But now the desire to work with AI necessitates my moving on. But first I will check all the databases for anything new in the last month in terms of large matches. 

I can feel a huge cohesion developing in Canada these days as we forge ahead with our Arctic protection with the global warming affecting the accessibility to the many deep water ports in the north that belong to Canada. The ability to alter how trade moves between continents is about to take place. Really it should be a friendlier world with so much to gain from co-operation but rogue nations continue to plague that ability and create difficulties that do not need to exist in the human picture. That they exist pose the greatest threat to humanity yet really. People are too selfish that demonstrate this rogue attitude in the world. It is all about them and nothing about humanity in particular. 

I am slowly getting used to this Google takeover of FitBit which I believe they own in terms of aggressive chatter directed at the user. I have managed myself these 80 years and intend to continue doing so until I cannot. However, it is collecting the data in a way that I used to look at having collected it myself so that is probably handy. We will see but I have no interest in the Premium package as it takes up too much of my time to look at and decide it is interesting. My exercise is done on the fly so to speak. I come to a point where I decide to exercise and prefer that as it doesn't interrupt my day. At the moment I need to get my 250 steps for this hour and will stop and do it and then return to writing my blog.   

So what do I actually hope to create with my large matches file (nearly 4400 lines and includes all of the chromosomes 1 to 23)? The intent is to bring together all of my known information simply drag it into a Legacy chart and then add what I find in terms of known matches and the cousin knowledge unknown matches to see how far back this information can take me. Then all the Blake wills that help to fill in the missing items from the 1400s on will be rolled in to this chart and I will have my genealogical chart from 1400 (or earlier if the material I have warrants their addition) to probably the end of the 1800s and into the early 1900s. My father was born in 1904 and likely I will include him as a child of Samuel George Blake my grandfather born in 1875. That should work for anyone looking at the chart as the census pretty much helps everyone in my Blake line with placing themselves into the correct sibling descent with Samuel or into the John Blake family (baptized 1799) and the father of Edward Blake (born 1845) who was the father of Samuel. I do have known descendants of Thomas (father of John baptized 1799) who was baptized in 1767 and the first generation of this Blake line at Upper Clatford with his father being Joseph Blake (baptized 1730 at Andover) and the son of Thomas Blake (baptized 1709 at Andover) and the son of Thomas Blake (baptized 1685 at Andover) and the son of John Blake (baptized 1649 at Andover) and Elizabeth (unknown) with John being the son of William Blake (baptized 1615 at Andover) and Ann Hellier. William (baptized 1615) was the son of William Blake and Dorothy Madgwick and William was the son of Richard Blake and Jone Blake with this Richard the son of  William Blake and Elizabeth (unknown) and the son of  Nicholas Blake married to Margaret Blake and the wills preceding Nicholas will support this furtherance back in time to Richard Blake and then Robert Blake and potentially the John Blake found at Knights Enham in the early 1300s having likely adopted his wife's surname as his own surname. So an interesting trip for sure. It fits in with what my grandfather told me although this seven year old going on eight but not quite there has a somewhat hazy memory of some of that information prior to Joseph. Forenames all jumbled but Nicholas stood out very prominently. 

Time to check on the vacuum it has had its hour to do the rugs.  

Riding OC-Transpo

 I had a doctor's appointment so took OC-Transpo to the new clinic which is really great actually. A lovely setup I must admit and took in my blood work from the Ontario Health Study to match up with the last blood work. They were the same basically and I think they are pointing to my diverticulosis which flares up every now and again. I have had it for a very very long time so I am used to it and how to manage it. But I wanted to check on my blood work from last summer and did discuss and will do again next February likely which works really well for me. I like my doctor and have been going to the same doctor for about eight to ten years now. She is excellent. Edward really liked her and they got along very well. He listened to her always and followed her advice but his disease was chronic along with the absolute isolation of COVID which proved to be difficult for Edward; he was a real people person but his liver disease eventually resulted in his loss to us which the girls still feel very very much as do I. They miss him and always will. 

Worked on a couple of matches yesterday and one proved to be most interesting as the individual still lives in England and in the general area of my Blake line but reaching back further into the past possibly our most common ancestor is as far back as William Blake and Dorothy Madgwick (my 9x great grandparents).  It is 20 cM and four of the five siblings have that much in common with a number of people but this one individual has a tree with over 12,000 people. My match is about half of the other four siblings as I am a low match for Blake. This is what I am looking for is traceable links back into the Blake family before my line dwindled down to just one child per generation for three generations in the 1700s. Before that the Blake family of Andover was very large and did move away from Andover (quite a few lines). 

A lovely walk at Petri which I greatly enjoyed and went around three times with my FitBit cheering me on but telling me that I should be tired but I am not. I tend to be able to keep going often enough when the FitBit thinks I am tired and my recovery time after stopping is generally very very fast for a nearly 81 year old. But I do do as much as 5x to 6x the amount of so called recommended exercise of 150 minutes of peak a week. I always have as I tend to be very very active. My sleeping pulse runs around 48 bpm. I do not think of myself as an athlete but this is a range achieved by most athletes. 

Today cleaning the main floor and I will be starting soon. It is lovely outside and I have already done 8,800 steps as I got off one block earlier and walked home down the street instead of getting off at the closest corner. My goal per day is 12,000 steps per day although generally I am closer to 15,000 steps per day. I used to be closer to 20,000 per day but decided it was a bit excessive and slowed myself up somewhat when I turned 80 years of age. 

Solitaire puzzles and then cleaning.  

