Ellin Martin (c 1600 – 1649) a Bride in Ringwould, Kent – 52 Ancestors #15

Posted on April 14, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Ellin Martin was born around 1600, possibly in Great Hardres (Hadres,) and was married to Sylvester Eastye November 24, 1625 in the church in Ringwould, Kent. He died before 1667 when his daughter was married. Ellen died in 1649 with a will that tells us at that time she was living in Waldershare. Documentation by other researchers states that both documents, her marriage and her will, respectively, state that she was “of Great Hardres,” but I have not seen evidence of this in either document. I find it difficult to believe this very specific piece of information was not located someplace, though because it is too specific, and a bit distant, to have been grabbed out of thin air.

The location called Great Hardres in the record indicating where Ellen Martin was born is now called Upper and Lower Hardres, noted as twin villages. We did not get to visit either as they are about 20 miles distant and much closer to Canterbury. If Ellen indeed was born here, they it’s likely that this church is ripe with her relatives and ancestors.

I’m not terribly clear what record indicated that Ellen was in fact born in Great Hardres. It’s reported to be her marriage record from 1625 in Ringwould, but transcribed records provided by the church do not include or indicate this information. What this means is that it’s quite likely that relevant information to these records may not all have been transcribed and it would probably be worth our while to have these records retranscribed, including Martin records from Ringwould. This information could also be in the Bishop’s returns, the records that were supposedly duplicates sent periodically by the church to the Bishop.

I am still somewhat baffled about how she would have met Robert Estes who lived some 20+ miles distant. That’s a long way to walk and that was the transportation available at the time. It’s more plausible that her family moved to Ringwould, in which case, there might well be additional records that contain valuable information. There are some Martin records in Ringwould’s church records, but not many.

The church below is St. Peter and St. Paul at Upper Hardres Court. Parts of this church date from the 1200s. A newer church was built 3 miles away in the twin village of Lower Hardres in the 1800s, but this would have been the church in which Ellen Martin was baptized in about 1600. I would surely love to see these church records.

Sylvester married on 24 November 1625, at Ringwould, Kent, Ellin Martin. Ellin was born about 1600 and died in 1649 at Ringwould, Kent, two years after the birth of her last child, our ancestor, Abraham. Ellin’s will states she was born at Waldershire, but at her marriage she reportedly gave her origin as Great Hadres, and her name perhaps as “Hellen Martine.” I don’t see any birth location reflected in the original records below.

Here is the entire page that includes their marriage. You can see that this was a small church, with only 2 marriages that year, 14 christenings and about as many burials.

The church at Ringwould was certainly beautiful and served as a respite for me that fine fall day in Kent as well. It seems that Jim and I had a bit of excitement with the rental car, and just suffice it to say that I desperately needed a break, even though we had only driven about 6 miles, on the wrong side of the road of course, from where we rented our car in Dover. But that hair-raising story will have to wait.

The village of Ringwould was first recorded more than 200 years before the Domesday survey, in an Anglo-Saxon Charter dated 861 AD under the name of Roedligwealda (the forest of Hredel’s people). The site of a Roman period farm has been identified close to the present Ripple windmill; which is in the parish, although metal detector finds and other relics which have been found, suggest that the area was populated well before the Roman invasion. The oldest coin ever found in England was discovered by a metal detectorist working close to Ringwould. It seems probable that the village was established sometime during the Anglo-Saxon period, probably in the 6^th century AD, and certainly well before the Norman Conquest of 1066.

The village of Ringwould has about 350 residents and is about the size today that it was when our ancestors lived nearby or in the village itself. The church connects both front and back street and is, in essence, the center of the village. It was also the center of village life. Musters were help here for defense and below the church in the field, target practice was held with arrows hewn from the cedar trees in the churchyard.

The walkway to the church through the center of the village remains today. It used to be a cart path, and it had to be at least 30 inches wide in order to accommodate the width of 2 pall bearers and a casket.

However, on that special day, on Monday, November 24, 1625 there are no caskets approaching the church, but instead, a wedding party. After walking past the old forge, the building on the right, the gate to the church yard would be up ahead. Inside the gate would be the gravestones of all of those relatives who had gone ahead, and perhaps a few siblings who never made it beyond childhood. This was not an anonymous place. There is no room for grief today, although the bride may have paused for a moment to quietly pay her respects if her parents were in the churchyard waiting silently for her, or perhaps her grandparents, as they motioned her inside with feathered, wispy fingers.

When Sylvester and Ellen got married, the bride entered from the doorway of the church and the first part of the service was actually conducted in the doorway. I’m thinking that in Catholic times, it would have been a blessing or cleansing of some sort. Ellen would have walked up the walk to the church, in the center of Ringwould, and into this door the day she married Sylvester.

Many of the events of their lives together would transpire here as well, including, just 10 months later, the baptism of their first child.

Sylvester and Ellin Martin Estes had the following children. Note that descendants of females with bolded names would be potentially be mitochondrial DNA candidates.

1. Robert Eastes, baptized 10 September 1626, Ringwould, Kent, died 1692 and buried 23 June 1692, Waldershire, Kent, married Elizabeth, who died in 1676 at Waldershire, Kent, and was buried 8 August 1676. Married second Margaret Coachman, 26 June 1688, Hadres, Kent. Children: Robert (1652), Elizabeth (1653), Susan (1655), Silvester (1657-1692) of Waldershare, Kent;

2. Anne Eastes, baptized 25 November 1627 at Ringwould, Kent, died young;

3. Silvester Eastes, (a female) baptized 31 May 1629 at Ringwould, Kent, married a Nash.

4. Susan Eastes, baptized 30 March 1631 at Ringwould, Kent.

5. Thomas Eastes, baptized 20 January 1633, Ringwould, Kent, died 15 April 1682, Pelham, Kent, married Sarah and had children: John (1665) of Waldershare, Kent, and later of Acrise, Kent.

6. Richard Eastes, baptized 5 October 1634, at Ringwould, Kent.

7. Mary Eastes, baptized 2 October 1636 at Ringwould, Kent.

8. Anne Eastes, born 1637 at Ringwould, Kent. [There is some doubt as to whether this child belongs to this family.]

9. Nicholas Eastes, yeoman, baptized 9 December 1638 at Nonington, Kent, married Jane Birch, died 1665, Sutton, Kent. Children: John (?-1715) of Sutton.

10. Elizabeth Eastes, born 1639/40 at Nonington, Kent.

11. Ellen Eastes, baptized 11 December 1642, Nonington, Kent, died 1729 and buried 26 December 1729 at St Leonard’s, Kent. Married Moses Eastes, 23 December 1667, at Deal, Kent. Moses was baptized 12 November 1643 at St Leonard’s, Kent and died at Deal, 19 March 1707/8 & buried 23 March, at St Leonard’s, Kent. Children: Richard (1667/8-1668), Constant (1669-1708), Aaron (1671) & Samuel (1674/5), of St Leonard’s, Kent. Ellen was the second wife of Moses Eastes, her second cousin once removed.

12. John Eastes, baptized 29 December 1644 at Nonington, Kent.

13. Abraham Eastes, born 1647, probably at Nonington, Kent, married Anne Burton (widow), 29 December 1672, at Worth, Kent. Abraham them immigrated to America and married Barbara, long rumoured to be Barbara Brock, without one shred of evidence. Abraham died November 21, 1720 in King and Queen County, Virginia.

Sylvester and Ellen’s children born between 1626 and 1636 were baptized in Ringwould, but the ones born between 1638 and 1644 were baptized in Nonington. There is no baptismal record for Anne born in 1637 or for our Abraham born in 1647, but based on his brother’s 1644 baptismal record in Nonington, it’s presumed Abraham was born there was well. St. Mary’s church in Nonington is shown below, although we were unable to visit.

Nonington is about half way between Ellen Martin’s potiential birth location in Great Hardres (Hadres) and the Ringwould area where the rest of the Estes family was located, although there are no further Estes records and no Martin records in the church records there.

Suffice it to say that indeed, St. Nicholas church in Ringwould is steeped and bathed in the history of the Estes family as well as that of their wives. Many Estes children, my ancestors, were baptized in this very baptismal font.

Most of Ellen’s children were baptized here.

Ellen and Sylvester regularly attended church in Ringwould. Sylvester was sometimes a church warden there according to Deal Parish records.

Sylvester died sometime after Abraham’s birth in 1647 and before his wife, Ellen, died, with a will in 1649. The last family record at Ringwould is 1644.

Ellen died in 1649 at Waldershire, just down the road from Ringwould, before she was 50 years of age. Many of her children were young. Abraham, the youngest, was only 2 years old. It must have pained her greatly to know that she was going to leave them, and in doing so, leave them as orphans.

In Ellen’s will, shown below, she tells us who her children are and makes the best provisions she can to care for them. It’s the one peek at her life that we have, directly from her….albeit probably through an attorney or equivalent of the time. One thing is for sure, the woman did have some financial means. This family was not poverty stricken.

In the name of God, Amen, the fifth day of April 1649, I, Elin Estes [sic] of the parish of Waldershire [sic] in the County of Kent widow, being sick in body but in perfect memory thanks be given to God, do make and ordain this my last Will and Testament in manner and form following,

First, I bequeath my soul to Almighty God hoping by the mercy and merits of Jesus Christ to enjoy Everlasting life and my body to the Earth to be buried at the discretion of my Executor hereafter named.

First, I give to my son, Thomas Estes, twenty pounds of current money of England to be paid to him as followeth, that is to say, ten pounds at his age of twenty and one years of age and ten pounds when my youngest child shall come to the age of twenty and one years.

Item, I give to my son, Richard Estes, the sum of five pounds when he shall attain to the age of twenty and one years.

Item, I give to my son, Nicholas Estes, fifteen pounds to be paid to him when he shall attain the age of twenty and one years.

Item, I give to my son, John Estes, twelve pounds to be paid to him when he shall attain the age of one and twenty years.

Item, I give to my son, Abraham Estes, the sum of twelve pounds to be paid to him when he shall attain to the age of one and twenty years.

Item, I give to my daughter, Anne Estes, twelve pounds to be paid to her at her age of four and twenty years or day of marriage which shall first happen.

Item, I give to my daughter, Silvester Nash, five pounds when my youngest child cometh to the age of twenty and one years.

Item, I give to my daughter, Susan Estes, the sum of twelve pounds to be paid to her when she shall attain to the age of one and twenty years or day of marriage which shall first happen.

Item, I give to my daughter, MaryEstes, ten pounds to be paid to her when she shall attain to the age of one and twenty years or day of marriage which shall first happen.

Item, I give to my daughter, Elizabeth Estes, ten pounds to be paid to her [next few words crossed through but said: “when she shall attain”] at her age of one and twenty years or day of marriage which shall first happen.

Item, I give to Ellin Estes, my daughter, ten pounds to be paid to her when she shall attain to the age of one and twenty years or day of marriage which shall first happen.

And I do nominate and appoint Robert Estes, my son, whole and sole Executor of this my last Will and Testament and I give to my said son, Robert Estes, all my goods, chattels and household stuff paying my debts and legacies and funeral expenses.

In witness that this is my last Will, I do hereby publish and declare this to be my last Will and Testament in the presence of those whose names are hereunder written:

Thomas Jenkin, John Peers

Ellin Estes, her mark

Her will was proved at London before Sir Nathaniel Brent, Knight, doctor of laws and Master or keeper of the Prerogative Court the sixth day of December in the year of our Lord God one thousand six hundred fifty one by the oath of Robert Estes, the son of the deceased and Executor therein named to whom administration of all and singular the goods, chattels and debts of the said deceased which any manner of ways sworn the same will was granted and committed, he being first legally sworn by virtue of a commission in that behalf issued forth well and truly to administer the same.

I have always wondered why Ellin’s will was probated in London.

At time time of Ellen’s death, she would probably have been attending the church at Waldershare, All Saints Church, which is no longer in service. Like many others in the area, it has a rebuilt Victorian Nave. Jim and I were not able to visit, but it is found on Sandwich Road, Waldershare, near Dover.

The proportions of the building are dramatically affected by the two red-brick chapels on either side of the chancel, both of which were built after Ellen’s death, so the church she knew would have been the original one without the additions.

This is likely where Anne is buried, unless her family took her down the road to Ringwould to be buried with her husband, assuming he was buried at Ringwould. It would be interesting to check the Waldershare church burial records to see if she is listed. For that matter, Sylvester could be buried there as well as Abraham’s christening record.

Ellen’s eldest son, Robert, born in 1626, would found the Waldershare Estes line. Interestingly, Robert in 1670 and again in 1680 donated money towards the redemption of English captives “out of ye Turkish slavery.

While we have managed to piece together some of Ellen’s short life, we are still left with the question of who her parents were. It feel like it’s most likely that they were all members of the same church and lived in the same area. A young couple has to live in relative proximity to court.

The church in Ringwould was gracious enough to provide their transcribed church records in a binder. I photographed the entire grouping and later extracted the relevant surnames.

Ringwould Church Records

Ringwould church records begin in 1569 and include christenings, burials and beginning in 1572, marriages. I did not copy any beyond 1746. These records were transcribed from the originals and provided at the church in Ringwould, where I photographed the pages and have extracted various surnames from their transcription.

Based on the records shown below, the Martin family in Ringwould, living the before Ellen’s marriage to Sylvester, appear to descend from the progenitor, William, who married first Margaret Clark in 1576 and then Elizabeth Hart in 1584. Both wives died, Elizabeth passing in 1597. The only name resembling Ellen is Emlin born in 1580, which would make this person too old to be having children as late as 1647. Based on these records, there are obviously some records missing, such as Thomas’s wedding and the birth of Nicholas who married in 1621.

From the looks of things, Ellen, if born in roughly 1600 could have been a child of a third marriage of William whose wife died in 1697, although he is referred to as “an aged man” at his death in 1614. If he was just age 25 when he first married in 1576, he would have been 63 in 1614. That was certainly aged for that time. However, even “aged men” could and did father children. Ellen could also have been the daughter of Thomas who would have been age 23 in 1600. If that is the case, then William Martin and Margaret Clarke would have been her grandparents. Of course, it’s also possible that her parents had already passed away and she was sent here to live with Martin relatives. It’s worth noting here that her first male child was named Robert for Sylvester’s father but their second male child is named Thomas. There is no William.

Martin

March 5, 1575 – Roger Howell and Beatrix Martyn, married

Nov. 19, 1576 – William Martin and Margaret Clarke, married

April 16, 1677 – Thomas Martyn, son of William christened

Nov. 1, 1579 – Nicholas Martyn, son of William christened

Nov. 8, 1579 – Nicholas Martin, son of William buried

Jan. 22, 1580 – Emlin, daughter of William christened

April 23, 1584 – John Martyn, son of William christened
May 24, 1584 – Margaret Martyn, wife of William buried
June 24, 1584 – William Martyn and Elizabeth Harte married
July 25, 1584 – John, son of William buried

April 21, 1597 – Elizabeth Martyn, wife of William buried

Jan. 10, 1607 – Margaret Martin, daughter of Thomas christened

April 13, 1614 – William Martin, an aged man, buried

April 28, 1614 – Margaret Martin, daughter of Thomas buried

May 29, 1621 – Nicolas Martin and Elizabeth Whitten married

July 23, 1622 – Margaret Martin, daughter of Nicolas christened

Nov. 24, 1625 – Silvester Esties and Ellen Martin married

Was Ellen the daughter of Thomas or William Martin?

Note – In Ellen supposedly was born in Great Hardres, although that location is probably at least 20 miles distant and it begs the question of why the family came to Ringwould, and when. However, familiarity and family ties in that area may also explain why the Estes family moved back in that direction some 10 miles to Nonington during the English Civil War. However, one of her sons did marry someone from Hardres, so it’s certainly possible. This marriage makes me wonder if there were relatives in that area.

July 29, 1627 – Thomas Martin, son of Nicholas christened
Aug. 6, 1627 – Thomas Martin, son of Nicholas buried

July 27, 1628 – Jane Martin, daughter of Nicholas christened

Jan. 9, 1630 – Thomas Martin, son of Nicholas christened

Sept. 15, 1633 – Ellenor Martin, daughter of Nicholas christened

April 12, 1635 – Nicholas Martin, son of Thomas and Elizabeth

Jan 21, 1637 – John Martin, son of Nicholas and Elizabeth

September 13, 1640 – Elizabeth Martin, daughter of Nicholas and Elizabeth christened

April 4, 1643 – Mary Martin, daughter of Nicholas christened

Nov. 14, 1644 – Wilman Martin, wife of Thomas, buried

Dec. 29, 1647 – John Martin, son of Nicholas buried

March 24, 1664 –William Martin buried

April 16, 1688 – Daniel Martin and Margaret Bradly married

Feb. 28, 1699 – Nicholas Martin, buried

April 16, 1716 – Mary Martin buried

Ellen Martin’s DNA

In order to obtain Ellen’s mitochondrial DNA, which is passed from mothers to all of their children, but only passed on by their mother, we would need to find a female child of Ellen who also had female children, to the present generation. In the present generation, the descendant can be a male, so long as they descend from Ellen through all females.

To begin this process, we only have information that two of the daughters lived to adulthood, although we can’t assume that the rest didn’t.

Of the children we know of who did live to adulthood, Ellen married Moses Eastes and had one daughter, Constant, born in 1699, christened at St. Leonard’s Church in Deal, and who subsequently died in 1708.

The other daughter who may have married is Silvester who reportedly married a Nash.

Unfortunately, we have no information about any other daughters, and the presumption is that they died young. Of course, presumptions are related to assumptions.

The only other possibility of obtaining Ellen Martin’s mitochondrial DNA is to figure out who her parents were, and then figuring out if she had any sisters who had daughters to the current generation.

I turned to both Rootsweb and Ancestry to see if perhaps my records were incomplete for this family. Unfortunately, the few female lines there are daughtered out quickly, and as for the rest of the daughters….maybe they didn’t die young. Maybe someone knows something about this family. They don’t seem to have been researched, so perhaps either there is a goldmine waiting to be harvested, or the lines have died out, which is why no one has documented this lineage.

I have a scholarship for either Ellen’s mitochondrial DNA or the Martin Yline from this group of individuals. In the Martin surname project, there seem to be three Martins from Kent, but I can’t tell who is who, assuming that any one of the three could be mine. Bottom line, I would love to have someone from this family line test.

If this is your Martin line, please give me a shout. If nothing else, we can compare records and autosomal DNA!!!

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Hugh Bowling (1591-1651) – DNA Rare as Hen’s Teeth – 52 Ancestors #14

Posted on April 4, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Thomas Speake, the immigrant that founded the Maryland line of the Speak(e)(s) family America, was born about 1634, had immigrated by 1660 and was married to Elizabeth Bowling by November of 1663. They lived in St. Mary’s County, Maryland. They had only two known children, John, known as John the Innkeeper, born in 1665, and Bowling Speak born in 1674. We know about their children, because Thomas died August 6, 1681 and he appointed James Bowling, his brother-in-law, guardian of his minor children, naming them.

The Speak family who descends from Thomas Speak who married Elizabeth Bowling carries as many genes from the Bowling family as from the Speak line. We just don’t think of it that way because the Speak surname has been passed down, and of course, the Bowling name, except as a first name, Bowling Speak, and then a middle name, Thomas Bowling Speake, did not get passed to future generations.

The Bowling Y-line DNA would be that of Elizabeth’s father who is believed to be Hugh Bowling, christened August 6, 1591 in Chorley, Lancashire, and died Sept. 7, 1651, buried in Standish, married to Ellen Finch in 1616.

Before our trip to England, we located some Bowling males, and thanks to Shirley Platt, Jerry Bowling agreed to have his Y DNA tested for a special kind of mutation called a SNP (single nucleotide polymorphism) that tells us about his haplogroup or his deep ancestral clan.

About 50% of the men of Europe descend from one group of settlers, but in our case, we’ve twice been lucky now, because our Speak line comes from the Dinaric area of the Alps and our Bowling line is even more unique. The Bowling males from Chorley, in Lancashire, carry haplogroup T1. What is T1, you ask? Rare, that’s what it is!!! We’re talking hens-teeth rare here.

And not only is it rare overall, it’s extremely rare in England.

Jerry has a total of 15 low resolution DNA matches, and of those, 3 are other Bowlings, 6 are to other English surnames, of which 3 are Dutton, and the balance are to men from either Portugal or Spain. All of the English surname men match Jerry exactly, and all of the Spanish/Portuguese matches carry one mutation difference. This indicates that the Bowlings are more closely related to the English men than the Spanish/Portuguese men. For example, the Stockton family is from just up the road, in Cheshire.

As we move to higher resolution markers, meaning matches closer in time, the other surnames all fall away and the Bowling men only match other Bowling men. They should be more closely related to Bowling men than men who match genetically but carry different surnames, unless an “adoption” of some sort, name change or illegitimate birth has occurred in the line.

This match with Iberian men doesn’t necessarily mean that the ancestors of the Bowlings were Iberian. It could mean that the Bowling men and the Iberian men both share a common ancestor from elsewhere, with both groups having migrated from that central location. Or, it could mean that the Bowling ancestors were Iberian. Perhaps we can find clues in the history of the population migration pattern of haplogroup T1. Let’s see what we can find.

At Family Tree DNA, there are haplogroup as well as surname projects. People who share a common haplogroup join the haplogroup project that matches their haplogroup designation in order for the population spread and migration pattern of the haplogroup to be studied. Generally, the haplogroup project administrators know more about their haplogroups than almost anyone else. Often they have a personal interest, carrying that haplogroup themselves. They are also often out in front of the scientists who define subgroups. Science is slow-moving by its very nature, and in genetic genealogy, sometimes scientists move so slowly that the science is obsolete by the time it’s actually announced. In other words, the field sometimes moves faster than the scientists can keep up.

In this case, Family Tree DNA, who waits for academic consensus before assigning new haplogroups, shows the SNP marker M70 as defining haplogroup T1, but the administrators, based on both STR markers and SNPs, have grouped Jerry with a small subgroup of people who are from ….are you ready for this….Egypt, Saudi Arabia (2), Bangladesh, Spain, Yemen (2), Bulgaria and the United Arab Emirates. Of this entire grouping, Jerry Bowling is the only individual from the British Isles or even from Europe except for Spain and Bulgaria. This group is labeled at the Alpha-1-Y group. Keep in mind, however, that not all testers join haplogroup projects and it’s obvious from this information that Jerry’s English matches have not joined.

So, in timeline order, the Bowlings are the most closely related to other Bowlings males, then the English non-Bowling men they match, then the Iberian men they match, then the Alpha-1-Y haplogroup T group. On the map above, showing the Bowling matches, the location in Turkey is believed to be the birthplace of haplogroup T.

