About Forestchild's Family Tree
Please sign in to see more. This site is dedicated to my mother. If it were not for her extensive memory of names, places and anecdotes, it would be a great deal less interesting. She used to tell me stories about
my family, both her side and my Dad's, when I was a child and, in doing so, implanted a fascination
and a determination to find out more.
I am finding tracing my family history really interesting, not just in the discovery of my family
origins but also in how it relates to social history. My Brinkworth ancestors originate from Gloucestershire. It is interesting to discover how the decline of the Cotswold woollen industry led
to various Brinkworths, Alders and Lustys moving to Australia, New Zealand, the USA and Canada. My
own branch of the family moved only as far as Wolverhampton to find employment in the developing
railway system.
I am fascinated by the way the railway theme runs through my family. My gr gr grandfather Brinkworth
was an inspector and his son, my great grand uncle a train driver. My gr grandfather Harris was a
porter. My grandfather Brinkworth was a carriage builder for a while and later he and my parents ran
a pub where the customers were largely railway workers. No wonder I have always loved trains and my
present home overlooks a
railway line!
Like many other people, when I started tracing my family history I rather hoped I might find a connection to a famous person or a well known event. Eventually I discovered that Jack Bodell, ex
British heavyweight boxing champion is a fourth cousin once removed. He is a direct descendant of
John Doyle my 3x great grandfather. There is also a strong possibility that I am descended from Richard Pendril, one of the Pendrill brothers who hid Charles II in the oak tree. My 3x great grandfather was William Rogers of Wolverhampton. His parents were called Richard and Sarah and the
only couple I have found in the right time frame are Richard Rogers and Sarah Bate who married at
Codsall in 1792. Is is very likely that this Richard Rogers is descended from Ann Pendrill daughter
of Richard.
My great great grandmother Ann Wilson worked for William Davenport the manufacturer of earthenware
and her sister worked for the Wedgewoods. My husband is probably distantly related to Simon Raven
the novelist. I am still looking for the royal connection, but I have recently discovered that my 3x
gr grandmother was Sarah Beresford and that all of the Beresfords descend from a Derbyshire family
who are connected to the Plantagenets, so I am almost there!
One of the things that really thrilled me was the discovery that I have ancestors from my home town
of Shrewsbury. I grew up there but both my parents were from Wolverampton and I didn't know then
that there were family connections. Not only was my paternal grandfather born there when his family
moved there for a few years in the 1870s but both of my maternal grandfather's grandmothers are from
that area. I truly am a Shropshire lass.
I think the most interesting person in my tree is my 4x great grandmother Elizabeth who lived to be
101, dying in 1864, and was still working as a laundress at 98! She was born in Stafford Elizabeth Harding.
She married twice, first to John Orton from whom I am descended and later to John Hughes. I have a cup which I inherited from her great granddaughter Marion(Mary Ann) Rogers with John and Eliza Hughes 1841 on it. It looks like a christening cup but I haven't worked out what the occasion was. Her granddaughter Harriet was born in 1841 but, according to her christening record, she had different Godparent.
Perhaps one of the reasons I have a need to trace my family history is because I am the only grandchild of both sets of grandparents. As a child I had a large extended family but it was all in
my grandparents generation, and by the time I was in my early teens most of them had passed on. My
maternal grandmother had 11 brothers and sisters but I only ever knew 4 of my great aunts. Of those
only two had children. My paternal grandmother had five brothers but I never met any of them, though
I did get to know the daughter of one later on. I must have a large number of second cousins I have
never met and I would love to find some of them.
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