Always good to have the cleaning part of the week completed

 Research extends ahead of me for a couple of days and I welcome the time for that. This has been a busy Christmas and New Years with lots of skiing and fresh air just walking about. It has been pretty cold though although a warming trend is coming and with it a January thaw for at least a day or so. When we first moved to Ottawa there was never a January thaw; that was southwestern Ontario where the streets would run with all that lake effect snow as it flowed into the local rivers. But the weather here has changed somewhat over the past fifty years and hard to believe I have now lived in this area for fifty years plus. We came here with our toddler of 11 months; walking was in process but just short lengths at that time but quickly changed to running all over the backyard. I was so thin weighing 11 pounds lighter than I am now and that didn't change for a few years as I chased my toddler about keeping tabs on her. But it was a new adventure although I did fall ill about two months later but managed until I was better again a couple of months after that. I tried to do too much all at once. It is a dim memory actually those first few months here. 

Worked on the Blake Newsletter yesterday and will complete it today probably. I had an email from a descendant of the Mayo Blake family asking if I had any information on that line. Indeed I do not particularly but their closeness to the Blake family of Galway is interesting. The Galway Blake family is a huge family coming down through the centuries and written up by Martin J Blake (published in London, England)) in 1902 and 1903 as two volumes. Volume 1 begins around 1300 through to 1599 and Volume 2 records the years from 1600 to 1700. The books are available on Archive.org (https://archive.org/details/blakefamilyrecor00blakuoft/blakefamilyrecor00blakuoft/page/n1/mode/2up) . There are many descendants of this family and the yDNA study at FT DNA for the Blake family has a number of testers who can trace back into this Galway Blake family. Members of this family are found in many places in Ireland and in England. The best way to look at your own Blake line is to have a male descendant in the Blake line test their yDNA. There are a number of founding lines for Blake in the British Isles (including my line) and many of them can be found in the Calendar of Patent Rolls. I extracted the Blake records from this set of documents when they were loaned to a research at the University of Iowa and I did build a chart showing frequency of Blake in the various counties of England as that was primarily the focus of my research at the time. I did take on the Blake study at the Guild of one-name Studies in 2011 when it was left vacant by Paul Blake who had been the main researcher for Blake for many years in the British Isles as a member of the Guild. So my answer said all of what is above (briefly) and to consider that the Blake line at Mayo could be an offshoot of Galway even if the furtherest back known in their line was  a British military officer in Mayo during the 1600s when Cromwell was the head of government in England. Her thought was that her ancestor was descendant of the Blake family of Somerset (related to Lord High Admiral Robert Blake). I think she wondered if we shared Blake ancestry but my grandfather was always quite sure that we were not related to the Calne Blake family or the Somerset Blake family in the male Blake line. Interesting he thought that but people thought differently and learned differently in the late 1800s with rote being the prime method of learning. That means to me that your family stories were passed on by word of mouth generation after generation and that was why Nicholas Blake was discussed in the latter part of the 1800s even though he was just a small farmer at Knights Enham who left his will in 1547. It was this Nicholas who was given all sorts of different relations that created a stir at that time. An American, Horatio Gates Somerby, had created a story about this time period using Nicholas, giving him incorrect parents and siblings although some of the material was correct but mostly incorrect. Amazing that there would be such a discussion 350 years later after Nicholas' death but it was this style of learning that brought forward in people's minds the details of their lives lived generation after generation and caused a rejection by those who were in the know labeling Horatio Gates Somerby as a fraud who simply engineered stories in order to impress his American clients. Indeed the founder of the Blake family of Galway was Richard Caddell (Welsh and also known as Richard Niger) who used the surname Blake after receiving land grants at Galway and Mayo having accompanied then Prince John (later King John) to Ireland in 1185. The email was interesting since the Blake family of Galway was also at Mayo in the 1100s/1200s. But I do not do family research for individuals; I simply tell them what I do know and leave it up to them to do the research back in their lines. 

I continue to be amazed at the Blake autosomal matches that I have with individuals in the present coming down from early Colonials in the American colonies.  There are distinct lengths that fall into the pile-up or common areas of the chromosomes implying quite distant relationships but the size of the matches is sometimes rather surprising and one gets a notation of sixth cousin or even closer on occasion and I know very well that is not the case. The only Blake known to me that early in the American Colonies was Joanne Blake (daughter of William Blake and Dorothy Madgwick) who married Major General Roberte Sedgewicke 6 Jan 1634 at Andover and their children all appeared to be born at Charlestown, Royal Colony of Massachusetts in the 1630s/1640s. Joanne herself returned to England after the death of her husband in Jamaica but their five children remained in the colonies. 

Tea drank and need to do the solitaire puzzles and then breakfast. The days move on so very quickly.  

  

 

Amazing that I can miss items I sign up for

 Time flows so quickly even in retirement and a loss of internet meant I missed out on a webinar I wanted to attend. The phone just didn't seem to want to do it. However I will be receiving the Advent messages anyway as one could sign up for that without attending the webinar. They sound like a treasure to receive this Advent. 

The Reign of Christ service yesterday online was lovely; many of my favourite hymns were sung and the sermon was quite interesting. I do like receiving the Church Service every Sunday on my television. At 80 I have less and less desire to be out and about. It takes too much time out of the day. Even yesterday I went and got my COVID shot (I have never missed one actually) and as it was a fairly nice day I put on my snow boots and walked up to get my shot and two litres of milk as I was running out of milk. Grocery shopping one of these days but for the moment I can make do with what is in my refrigerator and cupboards. I am not a big eater but have managed to gain back the four pounds that I lost when I had the flu. So no more doubling up of meals - just three meals a day and that is nice and eating extra meals uses up my work time. 