What do we know about haplogroup T, the parent of subgroup T1?

Haplogroup T is very rare in Europe, with less than 1% of European men carrying haplogroup T. It is much more common in the Middle East, portions of South Asia and portions of Northern and Eastern Africa.

In addition, the distribution of haplogroup T is very spotty, with some areas virtually devoid of this haplogroup, while in other locations we find rich pockets. The map below shows the distribution of haplogroup T.

On the map above, haplogroup T is found most often in Northern and Eastern Africa, in the Middle East and South Asia and in spotty locations in Southern Europe. It’s believed that haplogroup T originated in the Taurus Mountains in Eastern Turkey about 25,000 or 30,000 years ago, with subgroup T1 being born in the Middle East between 10,000 and 25,000 years ago.

A Relief of the Taurus Mountains is shown below. Cyprus is the island just to the south of the mountain range.

So how, then, did our haplogroup T ancestors get to Europe? And not just Europe, but the western periphery of Europe?

There are four scenarios that have historical evidence and fit what we know of the migration path of haplogroup T. Any or all of these could have come into play, or perhaps another scenario we don’t know about today.

Scenario 1 – The Phoenicians

The Neolithic period, as the introduction of agriculture was known, began about 12,000 years ago in the Levant and had arrived in Europe by about 7,000 years ago. It took another 3000 years to spread across Europe from Southeast to Northwest, moving at the rate of .6 -1.3 km per year, or between a third and 4/5^ths of a mile, or between 400 and 1400 yards, just enough for the next generation to move next door to find available, unoccupied farmland.

The path to Europe was originally thought to be through the Caucus region, present day Turkey, Georgia and countries East of the Black Sea, but alternate routes are a probability and for our haplogroup T1 ancestors, a certainty. Another route was likely a coastal Mediterranean route or a slightly different route that bypassed the northern Caucus area for the easier coastal route, crossing into Turkey at Istanbul and then taking the overland route in Europe. These routes would also explain the frequency of haplogroup T found in the Balkan area, into Italy, the Iberian peninsula and throughout the Mediterranean in addition to northern Europe.

The coastal route associated with Phoenician trading is a strong possibility. Phoenician traders, whether they settled or regularly visited, would have deposited their Y-line DNA for centuries in various trading and settlement areas, as shown in the following map from the paper “Identifying Genetic Traces of Historical Expansions: Phoenician Footprints in the Mediterranean”.

As you can see, illustrated on the map below from the National Geographic Genographic project, the population migration route for haplogroup T parallels these settlements.

The Phoenicians were dominant traders 2000-3000 years ago. The following map shows both Phoenician (yellow) and Greek (red) trade routes in 500 BC. The route is extremely suggestive of correlation when compared with the frequency charts compiled from research papers. Many of the locations with the highest frequencies in the Mediterranean today were trade destinations of the Phoenicians or Greeks.

Scenario 2 – The Jews

Haplogroup T is found in very low levels throughout Europe, but they tend to be clustered and are often significantly higher in areas where Jewish families are known to have settled. Below, we see a haplogroup breakdown within the Ashkenazi Jews. This, of course, implies that even if haplogroup T was already resident within Europe, additional families were part of the Jewish diaspora. Clearly not all European men who are haplogroup T were of the Jewish faith, but many are. Haplogroup T dates much further back in time than the Jewish faith, so many people will be distantly related to those of the Jewish faith, but not Jewish themselves.

The Rapalye/Rapparlie Family

We have actual evidence of a haplogroup T1 family found in Germany, France and the Netherlands and having a history of being a Sephardic Jewish from Spain who left with the edict of Nantes in 1492 evicting all Jews. I am intimately familiar with this family because my family in Mutterstadt, Germany is the Rapparlien family, referred to in the Bible, originally from the coast of France at Calais.

The Rapparlie family crest, shown above, is taken from the Rapparlie family Bible in Mutterstadt. The information on the family crest translates as follows:

“Rapparlie. An ancestral Spanish family which came in the 16th century to the Netherlands. From where (our ancestor) Josef Georg, who lived in Leuven, came to Frankfurt (the one of the river Main). He obtained citizen rights there in 1820.”

The translator adds information telling us that the Rapparlie family is likely to have fled from Spain to the Netherlands because of the Decree of Alhambra of 1492, an edict expelling all of the Jews from Spain.

Estimates are that between 165,000 and 800,000 people were evicted with about 28,000 displaced individuals migrating to what is today France, Holland, Germany and England. These displaced Jews became the Shepardic Jews, and were forced to convert to Catholicism before the expulsion, becoming therefore known as Conversos. Their conversions were often insincere, only a method to survive persecution, and therefore they would have been ripe pickings for the rebellion against Catholicism accompanying the Protestant reformation some years later.

The Rapparlie (and variant spellings) family in Valenciennes were known to be silk weavers, and historical records are full of references to Jewish silk weavers in Spain and other Middle Eastern and Northern African locations in the Middle Ages and prior to their eviction from Spain in 1492.

Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews

The Ashkenazi Jews were known to have been in Europe as early as the Middle Ages in the 4^th century. It is unknown if this early group survived intact, but Jews are again prevalent in the records by the 10^th century. Most of the Jews were clustered in cities, trade centers, as their high rates of literacy and knowledge of trades made them successful and desirable, if sometimes looked down upon because the Christian church forbade Christians from participating in usury (money lending in exchange for interest), which the Jews embraced heartily.

Conversely, the Jews maintained their separate living quarters, communities and family units, practiced endogamy (married only within their Jewish community) and they too looked down up on their neighbors. Unfortunately, this mutual distrust and antipathy was the seed of eventual anti-Semitic discrimination and ultimately, attempted genocide.

The Sephardic Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492 and again in 1497, and many settled in Europe, but the two Jewish groups tended to maintain separate communities as their beliefs, practices and languages had come to differ in the centuries they had both been separated from their motherland.

Following the Roman takeover of Judea, the Jews were exiled from Jerusalem in 70AD. They continued to be residents of Palestine for several hundred years, but groups began to look for opportunities elsewhere and they began to be found in other locations in Mesopotamia and dispersed within the Mediterranean region. The largest concentrations were in the Levant, Egypt, Asia Minor, Greece and Italy, including Rome itself. Smaller communities are recorded in Gaul (France), Spain and North Africa. Christianity became the official religion of Rome and Constantinople (current day Istanbul) in 380 and Jews were increasingly marginalized.

The Germanic invasions of the Western Roman Empire in the 5^th century by tribes such as the Visigoths, Franks, Lombards and Vandals caused massive economic and social instability within western Europe, contributing to its decline. In the late Roman Empire, Jews are known to have lived in Cologne and Trier as well as in what is now France. However, it is unclear whether there is any continuity between those Roman communities and the distinct Ashkenazi Jewish culture that began to emerge about 500 years later.

After 800 AD, Charlemagne’s unification of former Frankish lands with northern Italy and Rome brought a brief period of stability and unity in western Europe which created new opportunities for Jewish merchants to settle once again north of the Alps. Many Jewish merchants embraced occupations in finance and commerce. From that time to the present, the Ashkenazi are well documented in Europe.

Unfortunately, their lives in Europe were not always stable, and with the onset of the Crusades, they were evicted from England in 1290, France in 1392 and parts of Germany in the 1400s, pushing them eastward into Poland, Lithuania and Russia. By the 1400s, the Ashkenazi Jewish Communities in Poland were the largest Jewish communities of the Diaspora. This area which eventually fell under the domination of Russia. Austria and Prussia (Germany) would remain the center of Ashkenazi Jewry until the Holocaust. A painting on the previous page of Ashkenazi Jews praying on Yom Kippur was painted in 1878 by Maurycy Gottlieb in his hometown of Drohobych.

During the Holocaust, of the 8.8 million Jews living in Europe at the beginning of World War II, about 6 million, more than two-thirds, were systematically murdered because of their Jewish faith or heritage. More than 91% of the Polish Jews died, 82% in
the Ukraine and between 50 and 90% in other European nations (Germany, France, Hungary and the Baltic states). Sephardic communities suffered similar depletions in a few countries including Greece, the Netherlands and the former Yugoslavia. At this time, many Jews began to immigrate, to the United States, Canada, Israel, Australia and Argentina where they and their descendants are found today. At right, refugee Jews are portrayed arriving in London, poor and destitute, but alive.

Scenario 3 – Phoenician, Jewish or Maybe Moors?

First, let me say we simply don’t have the definitive answer to this question, but let’s use what records we do have to try to narrow the possibilities.

The Bowling family first has records from 1520 in Chorley, in Lancashire, England. This Bowling family was, indeed, Catholic, as was the rest of England in 1520. The Protestant Reformation had not yet happened and wouldn’t until in the 1530s, specifically, 1534 when Henry VIII declared himself the head of the church in England and broke ties with Rome.

After that, the Bowling family, along with the Speak family, the Finch family and others would staunchly refuse to become Protestants.

It’s hard for me to believe that the Bowling family was Jewish in 1492, when only 28 years later, or one generation, we find them in England, and not coastal England, but in the middle of Lancashire. Even harder for me to believe is that they would become Catholic, the religion that persecuted them so terribly and forced the Jews to leave Spain in such desperate straits. If they were going to become Catholic, they would simply have converted and stayed in Spain. It would have been a lot easier that way.

They could have been Phoenician. They could also have been Moorish, as the Moors from the Middle East and North Africa invaded the Iberian Peninsula in 711 and called the territory Al-Andalus, an area which at different times comprised Gibraltar, most of Spain and Portugal, and parts of France. There was also a Moorish presence in what is now southern Italy, primarily in Sicily which also has a significant amount of haplogroup T, although none that matches the Bowling line.

This 13^th century painting depicts Moors in Iberia.

Medieval Spain and Portugal were the scene of almost constant warfare between Muslims and Christians. Al-Andalus sent periodic raiding expeditions to loot the Iberian Christian kingdoms, bringing back booty and slaves. In a raid against Lisbon, Portugal in 1189, for example, the Almohad caliph Yaqub al-Mansur took 3,000 female and child captives. In a subsequent attack upon Silves, Portugal in 1191, the governor of Córdoba took 3,000 Christian slaves.

Similarly, Christians sold Muslim slaves captured in war. The Knights of Malta attacked pirates and Muslim shipping, and their base became a center for slave trading, selling captured North Africans and Turks. Malta remained a slave market until well into the late 18th century. One thousand slaves were required to man the galleys (ships) of the Order.

The religious difference of the Moorish Muslims led to a centuries-long conflict with the Christian kingdoms of Europe called the Reconquista. The Fall of Granada in 1492 saw the end of the Muslim rule in Iberia.

Perhaps the history of Lancashire itself can help us understand how our ancestors might have settled in that region.

History of Lancashire

In the Domesday Book, written in 1086 after William the Conqueror conquered England in 1066, some of the lands now within Lancashire had been treated as part of Yorkshire. The area in between the Mersey and Ribble Rivers (referred to in the Domesday Book as “Inter Ripam et Mersam”) formed part of the returns for Cheshire. Although some have taken this to mean that, at this time, south Lancashire was part of Cheshire, it is not clear that this was the case, and more recent research indicates that the boundary between Cheshire and what was to become Lancashire remained the river Mersey. Once Lancashire’s initial boundaries were established in 1182, it bordered Cumberland, Westmorland, Yorkshire, and Cheshire.

Lancashire takes its name from the city of Lancaster, which itself is means ‘Roman fort on the River Lune’, combining the name of the river with the Old English cæster, which referred to a Roman fort or camp. The county was established some time after the Norman conquest when William the Conqueror gave the land between the Ribble and the Mersey, together with Amounderness, to Roger de Poitou. In the early 1090s Lonsdale, Cartmel and Furness were added to Roger’s estates to facilitate the defense of the area south of Morecambe Bay from Scottish raiding parties, which travelled round the Cumberland coast and across the bay at low water, rather than through the mountainous regions of the Lake District.

Scenario Four – Roman Soldiers, Slaves or Conscripts

From this information, we know two things. First, there was a Roman fort in this area, and second there were Scottish raiding parties. This DNA is not Scottish, so we can discount that but what it does tell us is that the fort was very probably heavily fortified and the soldiers patrolled throughout the region to protect it from the Scots.

We also know, from our visit to Chester, that a Roman fort was also located there. A little additional research yields even more interesting information, revealing a Roman fort right in the Ribble Valley at a location called Ribchester, shown below, which is located on the Ribble River half way between Gisburn, the home of the Speake family and Charnock Richard, the home of the Bowling family, about 10 miles from each.

Furthermore, this fort is much older than the Domesday Book. The first fort at Ribchester was built in timber in AD 72/73 by the Roman Twentieth Legion. The fort was renovated in the late 1st century AD and was rebuilt in stone in the early 2nd century. During the life of the fort, a village grew up around it becoming Ribchester. A fort remained at Ribchester until the 4th century AD and its remains can still be seen around the present village.

Romans also settled Sarmatians at Ribchester. In those days Ribchester was known as Bremetennacum and is known chiefly as the retirement home of the Sarmatians. Checking the distribution map, there is a high concentration of haplogroup T along the southwest Caspian Sea and a less dense concentration in western Iran and Iraq. Areas either long Iranian for millenia or well within the sphere of Iranian influence.

The map below shows the following locations:

The Lowbarrow Bridge location of the Roman fort recorded in the Domesday Book
Gisburn – home region of the Speak family
Ribchester, location of the Roman fort in the Ribble Valley
Charnock Richard, home region of the Bowling Family
Chester, location of a third Roman fort

In other areas in England, in particular, along the line of Hadrian’s Wall between England and Scotland, where we find several Roman forts and fortifications, we also find Mediterranean and North African DNA, quite a bit of it, and concentrated in pockets surrounding the forts. We know that not all Roman soldiers were Roman citizens, some were slaves and some were conscripted. Many slaves volunteered for military duty. And the Romans, of course, as soldiers will do, sometimes left their DNA behind, if they didn’t marry outright with the local females.

So Who Are We???

I really don’t think the Bowling family has a Jewish history. In part because they have no Jewish matches at all, nor matches in highly Jewish areas. Also, the known history of the family does not mesh with what would have happened historically at that time. England was not a Jewish haven, especially not the countryside. London might be another story, but Lancashire, in the Ribble Valley? I don’t think so as there is absolutely no evidence to support this.

The Bowling ancestors could have been Phoenician and found their way to the Iberian peninsula in that manner, but if they were, I would think we would see a path of matches throughout the Mediterranean, particularly on Greece, the southern end of Italy and on Sicily, and we don’t. We see Middle Eastern matches, Iberian matches and then English matches with only a couple of exceptions.

The Bowling men could be Moors, except the Moors didn’t invade the Iberian peninsula until about 300 years after the Roman occupation of England ended, meaning the Romans were no longer sending troops to England so the dates with Moors are problematic.

The scenario that fits best is that the Bowling ancestors were likely slaves or conscripted soldiers of the Roman legion that conquered England beginning in AD43. The Roman occupation continued until about the year 500 when the Saxons invaded. This means that Romans lived in Britain, among the British for about 400 years which equates to about 16 generations, plenty of time to assimilate with the local population.

The Roman empire from the year 43AD to 409 is shown below.

In time, slaves and captives became part of the Roman army, willingly or not, conscripts or otherwise, that invaded and subsequently ruled England for the next 400 years. Slavery was part of Roman life and captive soldiers and their family were traditionally sold into slavery. Note, on the map above, that the entire Mediterranean basin fell under the Roman rule, including several Middle Eastern locations where Bowling haplogroup matches are found.

This relief below, from Smyrna, present day Izmir, Turkey, shows a roman soldier leading 2 Turkish slaves away in chains.

Regardless of whether the Bowlings paternally are Moors, Phoenicians, Roman soldiers, Roman slaves or Jews, we share a common heritage between all of these groups – back in the Middle East before these groups were separately defined as such. Our origins are firmly tied there, for tens of thousands of years, in the land of sand and forbidding mountains, the Holy Land and the religious well from which Christianity, the Muslim faith and the Jewish religion all sprang. The Taurus Mountains and the Middle East. This is the land of our Bowling forefathers, before Lancashire…this is our homeland.

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Elizabeth Bowling and the Catholic Martyr – 52 Ancestors #13

Posted on March 28, 2014 by Roberta Estes

It’s just 13 generations between me and a Catholic martyr.

My ancestor, Elizabeth Bowling, was married to immigrant Thomas Speak(e), sometime before November of 1663, probably in St. Mary’s County, Maryland. In the fall of 2013, the Speak Family Association undertook a trip back to the homeland of both Speak and Bowling families, both from Lancashire, England, about 30 miles distant from each other. In preparation for the trip, I compiled information about the Bowling family from various sources. Aside from the DNA portion, little of this is my original research. I am grateful to all of the original contributors for their diligence and hard work, much of it done in the churches in England.

According to cousin Harold Speake, now deceased, Thomas Speak(e), who may have been an indentured servant, arrived from England sometime before 1662. We know that in 1662, he was arrested for debt, so he had been here long enough to acquire that debt.

We know that Maryland was organized as a haven for Catholics, persecuted in England, and the Speake family was indeed Catholic. They were in England, their family records being found in the original Catholic, now Protestant, church in Gisburn, and they were in the colonies as well. Bowling Speake, born in 1674, the son of Thomas Speake and Elizabeth Bowling was prosecuted and proudly pled guilty in June of 1752 for publicly drinking to the health of the “Pretender,” the Catholic and deposed King James. In other words, Bowling was Catholic and proudly and publicly so, regardless of the consequences.

The Bowling family was also Catholic in England as well as in Maryland. They lived near and in the village of Chorley and the area of Charnock Richard, some 30 miles from Gisburn, in Lancashire. The Bowling family members found themselves on the list of recusants, in other words, devout, religious warriors or stubborn, unrepentant Catholics, depending on your perspective.

On the map below, A is Chorley and B is Gisburn, both in Lancashire.

No record of the marriage of Elizabeth Bowling and Thomas Speake has been found in the UK churches, so it’s presumed that they married after both families settled in St. Mary’s County, Maryland. They probably both lived at or near Boarman’s Manor, given that Elizabeth’s brother James is recorded as living there. There was only one Catholic church in that area at that time, and both families likely attended. We were told during our visit in 2011 that the early church services were held in people’s homes. If your religion was enough to lose your land and your life for, holding and attending services was something that would have been a very important part of everyday life. And of course, they would have sought other Catholics to marry.

In his article, “The Bowlings of Boarman’s Manor,” Jeffrey Wills, Bowling family historian, tells us that the records of early Maryland give evidence of the Bowling family starting with James Bowling (1636-1693) who arrived in the province sometime before 1658. The Bowlings became associated with other Catholics who eventually settled on Boarman’s Manor in what is now Charles County, Maryland. James had no children from his two marriages, but his will makes clear that there were descendants from his siblings, John (died 1684), Thomas (died 1700) and Elizabeth who married Thomas Speake.

Jeffrey states that the family in Maryland was Catholic and possibly shoemakers by trade. Court records exist that establish relationships with a couple of people, neither of whom have been identified, but the most important clue to the Bowling origin comes from a 1734 deposition, where it is stated that John Bowling, brother to James, “came from Lancashire and left a brother there by the name of Roger Bowling” (Charles Co. Court Rec. R2, 528). Now we have the names of three brothers: John, James and Roger Bowling.

The Bowlings In Lancashire

In Lancashire, practically the only family of the Bowling name is one centered in Charnock Richard in the parish of Standish. T. C. Porteus, in his 1927 history of the parish, describes the township of Charnock Richard as “a nursery of recusants,” meaning a hotbed of Catholic nonconformity to the new Elizabethan church. Among the recusants listed there in 1628 are a John Bowling and wife. The township of Chorley is adjacent and there is a village of Chesham is about 15 miles southeast, shown on the Lancashire map below, both names that the Bowling family of Maryland used for their land holdings.

One problem with the Bowling family, and most English families of this timeframe, is that they reused every first name in every generation. That means if your father’s name was John, then one son would be named John, and one grandchild in every child’s family would be named John. If the original John had 10 living children, that means he had 1 son John and 10 grandsons John and in the next generation, using the same math, there would be 100 Johns in just the original John’s line. And every family had someone named John. If you were lucky, your ancestor was named something like Balthasar, not John. But in both the Speake and Bowling families, there were lots of Johns, James and Williams, etc.

Originally, the Bowling family that James and Elizabeth belonged to were identified as the children of Roger Bowling of Charnock Richard, a shoemaker who wrote a will 17 Sept. 1673, proved on 10 Nov. 1673. He refers to his children: John Bowling, Thomas Bowling, James Bowling, Ann Bowling, Jenet Bowling, eldest daughter Elizabeth (wife of John Catliffe). He also mentioned a grandson Roger Bowling, son of John.

However, the information about Elizabeth Bowling being married to John Catliffe, given that “our” Elizabeth married Thomas Speake, had to be reconciled. Some have suggested that John Speake, the innkeeper, might have been Thomas Speake’s child by a first, unknown, wife, with Elizabeth perhaps marrying Thomas as a widow in 1773, having Bowling in 1774. There is no evidence to support this speculation.

The Bowlings in England are not easy to unravel.

The baptisms of about fifty Bowlings are attested from the 1550 to 1650, and Roger is a name found in several generations, so locating the specific line is not straightforward. The fact that there is no baptismal record for the children mentioned in Roger’s will of 1673 suggests that there could be many more Bowlings than attested in the Anglican church records. Of course, Catholics attempted to prevent their children from being baptized in the Anglican church – and apparently often succeeded, much to the chagrin of genealogists today.

Jeffrey suggested that Elizabeth Bowling Speak’s line was as follows:

Elizabeth, daughter of
Roger “the shoemaker” Bowling, born 1619 who married Elizabeth, son of
Hugh Bowling, born 1591 who married Ellen Finch, son of
Raffe Bollling

Shirley Bowling Platt along with Jean Purdy, in England, have put together a summary of information as well. Shirley was kind enough to send me her detailed work, for which I am exceedingly grateful, and I have extracted from it below.

Jean and Shirley found additional information that proves that our Elizabeth Bowling was not the Elizabeth Bowling who married John Catliffe, so our Elizabeth was not Roger the shoemaker’s daughter.

