Mells parish records for 1748/9.

[Jo Harding]

Hello Roots Chatters,

Is there anyone out there who has access to the parish registers for Mells?

I would like someone to check an entry transcribed on Freereg. It is a baptism shown in Mells in 23 March 1748/9. This shows a baptism for Silvester Hurdle, father Josias Hurdle. The sex of the child is shown as F.

I suspect that the child was in fact Silvia Hurle (Hurdle being a name variant of Hurle). The name of Silvester is very unusual for that era. The sex shown as female is another reason to doubt the name of Silvester shown.

Can anyone check this and let me know their findings?

Jo.

[rosie99]

It has her as Silvaster Hurdle on familysearch 
gender Female
baptism date 23 May 1749
father Josias Hurdle

Rosie

[MinnieMoppet]

Hi, as Silvester was an unusual name at that time - and unheard of as a girl's name! - I am wondering whether the Silvester Hurdle born in 1749 in Mells, becomes - somehow (a hasty first marriage, tho I can find none, or a name-change to honour a 'patron' of the family?) - the Silvester Snelling that married James Payn in 1770 in Farrington Gurney .. not far up the road.  James Payn & his wife Silvester (she is actually named in the parish record birth entries) had 7 children (that I know of) and the first two are Robert and Mary (Silvester Hurdle had siblings Robert and Mary ... an extremely  tenuous link, but sometimes 'threads' in family history can be exactly that until ... sometimes years later ... I find definite 'proof' and my penciled notes get 'inked' in). All this can be found on the www.freereg.org.uk website (it actually has more stuff on my Somerset relies than Ancestry and similar sites). Not sure this is any use to your research, except to suggest that Silvester really is - crazily! - Silvester, and not Sylvia

[MinnieMoppet]

Here are Silvester and siblings:Participants
Information   Type
Information   Date
Information   County
Information   Location
Information   Detail
Information
Lucy HURDLE   Baptism   28 Jan 1734/5   Somerset   Mells (St Andrew) [Parish Register]   Detail
Robert HURDLE   Baptism   24 Jan 1736/7   Somerset   Mells (St Andrew) [Parish Register]   Detail
Mary HURDLE   Baptism   30 Mar 1739   Somerset   Mells (St Andrew) [Parish Register]   Detail
Silvester HURDLE   Baptism   23 Mar 1748/9   Somerset   Mells (St Andrew) [Parish Register]   Detail
I was checking using the name Hurdle Josias, between the years 1720 to 1750, in Somerset in general (i.e. the whole county, rather than picking Mells & the 'nearby places').

[rosie99]

The James Payn / Silvester Snelling marriage gives her abode as Paulton.

Silvester was not uncommon at that time for either sex.  Freereg has a few female Silvester/Sylvesters marrying in Somerset    I used marriages as an example as they were easier to define the sex of the parties.  There were 3 female births with the name in Mells