Chromosome 1 was the source of my working yesterday and I got maybe a dozen matches completed. This chromosome does have a number of known matches so that I can pretty much rely on them to place the grandparents but there aren't many Pincombe matches known to me and the Blake matches seem quite ancient as I can only locate a couple of them. My largest match actually is on this chromosome and occupies a good couple of lengths but it is obscured somewhat by endogamy which means it is Blake mostly Knight-Butt-Arnold but nothing in the Blake line itself other than a couple of known cousins but they are not really large lengths. There are smaller known Blake matches with cousins. It is the ancient Blake that catches my eye so will put some concentration into that as earlier matching in Ancestry pulled up some ancient results with the Sedgwick family of Massachusetts. Joanne Blake (daughter of William Blake and  Dorothy Madgwick married 6 Feb 1606 at Andover, Hampshire, England) married Roberte Sedgwicke 6 Jan 1634 at Andover, Hampshire, England. He died in Jamaica, she returned to England and died in London but their five children remained in Massachusetts where they lived and their first known son was baptized 31 Mar 1639 at Charlestown. The matches were small and eventually disappeared from Ancestry. But there are a number of American descendants in the area of those matches on Chromosome 1. So I shall pursue this chromosome looking for possibly ancient Blake autosomal DNA. With a couple of Blake-Blake marriages in this line the chances exist but they will be very small and somewhat encumbered with other possibilities for sure; one does realize that. But 281 matches are a lot of matches and it will take me a bit to get through all of them in a meaningful way. 

Cleaning day today and it is the basement and the robot will soon do its work with me checking to make sure it is fully charged. The first robot in the house for sure. 

Time to make my tea and do my solitaire puzzles. Dawn is just breaking across the eastern sky.  

 

Blake - Sedgwick and autosomal DNA

One of the most amazing extras of doing autosomal DNA is proving lines or at least finding matches that can best be explained because of a paper trail. I have five Sedgwick matches on my AncestryDNA account and all are Distant Cousins (5th to 8th cousins). The Sedgwick connection goes all the way back to William Blake Andover, Hampshire, England married to Dorothy Madgwick of Overton, Hampshire, England. Their son William is my ancestor and their daughter Johanna is the ancestor of the Sedgwick family. Johanna married Major General Robert Sedgwick 6 Jan 1634/35 at Andover.

We would be 9th cousins which isn't too far off the estimated 5th - 8th cousins.  Now I am assuming that Ancestry organizes people in terms of decreasing shared centimorgans and these five matches can be found on pages 6,  7, 14, 15, and 37. Looking at all the shared surnames in each of these five it is likely that I have other matches with the two on pages 6 and 7. For 37, no other matches likely. But finding Sedgwick matches is quite phenomenal.

I have been happy with the trace back on Blake this last couple of years as everything fits together very well. Finding others descending from other couples in this line would be very interesting. I really haven't looked that carefully yet at my Ancestry matches because they were primarily Americans but they have Irish and English matches in there now so must have a look. My number of matches has nearly doubled in the last couple of months at AncestryDNA.

Blake - Abbots Ann Parish Registers

Continuing on with the Abbots Ann Parish Registers and this is a particularly rough section. Out of place with respect to the transcription I was doing but welcomed anyway.I am now doing catchup with the time period from 1599 to the 1640s.

Abbots Ann Parish Church of St Mary has Virgin Crowns around the ceiling of the sanctuary. The graveyard has the grave of John Blake, malster, and his wife Mary (King) Blake and their daughter Mary who died in childbirth - their only child. It must have been a sad life for John after losing first his daughter and then his wife and continuing on for many more years on his own. Ann Blake who went to take care of her Uncle at Abbots Ann (sister to my 3x great grandfather Thomas Blake) must have been a welcome companion in his old age. He was generous to her although she eventually sold her inheritance and returned to live at Upper Clatford after her brother's wife Sarah (Coleman) Blake died about the same time as her infant son.

The first Blake entry has now appeared in the Parish Register with the marriage of Dorothy Blake (daughter of the widow Blake of Andover) and John Smyth of Blackfriers London. This marriage in 1632 is an interesting one actually. This Dorothy is generally thought to be the daughter of William Blake and Dorothy (Madgwick) Blake but both of her parents were alive in 1632. I shall have to rethink this thought.

Barrie Blake has pointed out a discrepancy which I had thought was just a spelling error on the part of the Creators of the Blake Pedigree Chart at the Swindon Wiltshire Record Office. They list Robert Blake and Alice Folyot as the individuals in the stained glass window at Calne. However, the coat of arms is actually that of the Folliott family whereas the coat of arms in the marriage crest is that of the Wallop family. I did not acquire the Post Mortem Inquisition for Avis Blake when we were at the National Archives so must think about whether I want to check it out. Online sources name Roger Malewyn as the husband of Avis Wallop prior to her marriage to Robert Blake. She was a widow when she married Robert. Since she does have a Postmortem Inquisition she must have held land which needed to be dealt with and hence the Postmortem Inquisition. It will be necessary to read that to understand if she was actually married twice before she married Robert Blake.

I continued with the Abbots Ann Register through the day and have now completed 701 baptisms, 203 marriages and 260 burials. The burials seem very low and they are very difficult to read - a lot of blanks. I am probably missing some of them and on proofreading may pick up more.