Jean says, “Burt saw Roger’s original will which is now too fragile to see. He thought her husband’s name was Ratcliffe. I have never found any Catliffes, but Radcliffes or Ratcliffes abound. The family originated in Radcliffe Towers, the ruins of which are about 200 yards from where I live. The chapel there was used by Catholics throughout the penal years. Steuart Bowling drew my attention to a marriage in 1672 on IGI of a John Radcliffe to Elizabeth? at Saddleworth Yorkshire. The place is misleading as it is actually on the Lancashire side of the Pennines, just above Oldham and is now part of the Greater Manchester connurbation. I have been to the church and Elizabeth Bowling of Charnock Richard married John Radcliffe (son of Alexander) at Saddleworth church in 1671. Sadly she is also buried there in 1676 and John married again in 1680.”

Therefore, we confirm that our Elizabeth is not the daughter of Roger Bowling.

Shirley and Jean attribute our Elizabeth Bowling to Hugh Bowling and Ellen Fynch/Finch, so eliminating Roger the shoemaker and attributing Elizabeth to Hugh directly and not as a grandchild. A daughter Elizabeth was born to Hugh and Ellen in Charnock Richard in June of 1635 and died in March of 1637/38. A second daughter Elizabeth was born to this couple on 25 Oct 1641, also in Charnock Richard, Lancashire. She was christened on 25 Oct 1641 in Standish. This is believed to be our Elizabeth who died before 1692 in St. Mary’s County, MD.

The rest of the children’s names proven through James Bowling’s will are found in this family as well, at least the ones we know, so this certainly seems to be the right family.

Shirley and Jean’s proposed ancestry for Elizabeth, listing oldest generation first, was as follows:

Robert Bowling born 1520 in Chorley married Agnes, last name unknown, who died on April 26, 1566 in Chorley
Hugh Bowling born 1540 and died July 17, 1598, married Constance Bibbie on 12 May 1560 in St. Wilfred’s, Standish, Lancashire. Constance was born about 1540 and was buried on 18 Dec 1601 in St. Wilfrid’s Church, Standish. This is the oldest Bowling burial record.

Perhaps she is buried here in the area where some stones have been cleared.

Or maybe here, near the church entrance, nourishing the newly planted trees.

Her funeral would have been preached in this stunningly beautiful church. This nave has heard many Bowling funerals over the centuries.

This exquisite carved cross has overseen many joyful and sorrowful events in the Bowling family – many baptisms, weddings and funerals. All of life’s events took place under the vigilance of this cross – first as Catholic and then as Anglican.

Most of the Bowlings, including Constance and her husband, Hugh, up until the early 1700s, were on Papists lists and/or fined for recusancy. Hugh Bowling and Constance Bibby were convicted of recusancy, which probably led to them losing their lands in 1591.

A record from Steuart Bowling (apparently translated from Latin):

Hugh Bowling of Charnock Richard, husbandman (small farmer); Constance Bowling of Charnock Richard, Roger Bowling of Charnock Richard, and Elizabeth of Charnock Richard, Cecily Bowling of Preston and John Pilkington of Coppull, husbandman, land in Coppull.” Choppull is adjacent to both Chorley and Charnock Richard.

Raffe Bowling born 1563 in Chorley, Lancashire. He was christened on 4 Dec 1563 in Standish, Lancashire, probably in this same baptismal font, and died in 1600.

Raffe (Ralph) Bowling was in Leeds, Yorkshire as late as April 16, 1590 (christening record of his son, Rauffe)–but was in Chorley as early as 6 Aug 1591 (christening of his son Hughe). Raffe married Margaret Marston in 1588 in St. Peter’s, Leeds, Yorkshire. There is a question if Margaret Marston was the second wife of Raffe…since some of children were born before this marriage in 1588.

Jean Purdy states that there is no proof whatsoever that our Hugh’s father Ralph (Raafe) was the one marrying in Leeds. She searched all the records of people given leave to reside in Charnock Richard. This was necessary under the Poor Laws—-there was a John Bowling in the late 1600s—but no Ralph or Rafe.

Hugh was born in 1591 in Charnock Richard, Lancashire. He was christened on 6 Aug 1591 in Chorley, most likely in the old bapistry, shown below, now retired, in St. Laurence in Chorley.

Hugh died on 7 Sep. 1651 in Charnock Richard and was buried on 7 Sep 1651 in Parish Church, Standish, Lancashire. Perhaps his coffin was carried in through this gate in the church wall.

Both Hugh and his wife Ellen’s funerals were most likely preached in this church, before their coffin was carried outside to be buried in the church yard.

Hugh’s grave is now unmarked someplace in the cemetery below.

The cemetery surrounds the church, some areas having been cleared of stones for maintenance. Some graves reused. The oldest stones, of course, would have been located closest to the church and now are, sadly, long gone.

The cemetery extends right up to the church walls, shown below.

Burial space was and remains an issue for all of these old churches. In some cases, extra land was annexed for the “burying ground,” but that wasn’t always possible. They had to make do with what they had and they did, using every possible inch and then reusing older graves whose families were no longer there or whose markers were not legible. Of course, there are also burials inside the church, in the floor and in crypts. Those burial locations were reserved for the wealthy or the notorious. Our family fell in neither category.

The death bed testament of Hugh Bowling gives his residence as “Bowleings Farm.” Later land records suggest this was at Four Lane Ends—where the lane in Charnock Richard crosses the road to Preston and Lancaster. There was another farm “Bowlings in the Fields,” which Jean believes belonged to the other branch of the family (that of Roger the Shoemaker). It was later acquired by Henry the Blacksmith’s Great Grandson, another Hugh Bowling, in the late 1700s. Jean was unable to pinpoint where that was—but the name suggests it was out of the village. Charnock Richard is about half way between Standish and Chorley.

Hugh married Ellen Fynch, daughter of Roger Fynch and Isabella or Elizabeth Brears on 9 Apr 1616 in St. Laurence Church, Chorley, Lancashire, probably entering through the front door shown below.

The Fynch Family

Ellyn Fynch was born in Jan 1597/1598 in Charnock Richard. She died on 13 Jun 1659 in Charnock Richard and was buried on 13 Jun 1659 in Standish Parish Churchyard, Lancashire, below.

It is believed that Roger Fynch (born 1573) is the son of John Finch (born circa 1548-84). He is believed to be the martyr, John Finch (Fynch), yeoman farmer of Eccleston, who was arrested at Christmas 1581, tried in Lancaster on April 18, 1584 on the charge of harboring Catholic Priests and subsequently found guilty and executed.

St. Mary’s the Virgin Church in Eccleston, below, dates to the 1300s, so it is likely the home church of John Fynch. The name of Eccleston itself came from the Celtic word “eglēs” meaning a church, and the Old English word “tūn” meaning a farmstead or settlement – i.e. a settlement by a Romano-British church. It’s quite ancient, having been mentioned in the Doomsday Book in 1086.

John Fynch’s devotion to the Catholic religion in the face of adversity is very likely representative of the devotion felt by the entire Catholic conclave in Lancashire.

John Fynch was a yeoman of Eccleston, Lancashire, from a Catholic family, but brought up an Anglican. When he was twenty years old he went to London where he spent nearly a year with some cousins at Inner Temple. While there he was struck by the contrast between Protestantism and Catholicism in practice, and determined to lead a Catholic life.

Failing to find advancement in London he returned to Lancashire where he was reconciled to the Catholic Church. He then married and settled down, his house becoming a center of missionary work, he himself harboring priests and aiding them in every way, besides acting as catechist. He drew on himself the hostility of the authorities, and at Christmas, 1581, he was entrapped into bringing a priest, George Ostliffe, to a place where both were apprehended. It was given out that Finch, having betrayed the priest and other Catholics, had taken refuge with the Earl of Derby, but in fact, he was kept in the earl’s house as a prisoner. For three years he was held prisoner in various locations and prisons, alternatively tortured and bribed to obtain information on other Catholics.

He was eventually removed to the Fleet Prison, Manchester, and afterwards to the House of Correction. When he refused to go to the Protestant church he was dragged there by the feet. Following that, he was returned to Lancashire where on April 19, 1584, he was tried with three priests, convicted and executed with Priest James Bell, on April 20, 1584 at Lancaster for secreting a Catholic priest for Christmas services and denying that the Queen was head of the Church.

John Fynch was Beatified in 1929 as one of the Lancashire Martyrs. Beatification in the Catholic Church is to be one of the blessed and thus worthy of public religious veneration in a particular region or religious congregation. The Catholic Church canonizes or beatifies only those whose lives have been marked by the exercise of heroic virtue, and only after this has been proved by common repute for sanctity and by conclusive arguments.

One of the church windows in St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Chorley honors John Fynch of Eccleston who is pictured with a haystack, because they say, on the church website, that he was of “farming stock.” They also mention that John Finch’s relatives still live in the Mawdesley area. The map below shows that these locations are in relatively close proximity, 3 or 4 miles, to each other and also to Charnock Richard.

It seems that Bowling Speake came by his proud, defiant recussancy honestly. John Fynch, his great-great-great-great-grandfather, would have been proud of him, some 171 years after John’s own act of defiance and 168 years after his barbaric death, being drawn and quartered. I’m sure that Bowling knew that his great-great grandfather was a Catholic martyr. That isn’t a story that is lost in a Catholic family. I’m sure it was both a source of great pride and great sorrow.

I have to wonder where John Finch/Fynch was buried, if the family was allowed to gather what remains of him they could find and if they were allowed to bury anything. He surely would not have been buried in the churchyard which was Anglican at that time. So where was he buried, and the priest also killed with him?

In the book, “The Antiquities of Canterbury In two Parts” by Nicolas Battely it states that John Finch, William Selling and Thomas Goldston were “buried in the Martyrdom.” This is in the History of Christ-Church in Canterbury section, page 35. Elsewhere in the book, it says “John Finch – of this prior’s acts or what he did living, I have seen no monument, but that of him dead, you may find in the Martyrdom, where he lies interred under this broken Epitaph, which is in the Appendix Numb LV.” Other places in the book refer to the Martyrdom as an actual location and in one place it is called “The Altar of the Martyrdom of St. Thomas” in the cathedral.

To say I was excited by this was an understatement. It was about 3 AM – I was hyperventilating. Was it even possible that I had stumbled upon the final resting place of our John Finch? And if so, why didn’t they tell us this when we visited St. Mary’s church in Chorley? They had other information about the family- why not this? Something seemed wrong.

I found the book online, scanned by Google, but as luck would have it, the ONE page I needed, page 62 in the final appendix, had been missed during the scanning. I had to give up and go to bed, but not before sending a message to a cousin asking him to see if he could find the elusive page 62.

I had even found a picture of the altar near where John Finch is buried in Canterbury. The next day, cousin Jerry found page 62, I typed the Latin of John Finch’s epitaph into a Latin translator, and here’s the English equivalent, more or less:

“Here lies John Fynch of Winchelsey once prior to this ecclefise who takes on 9 January eificia conftrueta closing many other goods whose soul.”

I wondered where Winchelsey was, and set about to find out. I discovered that it is no place close to Lancashire, on the Southeast coast of England, and the John Fynch from Winchelsey was a politician that lived in the 1600s. Crumb. Crumb. Crumb. Not our John at all. Our John Fynch/Finch is still MIA. I hate wild goose chases and I felt terrible about involving my cousin in this one – getting everyone’s hopes up. But I’m very glad we persevered for page 62!

Elizabeth Bowling in America

Jean Purdy feels that Elizabeth Bowling accompanied her brothers, James, Thomas and John from England to Maryland, departing for America with her brothers Thomas and John after their mother died in 1659. James Bowling was already in Maryland by that time.

What we do know is that Elizabeth Bowling Speake was subpoenaed to court on November 3, 1663 to testify. She had son John Speak, the Innkeeper, whose birth was determined from 2 depositions given by John as an adult to have occurred in 1665. This implies her marriage about 1663, and possibly somewhat earlier, to Thomas Speake. She had son Bowling in 1674 according to numerous depositions given by Bowling throughout his lifetime. It’s rather unusual that they didn’t have any more children. Perhaps they had children that did not live to adulthood.

Thomas died in August of 1681, still a relatively young man of 48, his will leaving everything to his eldest son, John. He appoints his brother-in-law, James Bowling, his executor and wills “that my Loving brother in Law James Bowling hath the Disposall of my children to be brought up in the Roman Catholick faith.” Elizabeth was apparently gone too, less than age 50, by the time her brother James made his will in 1692. James was childless and left his estate to his siblings and the children of his siblings, including John and Bowling Speake.

It must have been difficult on John and Bowling Speak to lose their father in 1681, their mother sometime in the next decade, before 1692, and their uncle in 1692 who was or probably had been raising them. John would have been about 27 in 1692 and Bowling about 18. That’s a lot of loss and a rough beginning for 2 young men.

Beginning with John Finch, the Martyr, to me, we find the following:

John Finch of Eccleston, the Martyr was born 1748, died April 20, 1584
Roger Fynch born 1573-1642, Eccleston married Isabella or Elizabeth Brears (1569-1631) in Charnock circa 1595.
Hugh Bowling was born in 1591 in Charnock Richard, Lancashire. He was christened on 6 Aug 1591 in Chorley. Hugh died on 7 Sep 1651 in Charnock Richard and was buried on 7 Sep 1651 in Parish Church, Standish, Lancashire. Hugh married Ellen Fynch, daughter of Roger Fynch and Isabella or Elizabeth Brears on 9 Apr 1616 in St. Laurence Church, Chorley, Lancashire.
Thomas Speake (c 1634-1681) married Elizabeth Bowling (1642 – before 1692)
Bowling Speake (1674-1755) married Mary Benson
Thomas Speake (1698-1755) married Jane, last name unknown
Charles Beckworth (or Beckwith) Speake (1741-1794) married Anne, last name unknown (1744-1789)
Nicholas Speak (1782-1852) married Sarah Faires (1786-1852)
Charles Speak (1804-1840/1850) married Ann McKee (1801/1805-1840/1850)
Elizabeth Speak (1832-1903) married Samuel Claxton (Clarkson) (1827-1876)
Margaret Claxton (1851-1920) married Joseph Bolton (1853-1920)
Ollie Florence Bolton (1874-1955) married and divorced William George Estes (1873-1971)
William Sterling Estes (my Dad) (1903-1963)

So there you go, just 13 generations between me and a Catholic martyr. Well, possibly, assuming all of that is correct.

What can we do, if anything, to solidify this connection? Can DNA help?

Can DNA Help?

How would we go about determining if there is a Finch connection in our Speak line? Actually, it’s in the Bowling line that feeds into the Speak line with the marriage of Elizabeth Bowling to Thomas Speake in Maryland in the 1660s. What this means is that if there is a Finch connection, every descendant of both the Bowling family in American through the Maryland group, and the Speaks family in America though Thomas and Elizabeth are descendants of the Finch family.

The first thing to do is to be sure that every Speak(e)(s) descendant who has taken an autosomal test is in the Speak project so that I, as the administrator, can see if they match any individuals with the ancestral or current surname of Finch.

Currently, we have 18 individuals in the Speak project who meet the criteria and have already taken the autosomal DNA test. When I began this comparison a few weeks ago, we had 12 Speak individuals, but I checked the matches of all 12 individuals and found another dozen or so autosomal matches to people with Speak lineage. I invited those people to join the Speak DNA project, even though they are not descended from the direct paternal line. In order to keep this straight, I have an autosomal grouping category in both the Y and mtDNA portions of the project since I’m actually using it for autosomal matching as well.

Next, I searched for Finch and Fynch matches for each of the project participants. It’s surprising how many I found. Among 12 participants, there were 42 Finch matches. Of those, four ancestral groups were repeated more than once. Looking at these groups, it’s possible that they could share a common ancestor between them. That is encouraging.

I checked the Finch DNA project to see if I can tell anything about the Finch groups I found with repeated autosomal matches to Speak descendants.

John Finch born 1625 England – his son Guy Finch b Aug 18 1655 in Berkeley Gloucestershire, England d 1688 Calvert Co., MD, married Rebecca, daughter Mary Finch married Charles Beaven.
Also in Calvert Co., MD, Elizabeth Finch born 1687 Woodbridge, Calvert Co., MD died in 1729 Charles Co MD married William Elder.
Margaret Finch b c 1590 in Stanley, Gloucestershire, England married John Flood and died in Charles City, VA (also shown as Surry Co., VA)
Stamford CT Finch group
One lone person who says “Finch- Lancashire,” but doesn’t answer the e-mails

The Calvert County, MD group could well be Catholic as well.

The Finch DNA project and site tells us that the CT group is from Yorkshire. Unfortunately, the Calvert County group seems to be unrepresented in Y DNA testing. There are also no families from Charles City, VA or Surry Co., VA.

Even more encouraging is that one individual listed their Finch ancestor as being from Lancashire. Unfortunately, I e-mailed them and they have not yet replied.

Shortly, I’ll check the list of Speak participants for Bowling matches as well to see who we match in that line that I could invite to join the project to see if the Bowlings are descended from the Finch family utilizing the same methodology.

From this point forward, we need to do the Finch genealogy work on one hand, relative to the matches, and on the other, we need to work on triangulation to see if we can attribute a DNA match to two people who share the same common ancestral line. That would confirm, along with a match to us, that we do share that common ancestor with them.

However, our common Finch ancestor is many, many generations removed. Little of John Finch’s DNA may be remnant in his descendants – but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try to find it. You can’t fail if you don’t try, but you also can’t succeed!

This job will take a little bit of genealogy sleuthing, some genetic analysis, a dash of synchronicity and a huge dose of good luck.

Wish me luck!! I’ll get back with you on this one. I’m busy hunting for my magic DNA wand right now. A little bit of magic dust wouldn’t hurt either!

http://www.thetoybug.com.au/Magic-Glitter-Wand

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Bowling Speake (1674-1755) Drinks to the Pretender – 52 Ancestors #12

Posted on March 21, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Bowling Speake was born in 1674 in St. Mary’s County, Maryland and died there, in the same location, which by then was Charles County, Maryland, after he signed a deed on July 23, 1755 and before his will was probated on Sept. 13, 1755.

Thomas Speake, his father, had arrived in the colonies about 1660 and subsequently married Elizabeth Bowling. They were having children by 1665 when their son John, known as John the Innkeeper, was born. A record of their marriage does not exist.

Their only other known child was Bowling Speake, although it would have been very unusual to have only two children. John and Bowling are the only ones named in the will of Thomas or that we can find in either earlier or subsequent records.

We know positively that Elizabeth Bowling and Thomas Speake were Catholic because Thomas states in his will “that my Loving brother in Law James Bowling hath the Disposall of my children to be brought up in the Roman Catholick faith.”

According to Harold Speake, early Speake historian, now deceased, John Speak left the Catholic Church when he married Winifred Wheeler, an Anglican (the date of the wedding was apparently August 11, 1685). Bowling Speak remained a Catholic and retained the family homestead.

In March of 1722, Bowling gives a deposition about the bounds of a tract of land called Mudd’s Rest that he purchased about 13 years prior from the daughter of Thomas Mudd. This would put his land purchase in about 1709.

In 1718, we discover that Bowling was a shoemaker.

Charles Co. Land Records Liber D2 p. 203
6 Aug 1718 mentions Bowling Speake, shoemaker.

In September of 1718, Bowling Speak acquired land called “The Mistake,” 200 acres, for 5000 pounds of tobacco, in an area known as Zekiah Manor which is today the land on which the current St. Peter’s Church is located. I have always wondered how “The Mistake” got it’s name. There has to be a good story in there someplace!

Land known as “Speak’s Enlargement” abutted “The Mistake,” according to a 1754 deed in which he deeded both to his son Thomas in which the land was identified as “where Thomas Speake’s dwelling place now is.”

In August of 1718, Bowling also purchased part of a tract called “Boarman’s Reserve” for 9000 pounds tobacco and later, in 1739, patented land called “Speake Meadow” which abutted Boarman’s Reserve.

These two tracts of land were located about 7 miles apart in Charles County, Maryland.

Bowling lived on his land at Boarman Manor, according to his will which says he leaves Edward “my dwelling plantation and a small tract of land called the Meadow.” Before Bowling’s death, he had sold part of the Boarman’s Manor land.

Upon Bowling’s death in 1755, he left the balance of his “Mistake” and “Speake’s Enlargement” lands to his children. In his will, he gives the location of this land which Speak cousin, Jerry Draney, traced through deeds to the current owners, the Catholic Church. Bowling’s son, Thomas (known as Thomas of Zachiah or Zekiah), born about 1698, lived on this land.

On July 23, 1755, Bowling Speake deeded land to his son Thomas Speake. Bowling’s will was then probated on September 13, 1755. On August 2, 1755, Thomas Speake, Bowling’s son, wrote and dated his will. His will was also probated September 13, 1755, the same day as his father. I can’t help but wonder if his father’s death in some way contributed to his own death. Or perhaps Thomas’s death was more than Bowling could stand.

Bowling’s poor wife, Mary – to lose her husband and her son within days of each other must have been almost too much to bear. We know she was alive at Bowling’s death according to his will, unless she had died between October 20, 1750, when he wrote his will and his death nearly 5 years later. It was unusual during that timeframe for men to make wills significantly prior to their death. He may have had an earlier scare and recovered. Wills at that time were often much more of an “on my deathbed” kind of event. Mary signed a release of dower in 1744 but when land was sold but in 1754 and 1755, no dower release was signed. We don’t know when she died.

Thomas’s children lost both a father and grandfather as well. The entire family was in double mourning.

Thomas of Zachiah left his land, today the land of St. Peter’s church, to his children, specifically to sons Charles Beckworth (or Beckwith) Speake and Nicholas Speake. Thomas’s will and his father Bowling’s will were probated at the same court session on September 13, 1755. That must have been a very sad day.

Charles Beckworth (or Beckwith) Speake was born in 1741 to Thomas of Zachiah and wife Jane. His brother Nicholas, who shared the land with him, was born in 1734. To date, a sale of this land has never been found, but it surely was sold, because Charles Beckworth Speak would strike out for North Carolina by 1788, taking with him his young son Nicholas Speak, born in 1782, who would in the 1820s found the Speaks Methodist Church in Lee County, Virginia. Nicholas’s great-grandfather, Bowling, probably turned over in his grave! His grandson had become a Protestant!

You can read more about this land and see it today in the article “Thomas Speak (c1634-1681) – The Catholic Immigrant.”

In a 1739 record, we discover that Bowling Speak married Mary Benson, via this archival record dealing with land in 1739 and that her father’s name was Hugh Benson.