Will of Nicholas Blake - National Archives, PROB 11/31/549, probated 20 Jun 1547

The will of Nic[h]olas Blake was written 31 May 1547 and probated 20 Jun 1547. I had forgotten that Nicholas mentions Robert Boswell and again this links with the will of William Blake of Speen in 1552 as Robert Boswell is his father in law whom he makes executor of his will. Now is this the same Robert Boswell? Always that question comes first to mind. He would appear to be the tenant of Nicholas and as I read through William's will I am seeing now that William Blake does hold the lease of the tenements that William Blake of Speen occupies but it appears that William also tills that piece of land. A mite confusing as you look at it and again the will of William Blake at Speen in 1552:

http://kippeeb.blogspot.ca/2012/05/will-of-william-blake-yeoman-of-speen.html

I still wonder if they are related but is this perhaps the answer to the mystery? No, the children of William Blake of Speen do not match the children on the Blake Pedigree Chart. William Blake at Speen's siblings however are Richard and John with no mention of a sister in his will (on the chart the children of William Blake married to Avis Ripley are John, William and Peter with a sister Agnes married to Roger Hyde). So this is not that family either. The children of William Blake of Speen are Anthony and others unnamed (perhaps only one other) and his wife was Ellyne. The date of William Blake of Speen's will is 1552 not 1582 as in the Pedigree Chart.

Nicholas names his wife Margaret and as of this date I have no ideas on her surname. He names his children as William Blake eldest, Edmund Blake under 21 years of age, Alice Goodwyn (married daughter) and Elizabeth unmarried. William is married and they have children as the inheritance of his daughters if they die before inheriting is to be divided up amongst the children of William. We can see the property in this will which has passed to William and mentioned in William's will of yesterday. William has added greatly to his holdings and again Lord Sandy is the Lord of the Manor. The holdings are all in Andover, Knights Enham and Kings Enham in Nicholas' will. William Blake is the first to state that he lives at Eastontown.

Working backwards from Peter Blake's will to William Blake's will to Nicholas Blake's will and then tomorrow to Jone Blake's will is an interesting trip through time. I am beginning to wonder about Peter Blake's will and whether I am dealing with these two William Blake lines with his will and then the other three (Jone-Nicholas-William) that fit together. On the other hand Peter Blake in his will does not mention any of the properties that the Jone Blake-Nicholas Blake-William Blake family hold. What he does mention is his kinsmen William Hinxman of Hatherden, Mr. Nicholas Blake of Gavelacre and Mr. Richard Blake his brother and their sister Mrs. Jone Blake. I need to think about these three people and exactly who they are and how they fit into the Blake family at Andover. It could be the clue that I have been struggling to find to solve the mystery of the two William Blakes at Eastontown (or one married twice).

One thing I do know and that is the William Blake who dies in 1642 leaving his will (married to Dorothy Madgwick) is in financial trouble and this trouble becomes even more evident in Dorothy's will. Then we see their now eldest son William (his brother Richard died in 1648) selling off property in particular to Mr. Nicholas Blake of Gavelacre. No relationship is stated in that particular indenture although we know that that William Blake is the grandson of Richard Blake the lynen draper as the indenture states that. Tying that family together from Richard Blake to William Blake to William Blake has been fairly straightforward. The question is, to my mind, is Charlou Dolan right in saying that Richard is the son of William Blake and Anne Tutt? This would then bring them into the Pedigree Chart and definitely William Blake is the son of Nicholas not Roger Blake and Mary Baynard. The marriage between William Blake (Charlou has this William as a son of the son of William Blake) and Anne Tutt is on the Pedigree Chart and does perhaps help to define these two families as being separate William Blake lines at Eastontown. The timing is simply not right for Richard Blake lynen draper who died in 1622 to be a son of William Blake and Anne Tutt as their grandfather on the chart (Roger Blake married Mary Baynard). Plus the will of the son of William (of Eastontown) does list the properties from his father's will that he inherited and he married Margaret Hibberd). It was the son of this William that was to have married Anne Tutt! It is perhaps time to revisit some of these Wiltshire wills that I have not yet transcribed but probably that is going to wait for the alphabetical walk through the wills and I am only at Hampshire.

The will of Jone Blake tomorrow will complete the cycle back and I will move on to the next will in line which is for the Blake family at Christchurch.

Transcriber: Elizabeth Kipp
Recorded: 6th May 2009
Source: The National Archives, PROB 11/31/549
Name of Testator: Nic[h]olas Blake
Place: Enham (near Andover), Hampshire, England
Type of Record: Will
Dated: 31 May 1547, probated 20 Jun 1547
Read: Electronic copy
Condition: scan, old English writing good, contrast excellent

[Left hand corner] Test[at]or Nicho[las] Blake

1    In the name of God amen In the yere of our Lord god a Thousand fyve hundred
2    Fourtie and sevyn and the last day of May I Nicolas Blake of the p[ar]ishe of Enh[a]m in the Dioc[ese] of Wynchest[e]r
3    being sicke of body but of good and p[er]fite remembrance make and ordeyn this my last will and testament
4    in maner and fourme folowing First I Bequith my soule to almightie god to oure Blessed Lady and to all the
5    Blessed company of heaven. And my body to be buried w[i]t[h]in the Church of Saint Michaell Th[e ]archangell Item
6    I geve to the Trinite Church of Wynchester vj d Item I geve to the church of Andever oon quarter of whete
7    It[e]m I give to Enh[a]m Church a quarter of wheat Item I geve and bequeth to Will[ia]m Blake my eldest sonne
8    the halfe of the Farme of Andever of my Lord Sandys holding which Robert Boswell occupyeth Also I geve
9    and bequeth to the said Will[ia]m the Tenement in Kings Enham of my Lord Sandys holding w[i]t[h] all the La[m]mes
10    lande lying in Andever feld that the said William nowe occupieth and holdith Also I geve to the said Will[ia]m
11    Blake my sonne my Leasse of the Tenement of the Lord Sandys called the olde hall w[i]t[h] all the app[ur]ten[an]cs ther unto
12    belonginge or lying in Knyghts Enh[a]m Also I geve to the said William Blake my free holde in Knyights Enh[a]m w[i]t[h] all
13    the appurten[an]cs there unto belonging Item I geve and bequeth to Edmund Blake my sonne the Leasse of the
14    Farme of Andever called Semers Farme w[i]t[h] all the appurten[an]cs ther[e ]unto belonging and walworth of my
15    Lord Sandys holding And a leasse of a Tenement in Kyngs Enh[a]m which is John Catts gentilman holde w[i]t[h]
16    all the appurten[an]cs ther[e ]unto belonging Also I geve to the said Edmund my sonne my freeholde in Andever
17    with seven acres and a half of arable land that Thomas Wescombe now holdeth with all the rest of myn[e]
18    erable lands grains pastures and com[m]ons of pastures of what nature kynde name and degre soever they be
19    which I do holde and kepe of any man[ner] at the making of this my last wille and testament Also I wille that
20    the forsaid Thomas Wescombe shal[l ]have the forsaid house that he dwelleth in for the terms of thurtie yeres
21    next folowing paying yerely therfor and to agree w[i]t[h] Margaret Blake my wife and Edmund Blake my son[ne]
22    Item I geve to Elizabeth Blake my daughter one hundreth of shepe and Twentie poundes of money at the day of
23    her mariage and her apparill. Item I give and bequeth to Alice my daughter twentie shepe and fyve quarters of
24    barley to be delivered at Michelmas next commyng Item I give to Sir Thomas Upton my curate to pray for my soule
25    and all Christ[ai]n soules x s. Also yf that it fortune Edmund Blake my sonne to dye before he be of lawfull age Then I wille
26    that my freholde w[i]t[h] all the other leases geven and bequethed by me to the said Edmond to remayn to William Blake
27    my sonne his heires and assignes And the goods to remayne to Alice Goodwyn and Elizabeth Blake my daughters equally
28    to be devided betwixt them And if it fortune the said Alice and Elizabeth to dye Then I will the said goodes to be devided
29    betwene the children of William Blake my son Provided also I will that Margaret Blake my wife shall have and
30    kepe all my free landes tenements holds leases with all th[e ]appurtenancs to them belonging which I doe holde of any man[ne]r
31    of man[ner] at the making of this my last will and testament during the terme of her life The residue of my goods and
32    c[h]attalls not gevyn or bequethed I geve and bequeth to Margaret Blake my wife and Edmunde Blake my sonne
33    whom I make and ordeyn myn executors of this my last will and testament Also I make and ordeyn William
34    Hopkins and Willi[a]m Aldred my Overseers of this my last will and testament for to se it p[er]formed according to
35    my mynde above specified Witnesse to this Sir Thomas Upton Curate Stevyn Smyth Will[ia]m Blake w[i]t[h] other
36         Probatum fuit test[ament]um suprascripti defuncti h[ab]entis etc xxth die mensis Juinij Anno D[o]m[in]o Mill[es]imo quingen[tesimo]
37    xlvij [1547] Coram d[o]m[in]o apud London aucto[ritate] d[o]m[in]o n[ost]ri Regis etc Iurament[o] Margarete Relicte executoris in h[uius]mo[d]i test[ament]o no[m]i[n]at[i] In persona
38    Stephe[n] Smyth procur[atoris] sui in hac p[ar]te Ac approbatum et insinuatum Com[m]issa fuit admi[ni]stracio o[mn]i[u]m et singulorom bonorum Jurium
39    Et creditorum d[i]c[t]i defuncti prefat[o] executrici In p[er]sona die proc[urato]ris De b[e]n[e] et fidel[ite]r admi[ni]strando Ac de pleno et fideli In[venta]rio secondo die post
40    festum s[an]c[t]e Anne prox[imum] futur[um] exhibend[o] necnon de plano et vero compoto reddend[o] Ad s[an]c[t]a dei Ev[a]ngelia in debit iuris forma jurat
41    Reservata po[tes]tate Edmund Blake executori etiam in h[uius]mo[d]i test[ament]o no[m]i[n]at cum venerit etc

King Family at Upper Clatford and Abbotts Ann

Joanna King married Joseph Blake 8 Jun 1757 at Upper Clatford and the marriage lines read:

Joseph Blake of Andover and Joanna King of this parish were married [8 Jun 1757].

No extra information other than the parish but I do find it interesting that the priest has recorded that Joseph was from Andover. Initially I wondered if Joseph had been sent off to Upper Clatford to help Thomas King with his farm since Thomas did not have any sons. But now as I look at the record I wonder if this was simply an arranged marriage and I need to look harder at the mother of Joseph (Thomas Blake married Ann Carter at Penton Mewsey 8 Dec 1728 and these were the parents of Joseph Blake). Thomas and Ann named their first son Joseph and although this is a name used in the Blake family since the marriage of Elener Blake and Joseph Hinxman 10 Dec 1610 with the first Joseph Blake baptized 14 Nov 1644 and the son of Mr. Richard Blake and Joanne Dashford. This Richard was the eldest son of Mr. William Blake and Dorothy Madgwick who were themselves married 6 Feb 1606 at Andover. It was the aunt of William Blake who married Joseph Hinxman. Richard did not name a son Joseph but it is not surprising that a grandson would do so in that Joseph Hinxman was by far one of the most important people in Andover (Lord of the Manor of Foxcott) in the 1600s. The next Joseph Blake I found baptized at Andover 24 Feb 1702 married Mary Holdway 11 Feb 1730 at Penton Mewsey and was the son of John Blake and Elizabeth (son of a brother of Richard married to Joanne Dashford). I have inserted the Mr. because it tells me something about this family which from the mid 1500s to the mid 1600s were a substantial family in Andover but appear to have dropped down from Mr. to yeoman status and then eventually down to labourer. Part of the cause I suspect in my line is the early death of Thomas Blake in 1714 (father of Thomas Blake married to Ann Carter) with his widow raising their only child.