Archives of MD v40 Assembly Proceedings, May 1–June 12, 1739
(LHJ Lib. No. 45)

Your Commitee find on Inspecting the papers of the Petitioners and Land Called Crackburns Purchase Containing Two Hundred acres was Granted on the 24th Day of October Ann. Domr. 1659 unto Richard Crackburn assignee of Walter Peak and Peter Mills assignee of Paul Simpson in ffee. Your Committee furhter find that the said Richard Crackburn by his deed bearing Date the 17th Day of November 1681, Did bargain and sell the said Tract of Land to Richard Gardiner of St. Marys County in ffee.

Your Committee also find that Richard Gardiner and Mary his wife of St. Marys County afd. Did Convey to Hugh Benson of the same County Planter one Hundred acres part of the said Tract in ffee.

Your Committee Likewise find that Mary the Daughter and Heiress at Law of Hugh Benson Intermarried with Bowling Speak of Charles County and that the said Bowling Speak and the said Mary his wife by their Deed bearing Date the 31st day of March 1739 did Convey the said Parcell of Land unto the Petitioners in ffee….

Bowling’s Act of Defiance

This next 1752 record involving Bowling is just a wonderful peek into his life.

Archives of MD 50, p57-58
Assembly Proceedings, June 3-23, 1752 The Lower House.
L.H.J. Liber No.47; June 17 (p237-238)

The Lord Proprietary against Bowlen Speak} The said Bowlen Speak being bound by Recognizance for his Appearance here this Court, to answer of and concerning a Presentment by the Grand Jurors, for the Body of the Province of Maryland, against him found; for that he, on or about the first Day of March last, did, in a public Manner, drink the Pretenders Health, and good Success in his Proceedings; and being demanded whether he is guilty of the Premisses in the Presentment aforesaid mentioned, or not guilty, says he is guilty thereof, and submits to the Court’s Judgment thereon.

Therefore it is considered by the Justices here, that the said Bowlen Speak, for the Offence aforesaid, be fined to his Lordship the Lord Proprietary in the Sum of Ten Pounds Current Money; and he is ordered to give Security for the Payment of the Fine aforesaid: But for the Want thereof, he is committed to the Custody of the Sheriff of Charles County, there to remain until, &c. who being present here in Court, took Charge of him accordingly.

And it is further ordered, that he give Security in the Sum of Fifty Pounds Current Money, himself, with one Security, in the like Sum, or two Securities in the Sum of Twenty-five Pounds like Money each, for his the said Bowlen Speak’s keeping the Peace, and being of good Behaviour, until next Court; and do for the payment of the several Officers Fees arising due by Occasion of the Premisses aforesaid.

Thereupon the said Bowlen Speak, being present here in Court, acknowleges himself to owe and stand justly indebted to his Lordship, the Right Honourable the Lord Proprietary, in the Sum of Fifty Pounds Current Money, together with William Bryant of Charles County, Planter, as his Security, being likewise present here in Court, acknowleges himself also to owe and stand justly indebted unto his Lordship, the Right Honourable the Lord Proprietary, in the like Sum of Fifty Pounds like Money: And they severally acknowlege, that the several above Sums shall be levied on their respective Bodies, Goods, Chattels, Lands and Tenements, to and for the Use of his said Lordship, his Heirs, and Successors; in case he the said Bowlen Speak, shall not keep the Peace, and be of good Behaviour, until the next Provincial Court, and shall not pay the several Officers Fees arising due by Occasion of the Premisses aforesaid.

A true Copy from the Records of the Provincial Court, Liber E I, No. 10.
Folios 231 and 232.
Per R. Burdus, Clerk.
In Testimony whereof the Seal of the said Provincial Court is hereunto affixed, this 15th Day of June, Anno Domini 1752. L.S.

What was Bowling doing, and why? The Pretender here probably refers to “Bonnie Prince Charlie” given the date of 1751 when Bowling uttered these traitorous words for which he stated he was guilty and was remanded to jail because he did not have the fine of 10 pounds. Ironically, his security recognizance to be released, after paying the 10 pounds, to assure his good behavior “until the next court” was 5 times that much – 50 pounds. Apparently the judges felt that Bowling’s good behavior was anything but a sure bet!

However, Bowling’s friend, William Bryant, paid the security, of course, assuming I’m sure that Bowling would behave and his security money would be returned. The lesson here is never open your mouth unless you can afford the consequences or you’ll wind up in jail!!!

Bowling was not a young man when this happened. He was 78 years of age. His children were in their 50s, probably rolling their eyes and scurrying about trying to scrape together the money to bail Bowling out of jail. It makes me wonder if he was suffering perhaps from dementia that made him forget what was politically correct. Or maybe, at age 78, he simply didn’t care anymore. He was going to say what he wanted, the consequences be damned. I love his spirited heart and am so glad he left us this unquestionable view of his beliefs.

The Jacobites

All of this dissention hearkens back to the Protestant vs Catholic battles and politics in England, Scotland and Ireland, and was at the heart of the Jacobite movement. Remember that the US was a colony of Great Britain, so indeed, this mattered to the people who lived here. It involved who officially ruled them. The phrase “Pretender” alluded to one who believes he is rightfully entitled to the English throne, but who is currently not King. In this case, the men who would have been King has England been a Catholic country at that time.

Jacobitism was the political movement in Great Britain and Ireland to restore the Roman Catholic Stuart King James II of England and his heirs to the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland. The movement took its name from Jacobus, the Latinised form of James, and refers to a long series of Jacobite risings between 1688 and 1746. After James II was deposed in 1688 and replaced by his Protestant daughter Mary II, ruling jointly with her Protestant husband and first cousin (James’s nephew) William III, the Stuarts lived in exile, occasionally attempting to regain the throne. The strongholds of Jacobitism were the Scottish Highlands, Ireland and Northern England. Significant support also existed in Wales and South-West England.

The Jacobites believed that parliamentary interference with monarchical succession was illegal. Catholics also hoped the Stuarts would end recussancy. In Scotland, the Jacobite cause became entangled in the last throes of the warrior clan system.

The emblem of the Jacobites is the White Cockade. White Rose Day is celebrated on 10 June, the anniversary of the birth of the Old Pretender in 1688.

Yorkshire Rose, heraldic symbol of the House of York

White Rose of York from a manuscript of Edward IV in the late 1400s

After the execution of Charles I in 1649, his son Charles II became Pretender until his restoration 11 years later.

After the overthrow of the Catholic James II and VII in the Glorious Revolution in 1688, many refused to accept the legality of the new regime of William and Mary, James’s Protestant daughter and son-in-law, and continued to recognize James as King. James made a significant effort in 1690 to recover Ireland, but was defeated by William at the Battle of the Boyne. After James’s death, his supporters recognized his son, James Francis Edward Stuart, the Roman Catholic son of the deposed King James VII and II.

James was barred from the succession to the throne by the Act of Settlement 1701. Notwithstanding the Act of Union 1707, he claimed the separate thrones of Scotland, as James VIII, and of England and Ireland, as James III, until his death in 1766. In Jacobite terms, Acts of Parliament (of England or Scotland) after 1688, (including the Acts of Union) did not receive the required Royal Assent of the legitimate Jacobite monarch and, therefore, were without legal effect. James was responsible for a number of conspiracies and rebellions, particularly in the Highlands of Scotland. The most notable was The Fifteen, which took place in 1715-16.

Charles Edward Stuart, James’ elder son, the would-be Charles III, known as Bonnie Prince Charlie, led in his father’s name the last major Jacobite rebellion, the Forty-Five, in 1745-46. He died in 1788, without legitimate issue.

In essence, what Bowling said, publicly, in 1752, probably, if I had to guess, after having a bit too much to drink, was that he supported the overthrow of the government under which he was living. Not a wise thing to say in public. However, for Bowling’s descendants, it makes him a colorful man and allows us a peek at his true character. We know he remained a strong Catholic. This also tells us that his wife would have been Catholic as well, and his children baptized in that faith.

Bowling’s Will

Bowling Speake, born in 1674, according to several depositions during his lifetime, in St. Mary’s County, Maryland, died in August or early September 1755 in Charles County, Maryland, just three years after publicly drinking to the Pretender. His will was probated on September 13, 1755.

In the name of God Amen I Bowling Speake of Charles County in the province of Maryland being in perfect health and memory thanks be to God do make & ordain this my will & testament in manner & form following Viz.

Imprimis I give and bequeath to my son Thomas Speake his heirs & assigns forever 121 acres of land being part of a tract of land. ..Mistake beginning at the first bound tree and running thence to Jordan Branch & up the Branch to a small (sic) next of his Dwelling place and thence to the beginning to make acres –

Item I give and bequeath to my son William Speake two hundred and two acres with Dwelling place being part of a tract of land called mistake to him & his heirs forever and bequeath to my well beloved wife my Dwelling plantation and the use of all my persc Estate during her natural life and after her decease I give and bequeath to my grandson Speake the son of Thomas Speake my Dwelling Plantation and also a small tract of land c(alled) the meadow also his first choice of the negroes and the first choice of my beds and fuz

Item I give and bequeath to my granddaughter Ann Higdon the second choice of my beds an furniture my great chest one Dish & three plates one iron pot & Cattle and Sheep that a make to her without interuption –

Item I give & bequeath to my Daughter Mary Baggott th 112 of my cattle and sheep one feather bed and furniture and one chest

Item I give & to my son William one negro –

Lastly I do hereby nominate constitute and appoint my beloved wife Mary Speake and my aforesaid grandson Edward Speake the son of Thomas Speake full sole Executors of this my last will and textament

In Witness whereof I have hereunto se hand and affixed my seal this this(sic) Twentieth day of October in the year of our Lc Signed sealed published & delivered in the presence of us

Will McPherson Junr Wm Comes Bowling Speake seal
Ma–maduke Semmes

Annexed to the foregoing will was the foll(owin)g probate to wit

Maryland for 13th September 1755 Marmaduke Semmes William McPherson Junior and William Coomes the three subscribing witnesses to the foregoing will being duly & solemn sworn on the hole Evangels deposeth and saith that they saw the Testator Bowking Speake & seal the within will and heard him publish & declare the same to be his last will and and that at the time of his so doing was to the best of their apprehensions of sound & mind & memory and that they severally subscribed as witnesses to the said will in the presence of the Testator & at his request which was taken in the presence of Edwd Speake heiz who did not object to the same.

Perhaps Edward was Bowling’s executor because his son Thomas was already ill.

Children of Bowling Speake and Mary Benson were:

Thomas Speake, born 1698 in St Mary’s County, Maryland; died between August 2nd and September 13, 1755, in Charles County, Maryland; married Jane, last name unknown
William Speake, born about 1699.
Mary Speake, born about 1700; married ? Higdon and a Baggott?

However, it seems there was more than religion that separated John Speake from his brother, Bowling. As it turns out, there might be DNA as well.

Lancashire DNA Speaks

In 2013, on our Speaks family trip to Lancashire, we were very fortunate to meet several of our Speak(e) cousins in various locations. Several joined us for dinner one evening at the Stirk House, a country manor house once owned and restored by Harry Speak himself.

Our trip was precipitated upon DNA findings. Our cousin, Doug, from New Zealand tested and matched our American line descended from Thomas Speak(e) born about 1634 and who immigrated to America around 1660. The blessing was that Doug knew exactly where his Speak ancestors were from – Gisburn, Lancashire, England.

During and shortly after our visit, three of our British cousins, Gary, Stan and David took the Y DNA test to see if they matched each other as well as Doug. The prevailing sentiment was that indeed, the Speak families were not related to each other.

David, based on his genealogy, we know is a cousin of our New Zealand cousin, Doug, who matches the American line. In fact, it’s Doug’s fault that we were all there, in Gisburn – because our New Zealand cousin knew who his oldest ancestor was – John Speak – the man whose children were baptized in the 1700s in St. Mary’s of Gisburn.

Gary indicated that he was told that his line is not related to ours. By this time, in the 1900s, the different Speaks families were on the other side of Pendle Hill, not terribly close to each other and in different communities. The known ancestral villages of the three different Speaks lines are shown on the map below. Pendle Hill is the high area in the middle. The two most distant points, Gisburn and Bolton are about 25 miles as the crow flies, or about 30 miles driving, and Bolton is a more recent location.

So indeed, we are all quite interested in the outcome of the Y DNA testing.

And the answer is……drum roll…..all 4 men, Doug, David, Stan and Gary do share a common paternal ancestor. So yes, we are all related. Of course, figuring out exactly how we are related, and how far back, is another matter altogether.

I’ve reconstructed their pedigree charts as best I can. The men graciously provided me with their genealogy information.

What I’ve tried to do with these results is to group them according to ancestor. In other words, in the group above, 201632 and 312514 both share a common lineage via the John born in 1822 in Burnley and who married Mary.

This second chart is a bit more complex. We know that Gary’s ancestor Thomas was the brother of Harry who owned the Stirk House. Gary is still working on his ancestry, but in the mean time, I found a lovely family tree on Ancestry.com provided by the granddaughter of Harry Speak. It’s fully sourced, so I felt good about using it. So even though we don’t have a DNA sample from Harry of the Stirk House, we do have his genealogy which I aligned side by side with Gary’s, as the genealogy should be identical from brothers Thomas and Harry on back in time.

As you can see, the oldest ancestors here are Henry who was born in Twiston and baptized in Downham in 1650 and John born in 1700, location unknown, but who died in Hey, Houlridge and who married Mary.

The common ancestor between these two groups is further back in time. We really don’t know how much further back, but we do know it was after the adoption of surnames. The first mention of a Speak or similar surname male in this region is found in 1305 when Robert Speke was named as a landowner in Billington, which is inside the Whalley parish. This is the earliest known Speak or similar surname record. Given this information, we can safely say that the common Speak ancestor lived sometime between the 1300s and about 1650, a span of about 14 generations.

Let’s take a look at the DNA results found in the Speakes DNA project.

In the first section, after the kit number, you can see the names of the participants oldest ancestors, followed by DNA values at specific markers found on the Y chromosome which they inherited from their fathers unmixed with any DNA from their mother. Therefore, their Y chromosome also matches that of their father, and grandfather, on back in time on the paternal side – except for an occasional mutation. We count on those mutations to identify families and within families, to identify specific lines of descent.

This is actually quite interesting, because all of the British men, plus Doug from New Zealand, have a value of 17 at location DYS19. Two of the American participants have this value as well. This tells me one thing and then begs a second question.

The piece of information this provides me for sure is that the value of our original ancestor in this location was 17. We know this because all of the British samples and the New Zealand sample have this value. This tells me that the mutation happened either in Thomas, the American immigrant’s generation, or thereafter.

The fact that two American samples also have this value isn’t unusual, as one would expect for Thomas to have carried this value as well. However, here’s the fly in the ointment. The two American men who carry this value are from two different sons of Thomas the immigrant. However, none of the rest of the American men have this value. This means one of a few things – options below.

The genealogy of one of the two American men who carry this value is incorrect and they both descend from the same son of Thomas who carried the original mutation. This means that Thomas’s other son had a mutation to a value of 16.
Both of Thomas’s sons had a value of 17, and both of their lines fairly quickly had a mutation to a value of 16. This is unlikely but not unheard of.
Of course, the problem is that both of the two known descendants of Thomas Speak, the immigrant, have additional descendants that have tested and who don’t carry a value of 17.

How can we find out what happened here? We can’t. We can continue to research and if we find something significant in the research that suggests a different genealogy for one participant, that might shed light on the topic. But assuming this is a genetic mutation and not a genealogical problem, the only way we could ever sort through this to test people who descend from every generation of men along the way to see when and where this mutation took place. It’s interesting, but it’s not THAT interesting nor will it answer the question of which Lancashire line the American line is closer to genetically.

What I was hoping to find was a marker that differed between the Lancashire men. For example, if the green group of Lancashire men had a value of 12 at the first marker, 393, and the red group of men had a value of 13 at 393, we would immediately surmise that we most likely were more closely related to the group that sported a value of 13, since all of the Americans carry that value. Unfortunately, there is no marker yet tested in the British men that shows this level of differentiation.

However, we also haven’t tested everyone to 111 markers. The 111 marker upgrade was created for exactly this type of situation. Indeed, the answer may well be waiting for us, waiting to be uncovered or discovered in the 111 marker test.

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Thomas Speak (c1634-1681) – The Catholic Immigrant – 52 Ancestors #11

Posted on March 14, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Thomas Speak(e) is 10 generations upstream from me, or my 8 times great-grandfather. He is also the original immigrant in the Speak family, the one who braved the icy waters of the Atlantic to reach out for a better land, and apparently, religious tolerance, if not opportunity, in colonial Maryland.

My connection to Thomas works like this.

Thomas Speak born circa 1630 in Lancashire, England and died August 6, 1681 St. Mary’s County, Maryland, married Elizabeth Bowling before November 3, 1663 when she was subpoenaed to court to testify.
Bowling Speak born 1665 St. Mary’s Co., MD died between July 23, 1755 and September 13, 1755 when his will was probated in St. Charles Co., MD, married Mary Benson
Thomas Speak born 1698 St. Mary’s Co., MD, died between August 2, 1755 and September 13, 1755 when his will was probated, the same day as his father’s, in St. Charles Co., MD, married Jane, last name uncertain
Charles Beckworth (or Beckwith) Speak born 1741 in St. Charles Co., MD, died 1793/94 Iredell Co., NC, married Anne, last name unknown
Nicholas Speak born 1782 in Charles Co., MD, died 1852 in Lee Co. VA, married Sarah Faires 1804 in Washington Co., VA
Charles Speak born 1804 Washington Co., VA, died 1840-1850 Lee Co., VA, married Ann McKee in 1823 in Washington Co., VA
Elizabeth “Bettie” Speak born 1832 Indiana or Virginia, died 1907 Hancock Co., TN, married Samuel Claxton/Clarkson
Margaret Claxton born 1851 Hancock Co., TN, died 1920 Hancock Co., TN, married Joseph Bolton
Ollie Bolton born 1874 Hoop Creek, Hancock County, TN, died 1955 Chicago, Illinois, married William George Estes

Ollie Bolton and William George Estes were my grandparents.

Thomas was the first Speak ancestor to set foot on American soil. That was while we were still a British colony. I was lucky enough to visit St. Mary’s County, Maryland in 2011 where the original Speak family settled and lived for several generations. The annual Speak(e)(s) Family convention was held in St. Mary’s County, and through the generous research of several family members, original Speakes land was identified and much of our early history was pieced together. I wrote an article about the visit for the SFA newsletter, which I’ve adapted for this article.

This research was only possible due to the collaboration of several people. The early Maryland research was completed by John Morris and published in the SFA Newsletters at various times, the land records, research and maps of Bowling Speak(e)(s) land by Jerry Draney, the history of St. Ignatius church from their website, and most of the photography by me during my visit in October of 2011 with the Speaks Family Association. The photo above is from the St. Ignatius church website at http://www.chapelpoint.org/history.asp.

Our first ancestor to come to the land that would one day become America, Thomas Speak was already in Maryland and had married Elizabeth Bowling before 1664. The first record in Maryland that can be directly attributed to our Thomas referred to as Thomas of St. Mary’s, not to be confused with Colonel Thomas Speak who started out in Maryland and wound up, a wealthy man, in Virginia, was his land grant of 50 acres in 1670 “for service”.

John Morris in his 1998 article about the life and times of both Thomas Speak states that there is ample evidence of Thomas of St. Mary’s in Maryland before 1661. In January of 1661 a summons was issued to the sheriff in Charles County Maryland for a Thomas Speake to testify on behalf of the government about a crime. Col. Thomas Speake had been dead for 18 months and his son Thomas, who died without issue, was not yet 21, so the Thomas being summoned had to be, by process of elimination, our Thomas of St. Mary’s. On November 3, 1663, Elizabeth Bowling Speak was also mentioned in a court record, having been subpoenaed to testify.

In 1662/63 Thomas Speake filed a lawsuit against Arthur Turner in Charles County to collect debt and he described himself as a tailor and signed with his mark “TS”. Our Thomas did not know how to write. John Morris, a lawyer by trade, states that this record shows that Thomas Speake was not indentured at the time this was filed, because if he had been, the claim would have belonged to his master. However, we know he had been indentured, because he received 50 acres in 1670 for his “service.” If his indenture was the traditional 5 or 7 years, this pushes his arrival date back to between 1655 and 1657. John suggests that he was probably a young man, between the ages of 15 and 20 when he arrived, pushing his birth back to about 1630 or so.

The oldest son of Thomas Speake and Elizabeth Bowling was their son John (whom we call John the innkeeper) who testified at a later date that he had been born “about 1665” in St. Mary’s County. Charles County was originally part of St. Mary’s County and is adjacent today.

In 1668, Thomas filed with the court requesting that his cattle be recorded as marked in the following manner: “Cropt of both eares, overkeel’d of both eares and a nick underneath both eares.”

In 1670, Thomas received his land grant after having served his time as an indentured servant to pay for his passage to Maryland. Indentured servants were not allowed to marry. Typically, but not always, indentures were for 7 years. If this is the case, and he married Elizabeth Bowling in 1663, he would have been indentured by 1656 or perhaps, if only indentured for 5 years, as late as 1658. If he married earlier, then he would have been indentured earlier as well. He would have entered the country at the time of his indenture. He would probably have been between 18 and 30, so probably born between 1626 and 1638.

Although things would have changed between 1634 and 1655 or so when Thomas arrived, this drawing of St. Mary’s City in 1634 from the Maryland State archives map collection gives us some idea of what Thomas might have seen upon arrival. Note the Piscataway Indian village located just outside the fort on the left. As we now know, the Speak family had some sort of relationship with the Indian tribe as they lived on the land owned by Bowling and subsequently, his son Thomas (of Zachia) and his son, Charles Beckworth Speak. Today, archaeological excavations continue at the site of the Indian village on historical Speak family land.

Thomas is believed to have been born about 1634. He died in 1681 with a will that tells us a great deal about him, in particular that Thomas of St. Mary’s was a Catholic.

… I give unto my Loving Son John Speake all my Lands after the Decease of my Loving wife Eliz. but in Case she my said wife shall marry then she two Enjoy only her third according to law my will is also that my Loving brother in Law James Bowling [Bouring, Bowing] hath the Disposall of my children to be brought up in the Roman Catholick faith And … that my body may be decent lead. At the discretion of my loving brother James Bowling [Bouring, Bowing] my above said Exec.. And I do hereby revoke disannul and make void all former wills and Testaments by me heretofore made in witness whereof fire the said Thomas Speake to this my last Will and Testaments have set to my hand and seal this 6th of May 1681.

My meaning is to give…… Speake my loving Son all my lands to him and his heirs for Ever and to my personall Estate to be Equally Divided my wife first having… third… Rest amongst mind Children.

Not only was Thomas a Catholic, but he was a practicing Catholic and his religion was obviously very important to him.