Family lore helps a little at this point as the story was that Ann (Carter) Blake and her son Thomas lived in a cottage at Foxcott. What Thomas did for a living I have absolutely no idea and there are no records thus far to add to that lack of knowledge.

But how to look at this King family? The King family at Upper Clatford is quite large. They were farmers and millers at this small village 1 mile south of Andover. My direct line was a farmer and Joseph continued on the land with his widow Joanna eventually marrying Thomas Collins who farmed beside the Blake family (about two years after his wife Joanna died in 1779 with their marriage in 1781). Always the question, is my Thomas King related to the other King families at Upper Clatford.

In 1665 at Upper Clatford there were three King families and one King widow - Stephen King, William King and Thomas King. A son born to Thomas and Abigaill King that I had initially thought might be my Thomas but he was buried as a young child. However, the records as mentioned earlier are somewhat scanty in the early 1700s in Upper Clatford.  Find my Past does have new records up however, so I will give a check there once again. Probate Records on Find my Past for King but I have already found the will of this Thomas King and I have a copy.  Checking to see if anyone else is researching this family on World Connect and Ancestry with no new information.

I had decided I would look at the Carter wills to see if I can work anything out and I have several Carter wills in electronic and in paper form. I am curious if the marriage of Richard Carter and Elizabeth Musprett 4 Aug 1701 with daughters Mary baptized 27 Feb 1711 at Andover and Ann baptized 18 Nov 1713 at Andover are the wives of Thomas King and Thomas Blake respectively. If I can prove this (and it is likely that Richard was a son of Gyles Carter) then I think it might be possible that John Blake who married the eldest daughter of Thomas and Mary King (Mary) may have been related to Thomas Blake although this doesn't necessarily follow it might help to answer a few questions on all of these families. Perhaps the biggest one is why did Joseph Blake who lived at Andover go to Upper Clatford and marry Joanna King - were their mothers sisters?

Paper copy
Will of Martha Carter - Andover - 1737

Indenture of Mary Carter and others - Andover - 1748

Will of Gyles Carter - Charleton/Andover - 1675

Electronic copy
Will of Richard Carter -  Charleton/Andover - 1684

Will of John Carter - Charleton/Andover - 1780

Will of Robert Carter - Andover - 1725

Will of Mary Carter - Andover - 1828

I think I will start with the will of Martha Carter  and she was the widow of Robert Carter grocer in as much as I can ascertain at this point in time. I have not yet read the will. I believe this is in one of Martha's children's own handwriting and I am working from a xeroxed copy - perhaps Mary Carter although it is duly witnessed and signed. I do not think this is my direct line but it helps to establish what the sons of Gyles Carter were doing as he is the best known of the Carter family in this time interval. I suspect that Richard may be his son but need to eliminate other possibilities.

In the Name of God Amen
I Martha Carter Widow Grocer in the Parish
of Andover in the County of South[amp]ton being
weak but of a sound Mind and Memory blest be
too almighty God for it Therefore I make
and ordain my last Will and Testmament
in manner as folling. Item I give and bequeath
to my daster Martha Shergold her heirs and
assins my free living in Cholden in the
Parish of Andover Item I give too my
daster Katherine the wife of my son in
law William Neal the sum of one hundred
and fifty pounds of ____ money of Great
Britten too be paid on one year next after
my deceas Item I give and bequeath
too my daster Mary Carter all that my
messuage or tenements malt house ______
_____ gardens out houses Lands and
Premisses there too be _____
living and being in Andover aforesaid
now in my possing and also all my
In Clos. grounds lying in Andover
aforesaid contany ____ five acres
now in possesion of Mr. Carters Item
all the rest and residue of my estate both
real and personnell money securety for
Moneys Goods Chatells and Personal Estate
what so ever my debts and legacies and
funeral expenses paid and satisfied I give
and bequeath to my said daster Mary Carter
whom I make sole Executrix of this my last
will and Testament In Witness wearof I
have here too set my hand and seal
the twenty first day of December in the
seventh year of the Raine of our Souveren
Lord Gorg the second Anno Domini 1737
Mata (IS) Carter The mark of Martha Carter
 Signed Sealed published and delivered by
Martha Carter and as her last Will and
Testament in the presence of us who are
Wintesses here too yee have suscribed ____
names in the presence of said ____one
Gyles Dowling [signed]
William Stratton [signed]
Dorothy Baverstook [signed]

In the Andover parish Register

There are three daughters baptized to Robert Carter and Martha between 1692 and 1701 - Mary (d 1692), Katherine and Mary. I have not yet found the marriage of Robert Carter and Martha but it does not appear to have taken place at Andover. Robert was a Grocer and left a will in 1725. Neither Robert nor Martha were buried at Andover.

#322 - The National Archives
T[esta]m[ent] Roberti Carter

In the Name of God Amen
I Robert Carter of Andover in the County of Southampton Grocer
being in health and of a Sound mind and memory praised be
Almighty God therefore doe make and ordain this my last will
and Testament in manner following That is to say Imprimis
I give and devise unto my loving wife Martha All that my Messuage
or Tenement Malthouse Backside Garden Outhouses Lands and
Premisses therein to belonging Situate lying and being in Andover
aforesaid now in my possession and in the posession of Mr. Horlock
And alsoe all those my inclosed grounds and Lands comonly called
Mounty five acres lying in Andover aforesaid now in the
possession of Mrs. Hancock and which I have before purchased of Mr.
Thornburgh and others And allsoe All that my Meadow Ground and
four Acres and a halfe or thereabouts of arrable Land lying in
Charleton in the parish of Andover aforesaid and alsoe all ways
paths passages commons common of pasture profitts advantages
and appurtenances whatsoever to the said Messuage Lands
and Premisses belonging or appertaining To have and to hold
the said Messuage or Tenement Malthouse Lands and Premisses
with their and every or their appurtences unto my said wife
Martha her heirs and assignes forever subject and lyabiel nevertheless
(with my personal Estate) to the payment of the Legacyies herein after
given and bequeathed unto my daughter Mary Carter Item
I give and bequeath unto my son in law Mr. Richard Cook Shergold
and his wife Martha my daughter the sume of Ten pounds a peice
to buy them mourning Item I give unto my daughter Katherine
the wife of my Son in Law Mr. William Neal the summe of one hundred
and fifty pounds of lawfull money of Great Brittain Item I
give and bequeath unto my said daughter Mary Carter the
summe of Eight hundred pounds of Lawfull Money of Great Brittain
to be paid her within one year next after my decease and thereby
charge my Real and Personall Estates with payment of the
same Item all the rest and residue of my Estate be the real and
personall Money Securities for Money Goods Chattles and
Personall Estate whatsoever My debts Legacies and Funerall
expenses being first paid and satisfied I give and bequeath
unto my said loving wife Martha whom I make sole executrix
of this my last Will and Testament thereby revoking all former
Wills by me heretofore made In Wittness whereof I have hereunto
set my hand and seal the sixth day of Aprill in the eleventh year
of the Reigne of our Sovereigne Lord King George Anno Domini 1725
Robt Carter [signed] Signed Sealed Published and Declared by the
said Robert Carter as and for his last Will and Testament in the
presence of us who as as Witnesses hereunto have subscribed our
names in the presence of the said Testator Cornell Tirrell [signed]
Robert King [signed] Peter Fish [signed]

Interesting will and also interesting that Robert King is one of his witnesses.
However, I now know that the Robert and Martha Carter family are not the parents of Ann Carter but I am still left to wonder if they are the parents of Mary Carter who married Thomas King.

My next research day I shall continue transcribing the Carter wills.

Richard Blake of London mentioned in the London Visitation.

A bit of a quandry is Richard Blake's will which is dated 23 Mar 1643 in London and his burial was at Andover 12 Apr 1644 and the notation by the priest is that Mr. Richard Blake is of London. I have partially transcribed his will below. Interesting that he traveled from London to Andover (or perhaps he was moved there after death).

1. In the name of the eternall and
2. everliving god Father Sonne and holy ghost in whose name I was baptized in
3. whome only I hope and beleeve to be saved with a free heart and willing minde I
4. doe yeeld and render my soule into the hands of Father, sonne and holy ghost and
5. beleeve that the lord will have mercy upon my soule for he first made me; soe this I
6. beleeve that whether I live or dye I am the lords, to whome be all honour & glory
7. power and dominion forevermore Amen, As concerning my body I bequeath it to the
8. earth from whence it came I Richard Blake of London gent[leman] being sicke and weake in
9. body but of good and p[er]fect memory I thanke my god the giver and y[er]erver thereof
10. doe make this my last will and testam[en]t as followeth The twentie third day of March
11. one thousand six hundred forty three, Item I give to my sister Joane Baylie twentie
12. pounds To my sister Dorothie Burningham twenty pounds, To my sister Ellen Hinxman
13. twenty pounds, To my sister Margaret Savadge twenty pounds, .........

This Richard is the son of Richard Blake and Jone Blake. In his will he mentions his sisters in birth order - Jone married to Richard Bayly 6 May 1605 at Andover, Dorothy married to Peter Burmingham April 1608 Andover, Elenor married to Joseph Hinxman 10 Dec 1610 at Andover, and Margaret married to Richard Savage Apr 1616 at Andover. He also mentions his brother Peter later in the will which I shall complete transcribing tomorrow.  Only one other brother is still living Nicholas and I need to determine if Richard does mention him. He has a lot of names in his will and I would like to place all of them. Because his mother was also a Blake he has many Blake cousins on both sides of this family. This may help me to sort out her family.

My ancestor (his eldest brother) William married to Dorothy Madgwick was buried 4 May 1642 at Andover.  He has also left a number of children and perhaps they too are mentioned in the remainder of the will. One other brother John is deceased but I haven't determined which John Blake in the burial list yet. One sister is also deceased Elizabeth married to John Hapgood 18 Jun 1605 at Andover and deceased before 16 Oct 1607 leaving one child Elizabeth.

Looking at the London Visitation (1633) This is the Richard Blake mentioned as the son of Richard Blake of Andover in the county of Hampshire married to Jone Blake daughter of William Blake of Easton in the County of Hampshire. I hadn't put this visitation into its proper context yet but it appears that Jone Blake is a daughter of William Blake at Eastontown. Now Richard is the son of William Blake of Eastontown so we do have two William Blake's at Eastontown. This is the second marriage between children of the two William Blake's at Eastontown. I must continue working on this tomorrow whilst it is fitting together in my mind. This could be a really good breakthrough.

Thomas Blake at Upper Clatford

I have completed the baptisms at Andover up to the end of December 1756 and there are 11,785 baptisms from the beginning of the registers to this date at St Marys Andover. Next the burials and then the marriages and I will be ready to move on to Penton Mewsey parish registers. Having just discussed Charles Blake at Abbotts Ann I now move to remind myself of what I know about my own line at Upper Clatford going back to Andover.