This will also tells us that Thomas’s land, although never located, was probably in Port Tobacco, because that is where we find John Speake, known as John the Innkeeper, living, later. Bowling Speake, however, not being the eldest son, was on his own in terms of finding and acquiring land after he reached adulthood.

St. Ignatius Catholic Church of St. Thomas Manor at Chapel Point, Maryland

In England, Catholics were forbidden to practice their faith. They couldn’t hold office, and many unbearable restrictions were put upon them. In the late 1620’s, the Calvert family provided a plan for the colonization of Maryland; a new colony in the new world with freedom of religion possible for all. In November of 1633, the expedition set sail for America in two ships, the Ark and the Dove, with Fr. White among the colonists along with two other Jesuits, Fr. John Altham and Brother Thomas Gervase. The two ships arrived at St. Clement’s Island in March 1634. Fr. White celebrated the first Mass in Maryland and set about establishing the Church in this new land.

Catholic settlers began to move westward along the Potomac River. Fr. White established a claim for St. Thomas Manor lands and took up his residence. A chapel had been erected at the point of land now known as Chapel Point. Fr. White labored among the Indians, broke the language barrier, and wrote a catechism in their language.

The window above the entrance (and shown above) of the Church commemorates the baptism of the Indian King and Queen of the Piscataways. Fr. White also blessed their marriage, and baptized their child.

St. Ignatius Church at Chapel Point was founded in 1641 by Father Andrew White, a prominent English Jesuit, who was born in London in 1579 and who was one of the first Jesuits to arrive in Maryland.

Father John G. Shea, S.J., an authority on U.S. Catholic history, tells of a remarkable miracle wrought through the large relic of the True Cross (shown below) which Father White carried in a specially designed receptacle hung around his neck.

Fr. White was called to attend an Indian who had been impaled by the limb of a tree. The branch had gone through the upper part of his body and he was in great agony and near death. Fr. White was able to impart the necessary articles of faith, which the Indian accepted, and then baptized him and administered the last Sacraments. Leaving instructions that, upon death, the body was to be kept for burial with the Church’s ritual, he blessed the Indian with the relic of the True Cross, and departed.

The next day, Fr. White returned to bury the Indian and was astonished to find the Indian recovered and out fishing. Two small marks were all that was left of the wounds. The same relic of the True Cross which Fr. White brought to America remains at the Church.

The present Church was built in 1798 by Fr. Charles Sewall, S.J., and is dedicated to God and to St. Ignatius Loyola.

The bricks of the Church, house, and chapel are laid in an attractive Flemish Bond, with a header in between each of the two stretches which was a style most popular in colonial days.

On December 27, 1866, a disastrous fire occurred, destroying the interior of the Church, chapel, and Manor. Irreplaceable losses at this time were the Church records and other historic documents. The baptism book begun in 1862 was saved. The walls stood firmly and the interiors were restored in 1867-68. Some Church furnishings saved during the fire include the Church doors, a carved wooden crucifix, and the tabernacle. Former slaves are said to have carried the tabernacle from the burning Church. The old wooden tabernacle is of mahogany from Santo Domingo and the sewing within it was done by the Carmelites before 1830.

The photo below is the church and behind the church, the priest’s quarters in 1933, from a photo hanging in the priest’s home today.

Below, the church today across the cemetery.

Aside from the historical and religious significance of this church, it is also provides one of the most beautiful vistas of the Port Tobacco River to be found. From in front of the church looking across the cemetery, you look down over the river. A simply stunning and inspiring vista on a warm and windy fall day in October of 2011.

Back to Thomas

Given that Thomas Speak had to have been here before 1660, and the first and only Catholic church at that time was St. Ignatius, that had to be the church that Thomas attended. His children were Catholic was well, Bowling, his son, at one time being fined as such, and they were surely baptized there. Thomas is most likely buried on his farm, which has not been located, but there is also a possibility that he is buried in the churchyard at St. Ignatius. Whether he was buried here or not, he most assuredly attended here and stood on this land and of a more personal nature, touched and saw the “relic of the true cross” and took communion from this very chalice, complete with its bumps, bruises and dings from its life being carried in a saddle bag by the priests in their travels. Thomas may have been one of the settlers who hosted Mass in his home.

The “relic of the true cross” was brought from England by Fr. Andrew White, S.J. in 1634. He wore it around his neck in a silver and glass case, which was specially made for the relic.

This piece of wood was brought back from the Holy Land during the crusades and is supposed to be a piece of the cross upon which Jesus was crucified. Miracles are associated with people praying and touching the vial that today holds the cross. The relic can be “proven” to the silver makers mark of 1633 in London.

The silver “saddle chalice”, which can be taken apart and disguised as a bell, was used by the early Jesuit missionaries as they traveled the mission circuit.

Sometimes Mass was said at the manor houses, not just at church. In fact the houses had everything they needed, except a priest and the chalice. This chalice was the one carried by the priest when he visited manor houses and from which he gave communion in the church as well.

Thomas’s Eldest Son, John

Thomas’s eldest son, John was an innkeeper at Port Tobacco. The inn was located beside and slightly behind Chimney House. John’s Inn was a neighbor to this home which still stands today. John would have visited Chimney House as well as been in the court house regularly. The court house stands adjacent to Chimney House today, but at that time, these buildings would have been part of a much larger “square” which historical records tell us included several inns, merchants, the court house of course, and homes of course of the “movers and shakers” of the day, who wanted to live close to the port and the court. Port Tobacco was designated as the county seat as early as 1686 and by then, John was already living there. A courthouse was built in 1730, telling us that prior to that, court was held in private residences, or perhaps, inns. The courthouse today is at least the third courthouse following replacements and fires. Chimney House, however, is original, and our ancestors surely gazed upon this house and trod its floors as we did today. Note the “Pent closets”, windows in the chimney, a feature exclusive to southern Maryland homes in this time period. The purpose is unclear.

Thomas’s Second Son, Bowling

Thomas’s second son, Bowling, owned land in two locations, 6 or 7 miles apart, in Charles County, Maryland.

You can see on the map below that these various locations were not far distant from each other. Because of the topography, there is no such thing as “as the crow flies”. Today’s major roads, 5 and 6, were both Indian trails. The Indians had identified the paths of least resistance, and fewest swamps, etc., and the English followed suit.

A = St. Peter’s Church adjacent Bowling Speak’s land called “The Mistake” and “Speaks Enlargement.”

B = Bowling’s land at Boarman’s Manor which included “Speaks Meadow.” This land is located 6.7 miles from point A.

C = Port Tobacco which is where John Speak, brother of Bowling, was an Innkeeper and lived near the courthouse. This land is 12.1 miles from point B.

D = St. Ignatious Church, the first Catholic Church where Thomas, the father of both Bowling and John would have been a member. This land is 3.6 miles from point C.

One group of tracts was in Boarman’s Manor at Bryantown and the second was adjacent Zachia Manor. Part of Bowling’s Zachia(h) Manor land is now occupied by St. Peter’s Church. In that timeframe, everyone named their land. Bowling’s land where the church is located was called “The Mistake,” a name which lends itself to sure and certain speculation.

Bowling’s 220 acre Boarman’s Manor tract of land purchased in 1718 from Mary Gardiner is shown in the drawing below as parcels A (orange), B (green) and C (yellow).

The deed of sale from Mary Gardiner to Bowling Speak described it as “being part of a greater tract of land commonly called or known by ye name of Bormans Reserve beginning at a bounded poplar of Williams Hardys Land.” Boarmans Reserve was later incorporated into Boarmans Manor, a tract that occupied approximately 4,000 acres.

The 1797 patent of Cedar Grove, 537 acres, by Alexander McPherson is also shown on the drawing and includes a part of Bowling Speaks land identified below as parcel A and the uncolored parcels to the left and right.

Speaks parcels B, C and D (blue) are not included in Cedar Grove.

Cousin Jerry Draney found and mapped this land in anticipation of our 2011 visit. Today this land is located near Hunter Hill Place off of Bryantown Road.

Speaks Meadow (17 acres), shown on the above drawing identified as parcel D (blue) was patented by Bowling Speak in 1739. It was described as adjoining to the upper end of Boarmans Manor beginning at a bounded white oak standing in the northwest line of said Manor.

Jerry plotted this on a topo map, above, but here’s the same land using Bing, today. You can see the triangle shaped land characteristics and Leonardtown Road.

Here, these tracts are overlayed on the map.

In 1754 Bowling sold 60 acres, tract C, to Philip Edelen, who passed it to his son Richard Edelen. This parcel has not been found in the land records subsequent to this sale.

The tracts in the drawing above colored orange, green and blue, were willed to Edward Speak by Bowling Speak in 1755. The will states “my dwelling plantation and a small tract of land called the Meadow.” Edward Speaks sold all the land and by 1779 it was all owned by the Edelen family.

It’s believed that Bowling’s earliest land, that purchase in 1709 from the Mudd family was in fact a few miles up the road, located on what would become Boarman’s Manor, near Bryantown.

In an attempt to better understand these locations and their proximity to each other, and to sort out confusion between the different tracts, I found the current location of St. Peter’s church and the location on Hunter Hill Place where we visited Bowling’s Bryantown lands. The church is the red arrow a the top and the Bryantown location is at the bottom.

The map below shows the location of Bowling’s land, The Mistake, at St. Peter’s Church at the top, the location where the family group visited shown by the large arrow at the bottom and the triangle shape that encloses all of Bowling’s Boarman’s Manor land with small red arrows near the bottom.

During the 2011 visit to Maryland, the family group visited the Boarman’s Manor lands owned by Bowling.

Hunter Hill place, shown above, is a private road and the location of the large red arrow at the bottom of the maps shown above. It’s believed that Bowling’s Boarman Manor land is located here. Below are photographs of the area, left to right, forming a panorama.

Below, the Speak(e)(s) family group in front of Bowling’s land.

Bowling was born about 1674 and would have reached adulthood about 1695. We know that in 1752, Bowling is still an active Catholic based on the following entry:

Archives of MD 50, p57-58
Assembly Proceedings, June 3-23, 1752 The Lower House.
L.H.J. Liber No.47; June 17 (p237-238)

The Lord Proprietary against Bowlen Speak} The said Bowlen Speak being bound by Recognizance for his Appearance here this Court, to answer of and concerning a Pre-sentment by the Grand Jurors, for the Body of the Province of Maryland, against him found; for that he, on or about the first Day of March last, did, in a public Manner, drink the Pretenders Health, and good Success in his Proceedings; and being demanded whether he is guilty of the Premisses in the Presentment aforesaid mentioned, or not guilty, says he is guilty thereof, and submits to the Court’s Judgment thereon.

The Pretender is of course, James, son of King James and his Catholic wife. England feared the return of Catholicism.

In 1718, Bowling Speak acquired land called “The Mistake” where the current St. Peter’s Church is located. He also had land called “Speak’s Enlargement” which abutted “The Mistake.”

Upon Bowling’s death in 1755, he left his “Mistake” and “Speake’s Enlargement” lands to his children. In his will, he gives the location of this land which Jerry Draney traced through deeds to the current owners, the Catholic Church. Bowling’s son, Thomas (known as Thomas of Zachiah), born about 1698, lived on this land. Later the same year, within a month of his father’s death, Thomas died as well, leaving his land to his children, but specifically to Charles Beckworth Speake and his brother, Nicholas Speaks. Charles Beckworth Speake was born in 1741 and his brother Nicholas, who shared the land with him, in 1734. To date, a sale of this land has never been found.

The plat in the drawing below created by Jerry Draney shows Bowling Speake’s Mistake land as it was divided after his death. Bowling Speak sold the tract labeled B (250 acres) to John Lancaster in 1744 and tract C (100 acres) to James Montgomery in 1754. The remaining acres were willed to his children as follows:

To Thomas Speaks described as 121 acres of land being part of a tract of land called Mistake beginning at the first bound tree and running thence to Jordan Branch and up the said Branch to a swale next of his dwelling place and thence to the beginning to make out 121 acres tracts F and G in drawing below. Note: The first bound tree is located in the south east corner of the Mistake.
To his son William Speake “202 acres with his dwelling place located on Mistake ( tracts D and E below). (Note: Although the will states 202 acres when all the acreages are summed the total is 672 which is 100 acres more than the resurveyed Mistake.)

Thomas Speak, Bowling’s son, also died in 1755 and willed his land to his children as well. Speaks Enlargement has not been found in Maryland land records so it is assumed that it was never recorded.

To sons Thomas Bowling and John Speake “120 acres of land to begin at the second course or a line of a tract of land called Mistake and to run with the course of the land as they are laid out for me in the said tract of land called Mistake at the end of the course next to Jordan’s Swamp.
To my loving wife Jane Speake my dwelling plantation whereon I now live during her natural life together with all that tract or parcel of land called Speake’s Enlargement.
To my two sons Charles Beckworth Speake and Nicholas Speake all the remaining part of that tract of land called Speake’s Enlargement and my remaining part of that tract called Mistake containing both together 90 acres after the decease of my wife Jane Speake to be equally divided between them by a line drawn from Jordan’s Swamp to the opposite line.”

According to research by Joyce Candland there is no record that Charles Beckworth or Nicholas ever sold any land in Charles County. In 1779 William Speak sold 6.75 acres (tract E) to John Smith. The deed mentions the inclusion of dwellings, orchards and improvements indicating that William Speak must have lived on this land.

William also sold tract D to Elizabeth Askin.

Jerry plotted the Bowling land, “The Mistake”, on a map adjacent the land owned by the Catholic church.

On the map you can see the current church and within the yellow boundary, the old cemetery. The land outlined in Green that intersects the land in yellow is land that Bowling lost in a resurvey. Today it is the “point” in the photo below. You can also see the high power lines that transect the land today.

In the photos below, you can see the “point” in green which overlays the yellow.

Jordan’s Run is right beyond the trees below, which are the trees at left, above.

There is beauty hidden everyplace. Here is Bowling’s spider:)

St. Peter’s Church

In 1673, Governor Charles Calvert moved his residence to “his Lordship’s Manor of Sachay (Zacchia)” for greater security and brought with him a Franciscan priest who established a mission, Lower Zacchia, which was the beginning of St. Peter’s neighboring parish, St. Mary’s or Bryantown. A short time later, the Franciscans built a second mission in Upper Zacchia, which is now known as Waldorf, but was then nothing more than a cabin, with the loft used to house passing missionaries. When the friar arrived, a bell was rung long and loud so that the Catholics for miles around could be notified of his presence. He would stay but a short time, hearing confessions, saying Mass and otherwise helping the parishioners any way he could. Marriages were performed, babies baptized and other sacraments administered according to the needs of the day.

For the most part, until 1700, the mission church in Upper Zacchia was served by the Jesuits from St. Thomas Manor in Port Tobacco (St. Ignatius). In 1700, the log cabin was replaced by a church, probably a looking like an ordinary small frame house without a steeple to avoid the penalties places on Roman Catholic churches at that time. This church was located in the old cemetery about a mile east of the present church.

The location of this cemetery is right across the road from the church on Bowling (then Thomas of Zekiah’s) land. It’s not unlikely that the old cemetery contains a few, or perhaps more, burials of our families. More specifically, it’s very likely that Thomas, son of Bowling, is buried there along with his wife. Bowling may be buried here as well, especially given that both Bowling and his son Thomas died very near the same time. Both of their estates were probated at the same term of court in September 1755. There are many unmarked graves in this old cemetery and the records have been destroyed.

By the early 1800s a large portion of The Mistake was owned by Thomas C. Reeves. In 1767 Hezekiah Reeves, father of Thomas Reeves, purchased the 250 acre tract Bowling sold to John Lancaster and in 1801 (Tract B above). Hezekiah Reeves executed a gift deed giving to Thomas Reeves “that tract or parcel of land where he now dwells.” (Tract B above) The drawing below was obtained from St. Peters Catholic Church and shows the plat of a portion of the land willed to by Thomas C. Reeves to St. Peters in 1825. Notice that the plat shows 37 acres identified as The Mistake where the St. Peters Church is now located.

The drawing below shows an overlay of the Bowling Speaks property on a current image from Google Earth. The names are the land owners as of the early 1800’s.

Zekiah Manor

I was confused as to why Bowling Speak would have had to, or chosen to, have his land resurveyed, especially given that he lost acreage in the deal. However, looking at this map, and who owned the neighboring land (Lord Baltimore), it now makes sense. A picture IS worth 1000 words.

Zekiah Manor outlined in red as it existed in 1789, with the boot of Bowling Speake’s land that he lost in the resurvey shown over lapping.

Thomas of Zachiah, in 1749, also apparently leased additional land.

An article entitled “The Speake Famiy of Maryland” written by Harold Speake refers to a book entitled Poverty in the Land of Plenty by Dr. Gregory Stiverson. On p. 13 of Harold’s article, he states that “Thomas {Speake} leased Lot 68 from the Lord Proprietory in 1749.”

The entire survey of Zachiah Manor is shown, below.

Zachia Manor abutted the Speak property, and we find that lot 68 is on the northern boundary, shown occupied in 1789 by a man named Baggett.

In an article about the Alvin family, we discover some interesting information about the lands of Zachia Manor, which would certainly extend to the Speak lands as well, abutting the Zachia Manor lands.

“The lease was relatively cheap—Zachia Manor had the poorest soil of any of Lord Baltimore’s manors. And Lord Baltimore’s leases were on better terms than private landlords could afford to offer.”

Therefore tenants in Zachia Manor tended to be relatively poor.

This article also tells us that Lord Baltimore allowed leases for extended periods. One for a Mr. Key, as follows:

We know that Mr. Key did negotiate a lease on a certain Lott No. 34 of Zachiah Manor in Charles County from the proprietor, Lord Baltimore, and that the lease began on Christmas Day, 1750. The annual rent was set at ₤1 and 10 shillings per year, and the term was to extend over the life of his youngest son, Francis Key, who was Clerk of Cecil County. Lord Baltimore allowed leases on his manor lands to be set for a term extending over the lifetime of up to three persons designated by the lessee, or over a set number of years.

After the Revolutionary War, the land would have been sold as Lord Proproprietors were no longer needed. This survey was for the sale of the tracts that Lord Baltimore had been leasing previously.

Back to Bowling and Thomas

Bowling was assuredly a Catholic, and one could safely presume his children were as well. All of them probably baptized in St. Ignatius Church in Port Tobacco. It’s unlikely that all of the children born to Thomas, Bowling or Thomas (of Zekiah) survived. Those children were probably buried, after being baptized, if possible, either in the family cemetery, now lost, or in the St. Ignatius churchyard, whose early records are also lost. After 1700, they could have been buried in the old church cemetery on Bowlings and then Thomas’s land.

Charles Beckworth Speake lived with his father, Thomas, on Zekiah Manor from his birth in about 1741, inheriting land in 1755 at his father’s death, until he moved to Rowan/Iredell County, NC. He was on the Rowan County tax lists by 1787 and had died by 1793, leaving young orphans. Apparently his wife had died too, as the children were made wards of a Richard Speak. Nicholas, the son of Charles Beckworth Speake, reported being born in Maryland in 1782, so apparently Charles Beckwith Speak(e)(s) moved to NC between 1782 and 1787.

Charles Beckworth was probably born Catholic in Maryland, but may have switched to the “church of opportunity” after leaving Maryland. Charles’ son, Nicholas, as we know was a Methodist minister, never wavering from his path, establishing Speaks Methodist Church in Lee County, Virginia in the 1820s, near 1830.

Back in Maryland, we can rest assured that indeed, the two churches, St. Ignatius and St. Peters served the needs of at least the first 3 if not 4 or 5 generations of our Speak(e)(s) ancestors in Charles County, Maryland.

In the photo above, I am holding both the “relic of the true cross” and the chalice. Both of these items were assuredly near and dear to the hearts of Thomas, the immigrant, and his wife, Elizabeth Bowling who, along with her brother James, were assuredly Catholic. Their sons would also have taken communion from this chalice, Bowling and John. Bowling was a practicing Catholic, so we can presume his wife Mary Benson was as well. Their sons would also have been baptized Catholic, which included Thomas of Zekiah who died in 1755. Thomas’s wife, Jane was probably Catholic as well, but it’s about this time that we can no longer tell for sure. It’s likely that Thomas remained Catholic and that his son Charles Beckworth Speak was as well. Charles moved to North Carolina and died while his children were yet young, in 1793 or 1794. By 1820, Charles’ son, Nicholas was a devout Methodist. If Charles was still a practicing Catholic, then Nicholas would have been initially baptized Catholic, probably in St. Peter’s Church, when he was born in Maryland in 1782.

I am a 10th generation descendant of Thomas, the immigrant, and Elizabeth Bowling Speak. I’m sure that Thomas and Elizabeth never dreamed that 355 years later, their great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-granddaughter (yes, that’s 8 greats) would come back to Maryland, from someplace that at that time had no name (Michigan) and had not yet even been “discovered,” in one days time, in an incredible metal carriage with no horse, on roads with hard surfaces, at unbelievable speeds, to stand where he worshiped, to hold the chalice he drank from and the relic he prayed with. Perhaps he prayed for the life of my ancestor or his other children. Perhaps he prayed not to be forgotten, and perhaps, just perhaps, his prayers were answered.

Indeed, he hasn’t been. Not only did a group of his descendants come back to visit him, and homelands where he lived, his DNA lives on as well

DNA and the Speak Lines

Several Speaks men have tested who descend, or thought they descended from Thomas Speak.

You might notice on the chart above, that not all of the “sons” are yellow, the color of John, Bowling and Thomas. In fact, Capt. Francis and William are blue and red, and John E. is both green and yellow striped. This means that the descendants who tested in these lines do not match. Whether that is actually because Francis, for example, really was not the son of Richard, or whether an undocumented adoption has occurred some place in the line or the genealogy is incorrect has yet to be determined. In order to further define those lines, we need additional men from those lines to test.

John, on the other hand was schizophrenically colored with yellow and green stripes because his two sons lines DNA did not match. However, we know that the Thomas line is yellow because people from various sons lines all matches the yellow DNA results.

The Charles Beckworth to Nicholas Speaks line is the yellow line to the far right, above.

Based on this information and the combined DNA results of his descendants, we know that Thomas the immigrant was “yellow” because that DNA is found identically in both of his sons lines and from this, we have been able to reconstruct Thomas’s marker values. It’s really kind of amazing, to be able to reconstruct part of the DNA sequence of a man who died 333 years ago, and all without a shovel!