My Blake line which runs back from my father who was born at Eastleigh HAM in 1904 to his father born at Upper Clatford HAM in 1875 (Samuel George Blake). Samuel's father was Edward Blake and his mother Maria Jane Knight. Edward was born at Upper Clatford in 1845 and Maria Jane Knight was born at Turnworth, DOR in 1849. Maria Jane Knight's family lines are fairly well defined back into the mid 1700s and I will speak about the Knight family in another blog.

Edward Blake's parents were John Blake (b 1799 Upper Clatford) and Ann Farmer (b 1804 Woodhouse, Little London, Andover). Again I have acquired some information on the Farmer line back into the mid 1700s and it too will be discussed in another blog.

John Blake's parents were Thomas Blake (b 1767 Upper Clatford) and Sarah Coleman (b 1773 Abbotts Ann HAM). The Coleman family dates back to Goodworth Clatford in the late 1600s and they were inn keepers there with more information to come on this line later.

Thomas Blake was born posthumously in Oct 1767 after the death of his father Joseph (b 1730 Andover) in May 1767 and his older brother Thomas also in May 1767. Thomas' mother was Joanna King b 1736 Upper Clatford. She was the only surviving child of Thomas King and Mary Carter who had married 10 Jan 1728. Both of them were older (Thomas King was likely b 1688 Upper Clatford and Mary Carter was likely b 1692 Andover) and only two children were baptized to this couple Elizabeth b 1735; d 1735 and Joanna b 1736. Thomas King in his will 1762 mentioned the daughter Mary of John Blake (malster at Abbotts Ann). Is it significant that he doesn't mention Mary the wife of John (her grave would indicate that she was still living)? I am looking for a connection between Thomas King and John Blake and why they mention each others children in their respective wills (written more than 30 years apart). The mother of Joseph Blake is still a mystery although signs point towards it being Ann Carter and the wife of Thomas King was Mary Carter. John Blake leaves money to the Church at Upper Clatford and what significance should I find there? All these little questions emerged from John's will. Nice to see Thomas Blake mentioned there but so many new questions emerged.

Joseph Blake's father is Thomas Blake and he was baptized in 1730 at Andover. This Thomas is the son of Thomas Blake and Mary Spring who married in 1708 at Andover. I am fairly quickly answering the question of which Thomas this was in that Thomas Blake (b 1671) does not appear on the Poll book in 1710 and as the nephew of Peter Blake one would have expected him to be there I think. More proof still needed. The other Thomas that is a candidate is the son of John Blake and Elizabeth and baptized 1685 at Andover. Although this John Blake appears to be the son of William Blake and Ann Hellier I am holding that in abeyance because the father of Thomas (b 1671) is John the brother of William Blake married to Ann Hellier. I need to resolve this issue before moving back to the father of William and John and he was William Blake married to Dorothy Madgwick.

The line continues back to Richard Blake married to Jone Blake. These two bring the two Blake lines at Andover together in that Richard and Jone are both great grandchildren of Mr. Blake and Jone Blake. Jone left a will in 1527 naming her children: Robert, Nicholas and Elizabeth (married to Mr. Mylne). Jone was descended from Robert (his grandaughter (her father was Robert)) and Richard was descended from Nicholas his grandson (his father was William). Although I still need to work out which Thomas married Mary Spring the ultimate way back is the same result - Nicholas and Robert Blake as my two Blake lines at Andover and they were brothers.

Andover Parish Registers - 16

Another day of Andover Parish Registers and I continued with the marriages completing up to October 1625. The last couple of pages have been particularly difficult and there isn't any improvement to the end of this first register for the marriages. None the less I now have 515 marriages (a number of them partial with only the groom or the bride). I have managed though to find some of the old families that lived in this area represented which is quite handy as I work on my Blake, Madgwick, Spring lines. I still need to order the Blake wills but wanted to have a look at these early registers to see exactly which ones might be helpful to me.

Today, my youngest daughter ran her first marathon and she finished. That completed our family event for the Ottawa Race Weekend. The three of us spend the entire year getting ready (as time is available) for this one weekend event although my daughters run/walk at other events throughout the year I only do the one event.

Other than that the day was a beautiful one in terms of weather not too dreadfully hot although some found it quite warm to run the 42 kilometres and it was warmer than yesterday.

Tomorrow I hope to finish the marriages (there are seven pages left) for Andover. Then I can start the burials and I hope to learn quite a bit about the Blake family in early Andover. Burial registers are not on the IGI to any extent (infant burials are sometimes extracted) so this will be all new information for about 70 to 80% of the entries. Often enough in the older registers the priest recorded the name of the father if a child or the name of the spouse which is extremely helpful. Also location may be recorded thus permitting me to determine the particular family of the same surname.

Andover Parish Registers - 8

I have now completed the transcription of the Andover Parish Registers for baptisms to October 1621. That is a total of 1690 baptisms. The Blake lines are thinning out as they moved to Abbotts Ann, Penton Mewsey, Monxton, Upper Clatford, Kimpton, and others in the area of Andover. I will be looking for the Spring, Drew, Madgwick, and Hellier families as I move on through the register.

That was pretty well all of the transcription that I did today. I spent a couple of hours on Genuki and I need to continue with adding parish register transcriptions that I have received. I also have a number of pictures to add to the villages that we visited last year when we were in Hampshire.

We went for a 3Km walk today and a 14 Km bike ride. As well I hung the clothes on the line. We have managed to do that for the entire month of April and hope to continue right through to the end of October. It saves on electricity usage.

All in all an interesting day. We are watching as the alert level rises from the WHO regarding the swine flu. So far no cases in Ottawa.