The chart above shows that these four individuals all descend from Thomas, 2 through son Bowling, and 2 through son John. All 4 of these men match exactly on all of the markers shown. Therefore, we know that Thomas, the immigrant carried these exact same marker values. This process is called triangulation, and it’s how we “reconstruct” the DNA of an ancestor by utilizing the DNA of his descendants, preferably through multiple sons.

It would be the Y DNA of Thomas’s descendants that would match the Lancashire DNA and would, in 2013, guide us home, back across the sea, tracing Thomas’s footsteps, in reverse. What would he think?

http://dna-explained.com/2012/10/18/the-speak-family-3-continents-and-a-dash-of-luck/

http://dna-explained.com/2014/02/17/coventry-and-the-ribble-valley/

http://dna-explained.com/2014/02/28/following-the-ribble-river-to-gisburn-lancashire/

http://dna-explained.com/2014/03/12/downham-and-whalley-lancashire-next-stop-on-the-dna-journey/

The story isn’t finished. Check back for articles in the 52 Ancestors series and the 2013 DNA Trip series as well.

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Edith Barbara Lore Ferverda (1888-1960) and the Road to Hell – 52 Ancestors #10

Posted on March 8, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Edith was my grandmother, my mother’s mother.

I knew her as a buxom, heavy-set woman who always wore dresses, usually dark, that buttoned up the front, an apron, and black lace-up shoes. With her grey hair, she was the consummate loving grandmother, and I remember her running to greet us when we arrived, every time we arrived, and giving me a big hug. I’m glad I have that repeated memory, as she passed away when I was four of a sudden heart attack. This picture of me on her lap is exactly as I remember her.

As I look at her birth date, it’s just so hard for me to comprehend that someone I knew in my lifetime was born in the 1880s. My personal knowledge by talking to that person stretched from today back 126 years in time. That’s the width, or length, if you will, of her personal testimony. Until my mother passed away, in 2006, her length of personal testimony stretched back to 1866 with her mother’s mother, Nora Kirsch Lore and 1857 with her father’s mother, Eva Miller Ferverda. That’s 149 years that personal recollection in the family covered at one time. Both of those women, of course, would have had personal memories of their grandparents that reached back into the 1700s that they could have conveyed. Of course, that’s assuming Mother had the presence of mind and interest to ask the right questions – which – of course – she didn’t!

Isn’t that so often the bane of genealogists – learning too late that we should have asked those important questions when we could have.

The photo below, cropped from a larger family meal photo, serves as a 3 generation photo of me, Mom and her mother.

You could also call this a mitochondrial DNA picture, because we all carry the mtDNA of Edith’s mother, Nora, passed to Edith, then through Edith to mother and then on to me, and now to my children as well.

The Early Years

Edith’s parents, Ellnore “Nora” Kirsch and Curtis Benjamin Lore were married at the Kirsch House, the Inn where the family lived, in Aurora, Dearborn County, Indiana on January 18, 1888. Nora made her wedding dress and descended the spiral staircase in the parlor. This photo was taken on her wedding day.

Church baptismal records indicated that their first child, my mother’s mother, was born August 2, 1888. In case anyone is counting, that’s not 9 months. That means the baby was “2 months premature,” and of course, the baby wasn’t premature, Nora was pregnant when they married.

The family took great pains to hide this fact, going so far as to enter the year as 1889 in various places. Edith’s said that her birth year had been recorded incorrectly as 1888 for insurance purposes, which was probably something she had been told.

This seemed like a great deal of trouble to hide a pregnancy, especially since others in the same family had suffered from the same “prematurity” issue. But in reality, it wasn’t the pregnancy that was being hidden, but what they “did,” you know, that three letter s-word, to cause the pregnancy. Harumph….for shame….

However, today, we view these types of things from our cultural perspective and their perspective in 1888 was quite different. This was well into the Victorian Era which lasted from about 1850 to about 1900. Victorian morality could be described as any set of values that espouse sexual restraint, low tolerance of crime and a strict social code of conduct. Obviously that “sexual restraint” part had been an issue. Hmmm….

My mother recalled that they had a terrible time finding Edith’s birth certificate at all, because Edith thought she was born in Rushville, Indiana but she wasn’t it turns out, but in Indianapolis, Indiana. This was during a time period when the family would do just about anything to disguise a pregnancy before marriage, including sending the young woman away, which may be why the baby was born in Indianapolis and neither in Aurora where Nora was raised or Rushville where they subsequently lived.

Nora, Edith’s mother, had married a wildcatter oil driller from Pennsylvania, Curtis Benjamin Lore [Lord], known as “C.B.” Roguishly handsome, I do believe he got to look down the business end of a shotgun held by Nora’s father, Jacob Kirsch, who was none too shy about using said gun. Jacob fought in the Civil War, led a lynch mob who meted out justice to an itinerant bricklayer who killed a man, and I’m sure he had no great love for this “older man” who got his daughter pregnant. Had Jacob known that Curtis Benjamin Lore had a wife and family back in Pa., Curtis Benjamin Lore would have died in March 1888 of a shotgun blast instead of 24 years later in 1912 of TB.

Also, back then, when a woman married, she often dropped her middle name and inserted her maiden name in its place, so Nora Kirsch would have become Nora K. Lore and Edith Barbara Lore would have become Edith L. Ferverda when she married John Ferverda. For whatever reason, that seemed to be tradition, at least in that part of Indiana, kind of a rite of passage into marriage, but it could and would certainly serve to confuse an unsuspecting genealogist a few decades later, well, maybe a hundred years later. I think our ancestors have a sense of humor and enjoy doing things like this to us!

I have always loved this photo of Edith as a young child, wearing a gold bead necklace still in the family today.

Edith grew up in Rushville, Indiana where she would meet the agent who worked for the railroad, John Whitney Ferverda. They married on November 17, 1908.

Rushville Republican Newspaper, Nov. 18, 1908 – Miss. Edith Barbara Lore and Mr. John Whitney Ferveda were quietly married at the Presbyterian church parsonage in North Harrison Street last night by Rev. J. L. Cowling.

Rushville Republican Newspaper, Nov. 21, 1908 – Greenville News: Miss Edith Lore of Rushville and John W. Ferverda were married Tuesday afternoon. Miss Edith was one of the famous Watson “Beauty Bunch” composed of the 9 young women stenographers employed in Mr. Watson’s office during the campaign. She is a daughter of Curt B. Lore who drilled the first gas well in this city.

The photo of Edith, above was made into a postcard which was a popular way to say hello to someone when she was young. This was probably about the time she married John Ferverda. She did send at least one post card to him.

The back of the postcard, below.

Their courtship must have lasted some time, because this postcard was a year and 10 days before their marriage. They were at least flirting by November 1907.

A Woman with Aspirations

Edith was not a “normal girl” for her time. In fact, she never was “normal” when compared to her contemporaries of that time.

She went to business school in downtown Cincinnati, shown above in 1910, by commuting daily on the train from the Kirsch House where her grandparents lived, in Aurora, Indiana. Edith had aspirations, first, for herself and then for her family. She was a frustrated adult, because given the time in which she lived, and then the Great Depression, things didn’t quite work out the way she had in mind.

The Watson Beauty Bunch

The Rushville Republican Newspaper provides us with wonderful coverage of the Watson Beauty Bunch, a group of stenographers that assembled then used as “advertising,” for lack of a better term my a political candidate. I’ll just let the newspaper articles tell the story. The best part is Edith’s picture.

Click to enlarge.

And one more article.

The Watson Beauty Bunch would have been considered very sexist today, in essence exploiting women, and not for their benefit. I don’t know how Edith felt about this, then or later – although she often told stories about this time to her family. I do know that my mother mentioned it, and not in a negative context, simply as something interesting and an involvement with politics. Edith and the other “Beauty Bunch” women experienced some amount of notoriety and their involvement was exciting and unique for that time.

Mother said that James Watson, a career lawyer and politician, wanted Edith to accompany him to Washington DC, but she declined – a decision she always regretted. Watson, a Republican, was defeated in his 1908 bid for Indiana governor after resigning his seat in the House of Representatives to run, but continued to be very influential in politics, eventually returning to Washington in the Senate.

It’s sad that in 1908 women couldn’t yet vote and the extent of their contributions were as stenographers.

Another perspective would be that while Watson certainly couldn’t help how women were socially perceived and the institutionalized discrimination that existed at that time, he was giving credit where credit was due, allowing those typically marginalized to the shadows to experience some limelight.

A stenographer was “one who transcribes,” according to Wikipedia, “such as a secretary who takes dictation,” often in shorthand.

Edith’s stint in business school wasn’t really about business at all, but focused more on secretarial skills that were supportive to those in business. Few job or career opportunities were available to women at that time, and stenography was one that was. Despite the sexist nature of the job, it was this skill set that saw the family through the Great Depression.

The Great Depression

In fact, during the Depression, it would be Edith that supported the family. Her husband John lost his hardware business sometime between 1920 and 1930, a devastating personal blow. In the 1920s and 1930s, Edith worked at the chicken hatchery as the bookkeeper. She is third from right, front row, below.

In 1951, she went to work as a stenographer for the Welfare Department until her death in 1960.

The women in my family have TRIED to behave themselves, for generations, but overall, we haven’t been terribly successful. In a moment of wild abandon, my grandmother, Edith, on the rear of this motorcycle, her mother, Nora in front of her and her two sisters, Eloise and Mildred in front leading the pack. Yes, they did ride motorcycles, but not all 4 on one! No, their husband’s did not approve. No, they did not stop, well, at least not because of that. And even after they stopped, they had a little relapse from time to time. Yes, my grandmother was a biker chick, a Harley Mama. Way, way ahead of her time.

Edith Lore and John Ferverda moved back to his home town of Silver Lake, Indiana, away from the hustle and bustle and excitement of the big city and politics, where they spent the rest of their lives. I think in many ways this was really difficult for Edith.

In the Family Memory book I gave to Mom to record her memories, here’s what she had to say about her mother, Edith:

“Mother went to business school in Cincinnati. She commuted from Aurora at the Kirsch House to Cincy by train. After that, she worked for a man who became a state senator from Rushville. This was in the early 1900s before she and John [Ferverda] were married. He wanted her to come to Washington DC and be his secretary but she turned it down because she had met John and did not want to leave Rushville. She wanted to stay and marry my father and when he misbehaved, she reminded him that she could have gone to Washington instead. This was before women could even vote which happened in about 1918 when women become franchised. There were 8 or 9 young women who were the “Barnard Beauty Bunch” who worked his campaign. He selected her from that group but she turned him down.”

The Kirsch House, shown above at right, was located right beside the train depot, at left, so commuting to Cincinnati was easy.

Mom couldn’t remember the name of the man who ran for Congress. Google, being my friend, I discovered that William O. Barnard was elected from that district in 1908. This also makes sense in terms of the first name to go with the “Beauty Bunch”. While we think of this as highly sexist today, it was apparently effective then and thought of as normal. He was not reelected in 1910 and returned to practice law and become a judge in the area. This would have had to have been the politician and it also makes sense in that John and Edith married on Nov. 17, 1908, just days after the election.

Mom’s Most Precious Memory of Edith

Here’s what Mom said in answer to the question, “What is your most precious memory of your mother?”

“There are so many. For many years she drove me 40 miles nightly after work to Fort Wayne two or three times a week to attend dancing school from which I at one point emerged as a professional tap dancer for approximately 5 years. I first danced in Warsaw for a couple of years, then in Wabash, then in Fort Wayne. That particular career ended when I fell and broke a bone in my foot. She would go to work early and take her lunch so she could get her 8 hours in just in time to make the bank deposit and get me to class. When I got home and she didn’t get home till 5 it was getting dark. Lore, my brother, was delivering his papers and I was alone. A couple of times Mom found me sitting under the street light at the corner because I didn’t want to be alone in the house. After that she left work at 4.

In a small town there really wasn’t a sitter because there were so many neighbors watching to be sure that you weren’t doing something that your mother needed to be told about so she could get it stopped. Busy bodies did serve a purpose. Once it rained and neighbor boy Frank and I were playing in gutters. I heard the phone ring and I knew I’d better get inside and answer it or I’d be in trouble. “Barbara Jean – you get in the house and you stay out of the street – NOW.” We’d been having a “splashing good time”.”

My mother had Rheumatic Fever as a child which left her with a heart murmur, among other issues. The doctor at the time recommended dancing as a way to strengthen her heart, so dance she did. And she danced very well too, even with her “late start.” But Mom’s story is one for another time.

As Mom got older, a teen, she taught dancing and her mother played the piano for that as well as for the local Methodist church. In the piano room in the house in Silver Lake, a hardwood floor was installed for Mom’s dancing and teaching.

Edith managed to break both of her wrists roller skating, which, ironically, she would not let my mother do because she was afraid she would hurt herself and not be able to dance. Mom was 14 or 15 when Edith broke her wrists, so Edith would have been just under 50. Edith wanted to try and skate, but she fell and lit on her behind, catching herself with her hands, shattering both wrists. The Doctor said they were not repairable because she had crushed the bones. She practiced the piano to loosen them and worked out the pain because she was NOT going to give up playing for Mom’s dancing and recitals. That woman had tenacity!

Newspaper articles from the local paper give us some additional glimpses of information about her life after she and John Ferverda moved back to Silver Lake.

May 22, 1911

Edith used to accompany various students both for dance and voice. She had married John in 1908 and their first child did not arrive until 1915. This would have been after she married but before the responsibilities of children.

May 23, 1911

May 24, 1911

They were apparently pleased as she played for the students a second year as well.

July 30, 1912

Mrs. Gertrude (her name was Nora, not Gertrude) Lore of Rushville is here at present visiting with her daughter, Mrs. John Ferverda and husband. Mrs. Lore’s two daughters (Mildred, 13, and Eloise, 9) have been here for the past several weeks visiting at the Ferverda home. (I don’t think the following paragraph is relevant to the Ferverda family, but with all those females maybe my grandfather was taking up residence in the garage.)

October 11, 1912

Mr. and Mrs. John Ferverda of Silver Lake are here for a two weeks visit with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. H.B. Ferverda.

April 25, 1914

Mrs. Ferverda and Miss McClure entertained a crowd of young people at the McClure home Wednesday night.

July 10, 1915

Mrs. John Ferverda is at Leesburg this week visiting with relatives. The squirrel law is now out and she took a rifle with her and she will spend some time hunting squirrels.

What? My grandmother shooting squirrels. Her first child, Harold Lore Ferverda was born in November 24, 1915. So she was shooting a rifle in July of that year? Amazing.

Nov. 27, 1915

John Ferverda, our genial agent at the Big Four station and wife and Percy Helser the drayman, and wife, are the proudest people in the whole community and passed the most enjoyable Thanksgiving of any. The stork came to their homes Wednesday afternoon and left a bouncing boy baby at the Ferverda home and at the Helser home he left a sweet little girl.

There was a doctor in Silver Lake. Everyone knew him of course. But Edith’s two babies were not delivered by the doctor, but by a midwife. Edith truly was a woman of the Victorian Era. The doctor was not allowed to see her unrobed, and I don’t believe my grandfather, or any other man, ever did either. This was typical for the time. Hard to believe her granddaughters were bra burners and wore those immodest things called bikinis!!!

Jan. 22, 1916

J. W. Ferverda has returned home from a trip to Rushville where he was for a couple of days visiting with his wife and son.

From the sounds of this, perhaps Edith took her new baby and went home to be with her mother for a few weeks.

October 14, 1916

Mrs. John Ferverda and son have returned home from Aurora where they had been for a week visiting with relatives and many friends.

August 11, 1917

Mrs. John Ferverda and son are down to Wabash this week visiting with relatives and friends.

Nora’s mother eventually moved from Rushville to Wabash, Indiana. From the looks of this article, I’d say it was in 1917. Wabash was much closer to Silver Lake than Rushville and it was probably a welcome move for both women.

Family Life

I tried every Sunday to write something about Mom’s life. Her health was deteriorating by then, so I felt the need to record as much as possible while I still could.

Mom described her life and surroundings after she was born in1922. In doing so, of course, she also described her parents’ lives during that time.

“Search and discovery led to many new items that made life easier and better for many, many people. Medicine and surgical procedures were progressing. Surgery was softer and easier to handle. Penicillin was in the 30s. Inside bathrooms became the norm instead of the exception. We purchased the house where I grew up when I was about 3 [1925]. For several years we had an outside privy but then when I was about 8 [1930] a room was taken inside the house and water and drainage installed so we had an inside bathroom with a toilet, sink and bathtub. As a child, I took a bath in the foot tub. Adults washed all over from a washbasin and they were clean and smelled alright.”

“The electric refrigerator from GE had a big ball on top.”

‘Before that we had an ice box in the basement and an ice truck came by twice a week to put ice in the ice box. The ice was cut from Silver Lake in the winter.’

“Mother made her sewing room a bathroom. I sat on her lap while she pedalled the machine and I guided the fabric, or vice versa. It was a Wheeler and Wilson machine which was at that time a very good machine but the wheel ran backwards. I could not pedal and work the wheel and guide the fabric all at once. I could stretch to reach the pedal which we had to pump back and forth. I was about 10 then. That is the only sewing machine she ever had.”

“We had electricity in the new house when we moved into it in 1925. We had an electric stove and oven. That was a luxury. Four burners and the oven to the right side on the same level as the burners.”

“We had a phone in both houses. You would pick up the phone and ring the phone for the operator by cranking. She would answer and say “number please.” You would tell her the number you wanted to connect to.”

“You could call long distance too but most people avoided it because it was expensive. Today it is still expensive, but we call long distance more freely and more people have phones too.”

On another page of the family book, the topic is “my mother’s kitchen”. It asks questions about the most wonderful thing about your mother’s kitchen, how she let you help and about Mother’s best recipe.

Here’s what Mom had to say:

“Mother had a really good fudge recipe. She was at work and I was home by myself. I got the recipe out and made fudge, beat it until thick enough to put into pan, so I sampled it, and sampled it some more. By the time Mother came home, there were 2 pieces left which I gave to her and was so proud of myself that I had made fudge. Never occurred to me I shouldn’t have eaten the whole batch.”

For those of you who are adventurous souls, I scanned the recipe out of Mom’s recipe box and it’s below. White syrup is Karo Syrup. The chocolate referred to below is unsweetened.

My daughter made that same “from scratch” fudge recipe for my Mom as a gift for Christmas more than once.

I have a special memory of that kitchen too. My grandmother had bluebird pie tins with holes in the bottom.

My grandmother and grandfather had an apple orchard and a raspberry patch, so pies were always a staple. She made her own pie crusts of course, because at that time, frozen foods weren’t available at the grocery store. When she had a little extra dough left over she would spread it thinly in the bottom of the pie pan, butter it and sprinkle it with sugar and cinnamon and bake it special for me. I love those pie crust pies better than any other!

photo by dep31 at http://www.domesticendeavors.net

The next page in the family book asks about lessons learned from Mother, and here’s what Mom had to say:

“The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.”

I can’t tell you how many times Mother said this to me. Somehow seems appropriate, considering the fudge situation anyway:)

The Road to Hell

That was true of our DNA too….that good intentions, road to hell thing. We’ve learned a lot in the past decade plus.

As I mentioned before, Nora, Edith, Mom and I all carry the same mitochondrial DNA, passed from mothers to all of their children, not admixed with any DNA from the father. But only females pass it on. So it’s a special grandmother-mother-daughter-granddaughter kind of bond. It also means that to test to discover the mitochondrial DNA of an ancestor, you have to find someone descended from that ancestor to the current generation through all females. But in the current generation, males can test too, because they inherit their mother’s mitochondrial DNA, but just don’t pass it on.

When DNA testing first began, in about the year 2000, we didn’t have full mitochondrial DNA sequencing available like we do today. We know, for example, that our full haplogroup is J1c2f because every single location of our 16,569 mitochondrial DNA locations has been read. There is no more to read, no mitochondrial DNA upgrades to be had…so we’re done. Now the only way our haplogroup will “grow” is if new subclades within our subgroup of J1c2f are found and we fit into them, and then we might be classified as J1c2f1, for example.

For a long time, because we initially tested so early, all I knew was that my haplogrop was J, then J1, then J1c…you get the drift. So we tried to make connections with people, and their ancestry, who matched us only on the HVR1 and then on the HVR1+HVR2 when we could test for both regions. We found a match with a woman, Clara, whose ancestors were from a village not far from where Nora Kirsch’s great-grandmother was from in Germany. Clara’s ancestors were Jewish and had vacated that area in Germany to journey into the Russian mountains into an enclave where they felt they would be safe several hundred years before Nora’s great-grandmother lived there in 1800.

While Clara and I could not connect genealogically, we felt that the coincidence of a 50 mile close connection, even if a few hundred years apart, was too much to be purely happenstance. So, I thought, at that time, that it was very possible that our ancestors had at one time, been Jewish.

I was wrong. We didn’t have enough information at that time but we didn’t realize it.

As additional testing became available, both Clara and I took the full sequence test and discovered that we are in different extended haplogroups. This means that our common ancestors weren’t just 50 miles apart and a few hundred years, but 50 miles and a few thousand years, before the time of Christ and before the advent of the Jewish religion – back in the Near East. Yes, they had both wound up in Germany, but their paths there were very different. Clara’s ancestor as a Jewish woman and mine probably with the neolithic expansion of agriculture, thousands of years earlier.

Today, Clara and I don’t even show as matches. This is because of smart-matching. Family Tree DNA knows that if your full extended haplogroup doesn’t match, you really aren’t matches, so you are no longer shown at the HVR1 and HVR2 region as matches either.

How could we have been so wrong? Partial data – it’s a dangerous thing.

First, initially we had few matches. Second, some were Jewish. He’s an excerpt of my haplogroup origins page. Looks Jewish to me. Right?

Right up until I tell you that these are ONLY HVR1 matches, ONLY 6 of 86 entries, so 7% of the HVR1 entries, and that none of my HVR1+HVR2 matches nor any of my full sequence matches are Jewish. So were these HVR1 matches to test further, to the HVR2 or full sequence level, it’s very unlikely that any of them would continue as matches. Now you’re not so excited anymore are you? Well, this is the discovery sequence that happened over the years to our Jewish theory as well.

Fortunately in our case, we didn’t have a horse in the race, meaning we didn’t “want to be” Jewish or “not want to be” Jewish. We were ambivalent about it. We did however, want to know the truth, whatever it was – Jewish or not. Our DNA gave us that, once full sequence testing was available.

Some people, on the other hand, become very unhappy, even disbelieving, when their pet theory has a scientific blowout. Let’s just say this isn’t the first time that I’ve been thrown out of what I thought was my family tree. The bad news is that more often than not, I’ve been the one sawing on the branch! Ah yes, that road to hell thing…maybe it’s genetic:)

______________________________________________________________

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Ollie Bolton Estes Robbins (1874-1955) and the Wrath of a Woman Scorned – 52 Ancestors #9

Posted on March 1, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Ollie Bolton was born on May 5, 1874 in a neighborhood called Hoop Creek in Hancock County, Tennessee near the Claiborne/Hancock County line in 1874 to Joseph B. “Dode” Bolton and Margaret N. Claxton/Clarkson. We don’t know the middle names of either of her parents.

Ollie was my grandmother, my father’s mother, but I never knew her. She died in April, 1955, before my birth.

She is the least known of my grandparents. My Estes family told me stories of her first husband, my grandfather, William George Estes, who she married in Claiborne County, Tennessee on September 26, 1892, but there was no one to tell me stories about Ollie.

We don’t even know Ollie’s middle name for sure. In some places it’s recorded as Florence, but on my father’s Social Security application, he gives it as Ollie Elsie Bolton.

Ollie applied for a social security number on July 31, 1939. She is living at 117 S. Hamilton in Chicago. She is not employed and is age 65 at her last birthday. She gives her birthdate as May 5, 1874 and her parents as Joseph Bolton and Margreat Clarkson. No, that is not a typo.

Life Was Hard

Ollie’s life was hard. She lost her first baby at six weeks of age, the year after she was married, a month and 6 days before her first wedding anniversary. Her second child followed in 1894. Not long thereafter, Ollie and William George Estes moved to Springdale in Washington County, Arkansas where Ollie ran a boarding house and tended to her children, with little help from William George.

They moved back to Claiborne County and were living there in 1900, but William George was out of work more than he wasn’t, and he drank.

The 1907 photo of Ollie doesn’t portray her as a happy woman. Of course, photos can be poor or deceiving, but as of the time this photo was taken, 3 of the 7 children she had born were dead, and one had died tragically.

This photo was labeled “1907 Cumberland Gap.”

According to the 1910 census, three of Ollie’s children had died. We know who two of them are, Samuel who died at 6 weeks of age, and Robert who died when their cabin burned, but there appears to be a third child who died as well – probably born in the spot between 1894 and 1898 – and probably buried in Arkansas. It’s sad, that child is lost to us and we only knew of their existence from the census records.

Margaret says the family Bible was destroyed in the fire. It would have told us more.

The death of the child in the cabin fire must have been torturous for Ollie. The family in Estes Holler says that Ollie had left the children to go to a party. They don’t say where William George was. Odd that her absence is mentioned, somewhat scornfully, but his was simply accepted without mention.

It looks like Robert died before 1907. He was born in 1898 and the photo of the children in 1907 is without Robert. We know he died after they returned to Claiborne County, which was before the 1900 census. Cousin George showed me where the cabin that burned had stood, and the willow he planted in honor of the child who died.

I have often wondered if I was named after this child. It was my father that selected my name of Roberta.

Moving to Indiana

Shortly after the 1910 census, the family moved to Fowler, Indiana and were tenant farmers.

There appear to be some happy times there. Well, Ollie looks happy even if William George doesn’t. Ollie and William George are on the left and Howard Friar, with wife Mary “Ropp” Bolton. These two couples stood up for each other when they married. Aunt Ropp was Ollie’s half first cousin, a granddaughter of Joseph Preston Bolton and Mary Tankersley.

This family photo is labeled “1913, Fowler, Indiana,” although Aunt Margaret said the photo was taken in Boswell, Indiana on Easter Sunday.

The adults, other than Ollie and George to the right in the back row, are Ollie’s cousins, Clara and Mont Bolton, far left, and possibly family friend Ted Barnes third from left in the read. Beside Ollie is Elizabeth Bolton, sister of Mont and wife of George Smith. One of their sons, Joseph was missing in this photo, reportedly at scouts. My father, William Sterling Estes is the youngest male in the front row on the left beside his brother, their oldest son, Estle. Beside Estle at the right of the front row are cousins Lee and George Smith.

The Crazy Aunts, adversaries for life, Margaret, brunette on the left and Minnie, blonde on the right, are standing in the second row.

This is the only existing photo of the entire family. Margaret said that it was taken by setting a timer on William George’s camera. This photo was also taken about 1913 or 1914.

Shortly thereafter, the family scuttlebutt is that Ollie’s young cousin came to visit. By young, the young lady was born about the time that Ollie and William George were married. Ollie came home and discovered her cousin and William George in “the act.” Ollie grabbed either a bullwhip or a horsewhip, stories vary, but it really doesn’t matter, and proceeded to use it on him/them. The only thing that saved them was that there were others nearby. The Crazy Aunts tell us that it took “5 grown men” to restrain her. Never underestimate the wrath of a woman scorned.

Sadly, the parents didn’t just separate, but the family was divided in half. Margaret said, ” we had no home,” and that “neither Mama nor Daddy would take the boys.”

All the Children

Ollie Bolton and William George Estes had the following children, for sure, in Claiborne County, Tennessee, unless noted otherwise.

Samuel T. Estes born July 8, 1893, died August 20, 1893
Charles Estel Sebastian Estes born November 1, 1894, died August 26, 1972
Unknown child per the 1910 census, probably born and died in Arkansas
Robert Estes born June 1898, Arkansas, died before 1907, Claiborne County, TN
William Sterling Estes born October 1, 1901, 1902 or 1903, died August 27, 1963, Jay County, Indiana
Joseph “Dode” Harry Estes born September 13, 1904 died December 9, 1994, Wayne Co., IL
Margaret LeJean Estes born November 16, 1906, died August 6, 2005, California
Minnie May Estes born October 1, 1908, died February 3, 2008, Steinhatchee, Florida

Moving on to Chicago

There are other family stories surrounding this time as well. One story says that Ollie was pregnant with twins, that she lost after the scandalous “cheating husband” event. Another story says that another child, Elsie, was born and eventually died, and that Elsie was “retarded.” From what was said, Elsie likely had Downs Syndrome. One Crazy Aunt said Elsie died in Chicago, but there is no death record to support this, or any photos, nor any other indication that this child existed. Another rumor said there was also a second set of twins that died. By 1914, Ollie was 40 years old. She could well have had a Downs Syndrome baby. However, neither Benton County, Indiana, nor Cook County, Illinois records show the birth or death of any Elsia Estes or infant twins.

The photos above and below were labeled by Aunt Margaret as “Ollie Bolton Estes and Margaret 1918 Franklin Park, Illinois.” I have always questioned whether this was Ollie or Ollie’s mother. Another cousin has this same photo labeled differently which might imply that the women is Ollie’s mother, Margaret Claxton/Clarkson. The identifier “grandmother” is a matter of perspective. However, Crazy Aunt or not, Margaret was there in the photo and she should have known if it was her mother or grandmother.

I have a note in my file that Ollie moved to Chicago in 1919, and Margaret sent a photo of Minnie in Chicago in 1922, if she is correct about where it was taken. I cannot find Ollie in the census in 1920.

In the 1930 census, Ollie had remarried and she and John Robbins lived on Flournoy St. in Chicago. They had been married for 6 years which tells us that they married in 1924. She was 55 and he was 47. He was a clerk with the railroad. Minnie said she married John Robbins in Chicago, but Chicago marriage records don’t include their marriage.

Ollie was noted in her sister’s obituary in 1935 as Ollie Robbins. However, in 1953, she is called Ollie Estes in her sister, Ida’s obituary.

In 1939, Ollie applied for a Social Security card in Chicago.

We know she could write, based on this document, and we have her signature.

In the 1940 census, John and Ollie Robbins are living at 117 Hamilton. He is 56 and she is 66. They indicate they lived in the same location in 1935. Ollie says that she completed the 8^th grade. The 1940 census included several employment questions. It looks like neither of them were working and neither are seeking work. Ollie indicates she is unable to work. They rent for $12 a month, which is about half of what other rents seem to be. There were a few at $10 but mostly they ranged from about $16-$25 with $25 being very common.

By the time my mother met Ollie, about 1950, Ollie was already ill. Mother didn’t know if John Robbins had died or they were divorced, but he was not in the picture. Ollie lived with my mother and father during her last illness during my mother’s pregnancy.

Ollie’s death certificate lists her death date as April 9, 1955 and her address as 639 N. Kedzie in Chicago. Ollie Bolton Robbins, widowed, born May 5, 1872, age 82, was a housewife at home, born in Tennessee and lists her parents as Joseph Bolton and Margaret Claxton. She was never in the armed forces and the informant was William S. Estes, listed at the same address, and he signed as her son. Note that her birth year is off by two years on her death certificate. I’ve seen this situation many, many times.

Ollie is buried in the Elmwood Cemetery in Chicago. John Robbins is not buried there. I visited several years ago and let me say that this grave was not easy to find and the Chicago traffic was abysmal. I’d rather climb over fences and brave brambles any day.

Cemetery records show that my father bought the lot and the stone, although one of the Crazy Aunts claims that she did, along with two extra plots, asserting that “someone” had then sold the extra plots and pocketed the money. That’s not what the cemetery records showed, however. It’s beyond me why anyone would purchase extra plots there. There was no one else to bury. But then again, that’s why we call them the Crazy Aunts! They did make life very interesting with their various wild goose chases! Every now and then, one produced a goose, or at least a few feathers.

Ollie’s X Chromosome

My father carried all of Ollie’s X chromosome. Men only inherit an X from their mother, because they inherit the Y chromosome, which makes them male, from their father. Therefore, I too carry Ollie’s X chromosome, intact, because my father only had one X chromosome to give me. Therefore, one of my 2 X chromosome is actually Ollie Bolton’s X and theoretically half of what I gave to my children is Ollie’s. In reality, my children could have inherited anyplace between all and nothing of Ollie’s X, but I definitely carry it intact.

My father’s autosomal DNA has never been tested, as he died in 1963, but by phasing my mother’s DNA against mine, I can, in this case, determine my father’s X chromosome and therefore, Ollie’s too.

Phasing is a process where, by process of elimination, when you don’t have both parents DNA, you can determine which DNA belongs to which parent. For every DNA location, every person carries two nucleotides, either T, A, C or G. So let’s say that I carry a T and a C for one particular address. If my Mom carries two Cs, or a C and an A, then we can say for sure that the T came from Dad. This method isn’t foolproof, because if Mom carried both a T and a C, we have no way of knowing which she gave me and which came from Dad, but it’s better than nothing.

Therefore, when dealing with X matches, if an X match doesn’t also match my mother, then I know it came from my father, and therefore, also from Ollie. It’s interesting, the innovative ways we are discovering to identify, “obtain” and utilize the DNA of those long gone.

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Elizabeth Ann Speaks (1832-1907) and the Path from Tennessee to Gisburn, England – 52 Ancestors #8

Posted on February 21, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Elizabeth “Bettie” Ann Speaks was born in 1832 in Indiana or Virginia, per the census, although her parents were from Lee County, Virginia. She died in 1907 in Hancock County, Tennessee. I never spoke with anyone who actually knew her, but I spoke with people who knew of her.

My grandparents would have known her for between 20 and 30 years, but I didn’t know them.

She married Samuel Claxton, also spelled variantly Clarkson and Clarkston, according to Samuel’s Civil War records, on August 22, 1850, at the home of Tandy Welch. Her grandfather, the Reverend Nicholas Speak performed the ceremony. In the 1850 census, which was taken on December 13^th, they are living beside the rest of the Claxton clan in Hancock County, Tennessee, where she would live the rest of her life. There is no baby yet, but my great-grandmother Margaret Claxton was on the way, being born on July 25, 1851.

We don’t really know much about Elizabeth, who, according to family, was called Bettie. Family records show her middle name as Ann, but the Civil War pension application consistently shows her middle initial as L. She apparently did know how to sign her name, as she signed the application for a Civil War pension in 1878.

The first record, other than the census, is a note in the Rob Camp Church records where Elizabeth Clarkson is “received by experience” on Monday, August 25^th, 1858, meaning that she did not transfer from another church, but was “saved” and probably baptized.

In 1860, she was listed with the occupation of “scowering” and had 5 children. Her birth state is listed in 1860 as Indiana, but is listed as Virginia in other census records.

Her husband, Samuel would cross into Kentucky to join the Union troops in May of 1863 and served during the Civil War in the Tennessee Cavalry Company F, contracting tuberculosis which would kill him nearly a decade later. He was discharged in May 1865, ill, from the hospital.

This photo of Elizabeth was taken sometime during or after the Civil War and before her husband passed away in 1876, so between 1863 or so and 1875. That’s Samuel in the photo with her, wearing his uniform.

I must admit, the first thing I noticed about her was her “distinctive nose” as one of my cousins phrased it, and I am every so grateful that I did not inherit that from her. Genetics was my friend.

On the second Saturday of April 1869 Rob Camp Baptist Church released the following members from their fellowship:

E..H. Clarkson
Mary Clarkson
William Mannon
Elizabeth Mannon
Mary Muncy
Clarissa Hill
Sarah Shefley
Farwix Clarkson
Agnes Clarkson
Nancy Furry
Elizabeth Clarkson
Margaret Clarkson
William Bolton
James Bolton
John Grimes
Catherine Grimes
Joseph Bolton

These members were released for the purpose of constituting Mount Zion Baptist Church. On the third Saturday of May 1869 these brothers and sisters met, along with representatives from Cave Springs, Big Spring Union and Chadwell Station to officially constitute a church. That church, albeit three buildings later, still stands in the same location on land donated by William Mannon, noted above.

Elizabeth Speaks Clarkson is among the members listed, as are her in-laws, Fairwick and Agnes Muncy Clarkson. Her daughter, Margaret Clarkson, also listed would marry Joseph Bolton, Jr., in 1873. We don’t know if Joseph Bolton listed above is Jr. or Sr., but I suspect Sr. since Jr. would have only been 16 at that time. Margaret was 2 years older than Joseph Bolton Jr.

Interestingly, Elizabeth’s husband, Samuel’s name is absent. However, that is explained by a note in the church records dated Sept. 2, Saturday, 1868 wherein the following is found:

“Excluded Samuel Clarkson for getting drunk and not being willing to make any acknowledgements whatever.” The same day, “Elected brother Joseph Bolton to the office of Deacon.”

The churches of that time were rather strict, serving as a combination of religious institution, the only social outlet in the area and moral prosecutor. The church rules as set forth in their covenants included the following gems:

Every male member wishing to speak shall rise from his seat and address the moderator and then speak strictly adhering to the subject matter under consideration.
No member may speak more than 3 times on one subject without liberty obtained from the church.
No member shall have liberty of laughing or whispering in times of public worship.
No member of this church is permitted to address another member in any other appellation other than brother.
No member is permitted to abruptly absent himself in time of business without leave of the moderator
Members shall not neglect attending meetings and shall not remove out of the bounds of the church without applying for a letter of dismissal.

Judging from the disciplinary actions taken against members in the church notes, you also could not play marbles, swear, get drunk, talk badly about or have a dispute with another church member, attend another church, and certainly not one of a different faith, dance, tell a falsehood or commit adultery. One man had charges brought for “betting and shooting,” although I don’t know if that was one thing or two. Some of the disciplinary actions read like a soap opera and ran for months in the notes. The church committed impartial people to help resolve issues between church members, but often, the resolution was that both people either left the church or were dismissed. Church business was high drama and the soap opera of the day. Notes often read like court proceedings where offenders were “found guilty” and disciplined. Fortunately for members, the worse they could do was throw you out of the church. If you acknowledged your sins, confessed publicly, and promised to try to do better and live a better life, you could be “reinstated to full fellowship.”

In the 1870 census, Elizabeth Speaks and Samuel Claxton have 8 children and are living beside his parents, Fairwick and Agnes Muncy Claxton.

In 1876, Samuel dies officially of pneumonia, but probably of tuberculosis contracted during his Civil War service.

On Oct. 18, 1878, Elizabeth applied for a widow’s pension for her husband’s Civil War service. In1880, she is noted as a widow with 1 child.

In the 1880 census, Elizabeth is a widow and has 100 acres of land worth $250.

On March 13, 1881, Calvin Wolfe and Rebecca, his wife, deeded to Elizabeth Clarkson land on the North side of the Powell River adjacent Henry Yeary’s gate and Roda Shiplet’s line, Nancy Snavely’ line and the main road. The acreage isn’t given. Rebecca Claxton Wolfe was the sister of Elizabeth’s deceased husband, Samuel Claxton.

A few months later, Elizabeth then sells what appears to be the same tract of land of 27.25 acres “laying on the north side of the road leading from Tazewell to Jonesville” to several members of the Overton family, who do not appear to be related. Elizabeth signs the deed, so she can write her name.

On Sept. 4, 1894, Elizabeth Clarkson petitions the Mount Zion Church for a letter of dismissal. This typically means the person is moving or wants to join another church and the letter states they have been a member in good standing.

The only other photo we have of Elizabeth is one taken about 1896 with her family. She is in the dark dress, center, front middle.

In the 1900 census, she tells us that she gave birth to 12 children and 9 were living.

Margaret N. 1851-1920 married Joseph Bolton
Cyrena “Rena” M. 1852-1887
Surrilda Jane 1858-1920 married William (Luke?) Monday
Clementine 1853-after 1877
Sarah Ann 1857-1860/1870
Cynthia “Catherine” 1860-1901 married William Muncy
John 1861-1899/1900
Matilda 1867-1944 never married
Henry Clint 1869-1937 married Amanda Jane Estep
Mary W. 1872 – after1900 married Martin Parks
Jerushia Claxton 1874-1925 married Thomas Monroe Robinson
Elizabeth 1876-1877/1878

The family lived along the Powell River in Hancock County, Tennessee where the Clarkson Cemetery, now known as the Cavin Cemetery, is located at the intersection of River Road and Owen Ridge Road. Elizabeth’s stone is shown below.

You can see this cemetery from River Road.

This is the guard bull, assuring that overly curious genealogists do not escape from the cemetery, at least not until he says so.

Elizabeth’s parents, Charles Speak (1804-1840/50) and Ann McKee (1801/1805-1840/1850) had married in 1823 in Washington County, Virginia, and made their home in Lee County, where Charles’ father, Nicholas Speak was the founding minister of Speaks Methodist Church in about 1820. Charles mother was Sarah Faires (1786-1862).

The Speakes line in Lee County wasn’t difficult to trace but tracking back from there was more challenging. We would discover that records became more fragmentary as we moved back in time, and that the ancestors tended to move geographically. Figuring out where they moved from and to was often nigh on impossible. It’s not like they left a forwarding address and you have to know where to look to find the records to connect the dots, if those records exist at all.

Over the period of almost 25 years, we managed to track the Speaks line backwards in time – Nicholas Speak (1782-1852) to his father, Charles Beckwith Speake (1741-1793/4) who married Anne (1744-1789), surname unknown. Charles was the son of Thomas Speake (1698-1755) and Jane (b 1714) and his father was Bowling Speake (1674-1755) who married Mary Benson. Bowling’s father was Thomas Speake, the immigrant, born about 1633/34 and who died August 6, 1681. He married Elizabeth Bowling who was born about 1648 and died sometime after her husband and before 1692.

Without the Speak(e)(s) Family Association (SFA) and years of contributed research by others, I would never have been able to find these connections. My situation wasn’t dissimilar to that of many others. There were holes in the various genealogy proofs. We needed to be sure that our Speaks lines really were all one and the same.

The Holy Grail. “That after which one seeks.” Of course, everyone approaches DNA testing with their own personal set of goals, their own Holy Grail, but the most universal is to find out where they are from. Especially people in the Americas, New Zealand and Australia – we are countries of immigrants – mostly from Europe, some from Africa.

Many times during and after the crossing to the new land, the connection to the old country was lost – certainly the challenges of a the new world, a new life, in essence starting new or again – took up every minute of every day. The old world, while certainly a memory, was not something they talked about daily. By the time a generation or two had passed, information dimmed, and if we are lucky, we might have an oral history of the country they came from. Another generation or two and there is nothing left.

If your ancestor immigrated in 1650, there have been approximately 14 generations since the person who immigrated. That’s a lot of people to pass on an oral tradition – and most of the time it didn’t happen. Some people are fortunate. For example, if your surname is something like Campbell, well, you pretty much know you’re Scotch-Irish or Scottish and there isn’t much doubt about where you came from. But other people aren’t so lucky. Furthermore, even if you do know which country your ancestor came from, that’s not quite the same as knowing the village where they lived, or the castle if you are landed gentry or royalty.

I approached the SFA about what was then a new technology, DNA testing, and the Speakes DNA project was begun in 2004. We have since identified several different genetic Speakes lines. Originally it was a Y DNA project, but today we work with autosomal DNA as well and encourage everyone who descends from a Speak(e)(s)(es) and has taken the Family Finder Autosomal test at Family Tree DNA to join the project.

Initially, we wanted to learn more about our Thomas Speakes of Maryland. We knew he was Catholic, was in Maryland by 1660 or so, and married Elizabeth Bowling shortly thereafter, before November 1663 when she was subpoenaed by the Speake surname. But we didn’t know where he was from, where he married Elizabeth, when he was born, or much else.

Earlier research had shown that Lancashire, in England, was “a nursery of recusants.” In other words, a hotbed of Catholics who refused to give up their Catholic faith, accept and become members of the Anglican Church. The biggest difference between the two is that the Pope is the head of the Catholic church and the King is the head of the Anglican church. To many Catholics, that was a rather important detail. Most people simply complied, but in Lancashire, many didn’t, including the landed gentry. They protected their Catholic peasants who worked their lands.

There was also a baptismal record for a Thomas Speake in 1634, about the right time, but then there was also a later death record for Thomas’s wife and daughter. Of course, we have no way of knowing if this was the same Thomas. There are many missing records during this time, as you might imagine. Not only did the English Civil War take place, but also Catholics had their children baptized in secret by priests. They were only baptized in the Anglican Church when there was no other choice. Same situation for marriages and deaths as well. When Cromwell was on the throne, there was an 11-year period where many of the records are missing entirely in Lancashire. Suffice it to say, the records were not only incomplete, the ones that did exist were frustratingly inconclusive. We, as a family association, had come to believe we might never know any more about our Thomas Speake that we already did. The association allocated some funds for testing and several Speak(e)(s) men at the convention that year swabbed. I just happened to have several test kits available. Imagine that coincidence:)

Between 2004 and 2010, several Speak(e)(s) males tested and we confirmed the DNA of Thomas of Maryland as well as that of both of his sons, John and Bowling.

The Charles Beckwith to Nicholas Speaks line is the yellow line to the far right, above.

At this point, we had established the baseline DNA results for Thomas the Immigrant’s line, but we still had no idea where the family originated in England.

But then came Doug Speak from New Zealand. Ironically, Doug was recruited by one John David Speake, a gentleman who lives in Cambridge, England and whose DNA is shown not to match the DNA of the Thomas Speak of Maryland line. This was profoundly disappointing to us because we had felt a kinship with John for many years during our joint Speake research. John David had much better access to English records than we did or do, and we owe him a huge debt of gratitude.

New Zealand is newer country than the US. Doug’s ancestors had only immigrated to new Zealand in the 1800s, and he knew where they were from in England. While this was interesting initially, it became vitally important when we learned that his DNA matches the Thomas Speake family line.

This, in genetic genealogy terms, is the Holy Grail. Now if you discover your match is from London or a large city, that’s not the Holy Grail. Before the industrial revolution, places like London were merchant cities, not to mention the center of government. People migrated to cities.

However, if you discover that your surname match came from a small village in an out-of-the-way place – that indeed, is the equivalent of the genetic genealogy Holy Grail.

If you look at a map, you can see that Gisburn is about 2 blocks long, has a church, one pub, a deli and one restaurant. Well, of course, it has a few houses too, but it’s truly a small crossroads village.

In this church, St. Mary’s, Doug’s ancestors’ were baptized.

The Y DNA tells us that we share an ancestor with Doug, but it just doesn’t tell us who, or when. But no one immigrated TO Gisburn, unless it was from the village up the road, so we know this too is our ancestral land.

The Thomas Speak that immigrated in 1660 may have been baptized in Downham, another village church about 4 miles distant from Gisburn, so this makes sense. Churches were established where people could easily attend – and attendance meant walking.

In 2011, I announced at the Speakes Family Association convention that we had unlocked the secret of the area where our Speake family was from, I showed a slide of St. Mary’s Church, with their many Speake family records of baptisms, marriages and burials – and said as a throw away comment that I wanted to stand there. Little could I ever have imagined that indeed, two years later, I would be standing in that very churchyard.

It’s a long way from Hancock County, Tennessee, on the Powell River to Gisburn, Lancashire, England – 6 generations and more than 4000 miles. Wouldn’t Elizabeth Speaks Claxton be amazed!

So what are we waiting for? Let’s go see what we found!!!

Join me soon for the article, “Following the Ribble River to Gisburn.”

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John Curtis Bucher (1942-2012) and the Valentine – 52 Ancestors #7

Posted on February 14, 2014 by Roberta Estes

Our cousin, Cheryl, who grew up across the street from my grandparents’ house where my brother, John, spent a great deal of time mentioned one day in passing that John was known to be a “stinker” as a child. I’m sure she was not exaggerating. From all the stories I’ve heard, my brother, John was indeed a handful, and not much ever changed.

When going through Mother’s things after she departed this Earth, I found something, in John’s own hand, from when he was maybe 7 that proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he indeed fully earned his reputation.

John made Mom a Valentine. As all mothers are, I’m sure she was thrilled to receive something from her child. And then she opened it. The front is your typical children’s exchange Valentine – and I’m just as sure as I’m sitting here that my grandmother told him to write something to his mother on the back and tell her what he’d been up to…..so he did.

I got muddy five times.

I got in a fight Wednesday.

I got called down Tuesday.

I got in the coal bin Sunday and was I dirty.

I got a great big clok.

Yours truly,

John Curtus Bucher (Yes, he misspelled his own name.)

Indeed, I’m thinking that every day in John’s life was a new adventure just waiting to happen. This was probably an ordinary week in John’s life.

Not a lot changed in the following 60 years or so, except the magnitude of the trouble John got into. In 2011, the story of his weekly adventures started out something like this…..Sunday, I cut my leg with a chain saw…Monday, I got the tractor stuck in the mud…Tuesday, I went back to the woods and a tree fell on me……

My brother, John, passed away in October of 2012, ornery as ever, staunchly refusing to DNA test as he had for the past decade….asserting that he would rather “not know,” even in death. Actually, what he meant was that wanted to keep me from knowing, just on general principles…just because he could. Personally, I think he did that…or in this case…didn’t…just to irritate me…and he fully succeeded.

However, whether I agree or not with his motives or choices, I staunchly defend his right to them. So, for the record, it was NOT me who stole his toothbrush from his hospital room.

Nope, wasn’t me.

I know what you’re thinking.

Was not.

You see, I knew that toothbrush wouldn’t help at all.

I don’t know who used it, took it, or whose it was, but it wasn’t his.

John wore dentures!

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John Whitney Ferverda (1882-1962) and the Body in the Garage – 52 Ancestors #6

Posted on February 8, 2014 by Roberta Estes

My grandfather’s name was John Whitney Ferverda. I’ve always wondered about that middle name, with no idea where it came from. It does not appear to be a family name.

He was born on December 26, 1882 in Plain Township, Kosciusco County, Indiana, on a farm to Hiram B. (probably Bauke) Ferverda and Evaline Louise Miller Ferverda. He died on June 9^th 1962. I was 7 and I remember him, albeit somewhat vaguely. His wife. Edith Barbara Lore Ferverda who he had married in Rushville, Indiana in 1908 had just died 18 months before, so it had been a rough couple years in the family. With John Ferverda’s death, the homeplace had to be sold, the furniture divided, and all of those things that signal the end of an era and what we’ve come to know as closure needed to be done.

John and Edith had two children, my mother, Barbara, and one son, Harold Lore Ferverda, known by the family as Lore.

I think I’ll let Mom introduce you to her father, in her own words. I gave my Mother a book called “Grandmother’s Memories” to complete for her grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She did, at first in her own hand, and then later, as her handwriting became more difficult to read, she would tell me the answers and I would write them for her. The book asked questions or gave topic suggestions.

My Father’s name was John Whitley Ferverda. He was born in 1882 and died in 1962. He had blue eyes.

My Father’s most precious memory:

When I was so sick with rheumatic fever, every morning he carried me downstairs to the davenport and every evening upstairs to bed. He always had time to read to me. I was too sick to read for myself. I was 7 or 8 and he read everything to me I could get my hands on. He worked at the Ford Agency in Silver Lake selling cars and trucks. When I went to school, we walked and went the next half block further to the Ford Agency and asked Dad for a nickel. When he gave it to me, I promptly went to the drug store and bought a Hershey bar, which Dad knew I’d do.

My Father’s best story about growing up:

He was one of 11 children. From their farm they walked over to Tippecanoe Lake to swim which was about a mile. He took enough schooling to be a teacher, but never secured a position with the school. Instead he started with the railroad and was sent to Rushville where he met Mother.

Here’s a bit more info from the “History of Kosciusko County, Indiana” 1919:

John Ferverda is a merchant of successful experience and has been identified with the hardware trade at Silver Lake for a number of years, being one of the live and enterprising business men and citizens of that locality.

He was born in Plain Township of this county Dec. 26, 1882, a son of Hiram B. and Eveline Miller Ferverda, both of whom now reside at Leesburg. John Ferverda grew up on his father’s farm in Plain Township and was liberally educated. He attended both the common and high schools of Oswego, being a graduate of both, and also was a student in the Tri-State Normal at Angola. For his scholarship he was granted a license to teach, but never used it in that profession. His life was spent largely at home until the age of 22. Having mastered the art of telegraphy, he entered the service of the Big Four Railway as an operator, and was assigned at different stations along that system and remained in that service about 10 years. In 1916, Mr. Ferverda left the railroad to take up business and is now a member of the F. and F. Hardware Company of Silver Lake.

John is shown in front of his hardware store, below.

In 1907 he married Miss Edith B. Lore, a native of Rush Co., Indiana and a high school graduate. They have one son, Harold L., born November 24, 1915. Mr. and Mrs. Ferverda are members of the Lutheran Church and he is affiliated with the Denning Lodge No 88, Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, at North Manchester, and of the Knights of Pythias Lodge. In politics, he is a republican.

Was he ever a Republican. I remember Mom talking about her father quizzing potential suitors. The first question he would ask them is whether or not they were Republican. Mom said she knew better than to bring home a Democrat!!! For years Mom had a small ivory elephant watch charm about an inch long that was his that I suspect was meant as the symbol of the Republican Party.

At some point, before his marriage, probably while in college, John was in some sort of a play. He is the front row, bottom left corner.

John studied to be a teacher, but for some reason, after graduating, never pursued that avenue. Instead, he joined the railroad as a telegraph operator and station master. He was assigned to Rushville, Indiana. We don’t know exactly when he went to Rushville, but in an article in the Rushville paper, dated January 25, 1907, John was a pallbearer for Miss Maude Foust who died of typhoid. We also know he sang tenor in a quartet at the Presbyterian Church in Rushville, based on a November 1908 news report .

While in Rushville, John met and married Edith Barbara Lore, daughter of Curtis Benjamin, known as CB, Lore and Ellenore “Nora” Kirsch Lore. She too attended the Presbyterian Church.

Rushville Republican Newspaper, Jan. 3, 1910 – John Ferveda who was recently transferred to cashier at the local office has been given the agency at Silver Lake in the northern part of the state and will leave here in the next few weeks.

John and Edith moved back to Silver Lake where John served as the station master and where they spent the rest of their lives.

While their immediate family was small, John had many siblings in the area. He was one of 11 children born to Hiram and Eva Ferverda. One of his siblings, Roscoe, lived across the street from him in Silver Lake, Indiana.

John Ferverda’s parents were Brethren, although it appears that not all of the family continued in that faith which prohibited military service, among other things. John broke with the Brethren faith by marrying Edith who was a Lutheran, and Roscoe broke with the Brethren faith by serving in WWI. In fact, four of John and Eva’s sons, in total, served in the military, Ira in the Spanish American War and then Donald, Roscoe and George. Those three sons are standing together in the middle row, with George, on the right, in uniform.

John and Roscoe were close their entire lives, even though there was 9 years between them, Roscoe having been born in 1893. In fact, when Roscoe returned from military service, he too worked at the station with his brother for the railroad until the depot in Silver Lake closed in 1958 due to declining business.

John and Edith bought a house in Silver Lake that was located right by the railroad tracks, which were across the field to the right of their house in the photo below. I loved the large screened-in front porch on this house. The screens were painted yearly to keep them from rusting, and rocking chairs resided on the porch in warm weather.

One time, Lore was painting the screens and my mother was bothering him in her sisterly way. He decided to paint her cat’s nose, which infuriated my mother, so he then painted mother’s nose black too….except he “missed” and got her entire face with the side of the large brush he was using. Mother was scheduled to perform in a dance recital later that day on the courthouse square in Wabash. I’m sure you can imagine the drama and hullaballoo that results from that little incident. Paint then was not water soluable and required turpentine and scrubbing to remove. This was always one of mother’s favorite stories about her brother.

Roscoe bought the house right across the street. Roscoe and John were thick as thieves.

Old newspapers can be a lot of fun. In the local paper I found some tidbits that give us hints about John’s life.

July 31, 1910

Donald Ferverda is visiting with his brother John Ferverda and wife at Silver Lake.

Don was one of the three Ferverda sons who served in the military in WWI. After returning, he was a cashier at the bank in Leesburg and died relatively young of cancer.

February 5, 1911

Mr. and Mrs. John Ferverda of Silver Lake visited with Hiram Ferverda and family over Sunday.

Visiting your parents hardly seems like a newsworthy event. It wasn’t far from Leesburg to Silver Lake – about 18 miles. However, it’s a lovely tidbit.

July 30, 1912

Mrs. Gertrude (her name was Nora, not Gertrude) Lore of Rushville is here at present visiting with her daughter, Mrs. John Ferverda and husband. Mrs. Lore’s two daughters (Mildred, 13, and Eloise, 9) have been here for the past several weeks visiting at the Ferverda home. The garage building is nearing completion. The metal ceiling is completed and is now ready for the paint. The building will be ready for occupancy within a short time.

I originally didn’t think the second paragraph was relevant to the Ferverda family, but with all those females visiting “for an extended period”, maybe my grandfather was taking up residence in the garage:)

October 11, 1912

Mr. and Mrs. John Ferverda of Silver Lake are here for a two weeks visit with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. H.B. Ferverda.

October 19, 1912

H. L. Anderson of Westport who had been here as a relief agent for Mr. Ferverda during his absence went to Leesburg yesterday where he will be for 15 days while the Leesburg agent takes a trip.

Agent here refers to railway agent.

December 22, 1912

Paul Ferverda of Leesburg is here visiting with his brother, John Ferverda and wife.

John had brothers Ira, Irvin, Ray, George and Donald who lived outside of Silver Lake, but no Paul. Roscoe lived in Silver Lake across the street from John.

April 19, 1913

We understand that Ray Ferree who recently was bumped off of the Big Four at North Manchester by one who was older in the service will apply for the station here and if he applies it will almost be sure that the company will award him the position. The family will then move here and occupy the Mrs. Metzger property near the depot and Mr. Ferverda, the agent, who resides there at present will go to Markleville.

The family never went to Markleville.

February 16, 1914

H.P. Rager, John Ferverda and Dale Homman were down to North Manchester last evening taking the first steps in the degree work of the Masonic order.

November 13, 1915

Ray Feree is here this week as relief agent for John Ferverda at the Big Four. Mr. Ferverda is taking a vacation and will also have his eye operated on upon during his vacation. He went to Cincinnati the first of the week for that purpose.

This is a week before John Ferverda’s son, Lore was born, on November 24th. I wonder what kind of eye surgery he had performed, and for what condition.

November 27, 1915

Rushville Republican Newspaper, Jan. 8, 1916 – J. W. Ferverda, Big Four agent at Silver Lake and well known here has purchased a hardware store there in partnership with R. M. Frye. He has resigned his position with the railroad company.

January 22, 1916

J. W. Ferverda has returned home from a trip to Rushville where he was for a couple of days visiting with his wife and son.

September 10, 1916 – Silver Lake News

John Ferverda is going about bandaged up on account of a broken rib received a few days ago when he was assisting in unloading some machinery.

In 1918, every man had to register for the draft. WWI was upon us. John Whitney Ferverda registered, said that his occupation was in retail hardware and as an implement merchant. He was described as short, of medium build with light hair and gray eyes. I never knew he had grey eyes.

February 28, 1918

Friends and relatives here had just learned of the marriage last month of Roscoe Ferverda, son of Mr. and Mrs. H. B. Ferverda of Leesburg and Miss Effie Ringo of North Vernon, Indiana. Mr. Ferverda who was a telegrapher at North Vernon enlisted in the signal corps and just before being called for examination was taken sick with measles. He came home for two weeks and immediately upon his return to North Vernon was examined and sent to the training camp at Vancouver, Washington. The wedding took place while at North Vernon for the examination. The bride is expected here tomorrow for a visit with his parents.

So it seems that not only did Roscoe join the military, he married a non-Brethren wife as well, without telling his parents. Those Ferverda boys, renegades all of them….

In the 1930 census, we know that Roscoe is an agent for the Big 4 Railroad, almost the last person enumerated in the village of Silver Lake, in Lake Township, in Kosciusko County, Indiana. John Ferverda was the first household enumerated, living directly across the street from Roscoe. In 1930, John was a salesman at the Ford garage. With the decrease of rail shipping, jobs with the railroad evaporated.

Below, both the new and old garages in Silver Lake.

At some point, and I believe it was before or during the Depression, John Ferverda owned a hardware store in downtown Silver Lake. The problem was that people couldn’t pay their bills. Eventually, that business would close, and John would raise chickens in the chicken house behind the house and sell eggs. There may have been a Depression, but everyone still had to eat. Eggs and chicken were relatively cheap protein and both eggs and hatchlings were shipped as far as New York. John loved his chickens, and this one was his favorite and according to the back of the picture, his best producer.

Mother remembers cleaning chickens as a child during the Depression, and not fondly, I might add.

Sometime, about this same time, when Lore was a late teen, it seems that he “borrowed” the family car without permission, and managed to get it stuck in the snow. I don’t know how he managed to get ahold of his father, but he did. If he thinks he was in trouble with his Dad, he hadn’t seen anything yet because his mother, Edith, relied on that car to get her to the job that supported the family during the Depression.

So off John and Lore set to get Lore unstuck. I’m not sure who went with them, but I’m guessing it was Roscoe. The photo above is labeled 1937 in Mom’s photo album. There is another photo also of a sleigh with a horse pulling it that looks to be about the same time.

Mom kept a photo album, thankfully, and this was labeled as 1937. Left to right John Ferverda with Buster, Edith Lore Ferverda (John’s wife), Eva Miller Ferverda (John’s mother), Chloe Ferverda Robinson (John’s sister), Charlotte Robinson, Raleigh Robinson (Chloe’s daughter and husband.)

Two houses down the street was the Methodist Church where the Ferverdas were members. I have vivid memories of this church when I was little, sitting on the small child sized chairs and belting out Jesus Loves Me at the top of my lungs in Sunday School, which was through the side door on the left and downstairs. I can still hear it….

“Jesus loves me, this I know,
For the Bible tells me so….”

On the 1940 census, Roscoe and John are shown with 4 residences between them. Roscoe is still an agent for the railroad and now John is an “owner and overseer” on a chicken and fruit farm.

I had entirely forgotten about the apple orchard and the raspberries. The entire “back yard” was apple trees and behind the orchard, the property terminated in a huge mass of brambles which they called raspberries. All I know is that I avoided that area because no matter what I did, they always stuck me, one way or another. I can’t imagine how they picked those berries, but obviously they did.

My grandparents had a back porch with a hand pump where they washed and processed the apples. That same pump pumped the water for the kitchen and bathroom, both of which were adjacent to the pump room. This WAS considered running water at that time.

In 1941, John Whitney Ferverda registered for the WWII draft, even though he was 59 years of age. His signature is beautiful.

Silver Lake, where they lived was a small town, but it was not incorporated, so they were part of Lake Township, although Silver Lake made up the most populous part of that township. From 1943-1950, John Ferverda was township Trustee.

In 1945, the newspaper reported that , “Trustee John Ferverda provided a fully equipped chemistry lab and the course in chemistry was added in the high school.” John’s son, Lore Ferverda, had graduated from Silver Lake High School in the class of 1933 and went on to become a chemist, eventually holding several patents.

I do believe this was before recliners had been invented. I remember my grandmother starching those chair arm and back covers. My grandfather did this every afternoon. I think I inherited the propensity from him! Must be genetic.

Speaking of genetics, we have been fortunate that one of Roscoe’s sons volunteered to take the Y-line DNA test as well at the autosomal test. Roscoe’s daughter, Cheryl, has taken the autosomal test as well. In fact, these folks were some of the first testers at 23andMe and are now participating in projects at Family Tree DNA. There is a Ferverda DNA project, but needless to say, with a name like that, it’s not very large.

Cheryl, and I are in the final stages of planning a trip back to the Ferverda homeland in 2014. We can hardly wait and I’ll be sharing that with you too, but for now, back to John Ferverda.

John and Edith Ferverda with their first great-grandchild, Bruce, born on the 4^th of July, 1959. The family referred to him as “the firecracker with a short fuse.” I believe this photo was taken at Christmas, 1959. Edith passed away, a few days later, in January of 1960.

I don’t know where this photo was taken, but it wasn’t their house. This is a great photo and is exactly how I remember Edith Lore and John Whitney Ferverda.

By the late 1950s or early 1960s, John had tuberculosis. They believed it had been dormant for decades. Edith’s father and sister both died of TB in 1909 and 1912, respectively. He went to the tuberculosis sanitarium where he was treated for several months. After returning home, he became ill again in 1962, except this time it was inoperable liver and pancreatic cancer. He passed away on June 9, 1962.

This photo is of Edith and John’s two children at their gravesite. Stopping at the cemetery became a regular occurrence anytime we were in that vicinity, or could be without a huge detour.

Since neither of their children lived in Silver Lake, after John passed away, they put the house with the chicken houses and apple trees and raspberry bushes up for sale. I remember Mom talking about how difficult it was to go through their things. I also remember finding money hidden in the most unusual places. I suspect that was a relic of the Depression years when life was extremely difficult. One time, I picked up a powder box and a false bottom fell out, along with some cash hidden there. I wonder how much was inadvertently given away, secreted away like that.

Mom and Uncle Lore sold the property, and the new owners turned it into a funeral home. My mother was utterly mortified. They enclosed the front screened in porch with plywood painted white, turned the dining and music rooms into viewing parlors (the large window grouping on both sides of the house) and processed the remains in the kitchen and on that back porch. I would hope they installed a better water system. The garage, seen behind the house is where the hearse was kept and the bodies loaded, unloaded and well, um, stored.

My mother, for years, when someone died in Silver Lake just prayed that the funeral was at the “other” funeral home. She was utterly mortified that her family home had become a funeral home, and she said she simply could not go inside. Finally though, someone died, and she had to find a way.

That someone was Roscoe. He died, as luck would have it, 36 years ago this week, on the morning of the epic blizzard in Indiana, January 25, 1978. And when I say epic, I mean epic. We have photos of family members on drifts level with the roof.

These are just the kinds of things the Ferverda family did, especially these two brothers! Both John and Roscoe would have found that immensely humorous. Everyone else, not so much.

The roads were closed, for days. Finally State Road 14 was opened, one way, through snow tunnels.

Roscoe’s funeral was held, such as it was, and then, because the snow was too deep and the ground too frozen for too far down…Roscoe got to spend the next several weeks in his brother, John’s, garage.

Gone, But Not Entirely

John and Roscoe may be gone, but their DNA isn’t. Roscoe’s son provided his DNA, quite graciously, as part of a DNA presentation at the Allen County Public Library a few years ago for Y chromosome testing. Because of his generosity, we know that the Ferverda men fall into haplogroup I1, and their DNA is quite unusual. At 25 markers, only 2 matches, and one of those is a Scherp from Germany.

We’ve tested several downstream SNPs as well, to see if we can refine his haplogroup further, but so far, he has tested negative for all of the SNPs tested.

He is a member of the haplogroup I project, where the administrators have grouped him in the I1 generic group. Each project is grouped differently, according to the project goals and the administrators, but in this case, his grouping tells us that he does not match the other groups, such as “AS” for Anglo Saxon or “N” for Nordic, or Balkan or Iberian, for example.

For as unusual as his markers are in the second testing panel, at 25 markers, providing only 2 matches, his 12 marker matches are extremely common in haplogroup I, providing him with 1028 matches. His 12 marker matches are shown on the map below.

Clearly these 12 marker matches don’t hold at 25 markers, and most of these people did test at 25 markers. This is the best example I can think of as to why testing at higher levels is so important.