Is this Possible?

[Renatha]

My x4 Great-grandfather John NEEDHAM was born in Walsoken, Norfolk in 1781 and have just followed Ancestry green leaf to other family trees which give his parents as John NEEDHAM b. 1728 and Ann b. 1730 m. 1748 making them 53 & 51 respectively at the time of his birth. There are twin older sisters Sarah & Alice NEEDHAM b. 1776. This isn't right, is it? 

[StanleysChesterton]

While unlikely, it is possible ...

You need to just pencil that into your chart and then do your own research, just using that as a "possible".

I had one on my tree where I couldn't believe that my GG-gf had married a particular lady.  I had no clue where the online tree got that name from.  I could look up the marriage on LDS and see it, but that gave me no clues whatsoever that it was right ... I even got the banns, still nothing there to give me a clue - and, finally, I found the evidence myself ... if I'd just dismissed it offhand without pencilling it in as a maybe I might've completely forgotten to continue looking/checking. I'd have forgotten what I saw that day, just because I'd presumed they'd made it up due to laziness and "because the first names fitted and were in the right county".

Pencil. Sigh.  You'll find evidence once day one way or the other. 

[Annette7]

My gut instinct is No, it isn't right!

I don't know if online early records for Walsoken are bad or if they simply weren't there??

Whilst I can find John Needham's baptism there in 1781 I cannot find the twins said to have been born 12/12/1776 nor indeed any Needham's there before 1781.   Nor any trace of a marriage between a John Needham and an Ann in Norfolk.

I wonder if this is related:

A John Needom married an Ann Sandwith 5/10/1769 Thorney, Cambridgeshire - they had 2 children Thomas and Mary (twins?) baptised at Thorney 9/10/1770 - then nothing further for them at Thorney.    Thorney is only 13 miles from Walsoken so did they move to the latter place sometime between 1770 and 1776 (where another possible set of twins was supposedly born).

Worth considering - the name Needham in Norfolk was not that common and most of earlier baptisms seem to be in/around the Norwich area which is miles away.

Annette




     

[Ruskie]

Itmight be worth trying to view the original Parish records in case occupation or abode is given.

[Renatha]

Thanks all for assistance so far. I'd been thinking if they were married in 1748 as per Ancestry family tree info. it would be VERY unusual to not have children until 1776! I'll do some more research as per your suggestions and SC will definitely keep the info pencilled in! 

[Polly Lynn]

Purely as a genealogist I asked my ObGyn who had delivered my babies who the oldest mother was that he had delivered.  He said one woman was 46 and the following year he delivered another baby for her, when she was 47.  So 47 seems to be an upper limit for having babies.  In my family I have not seen older than that.  The world record is  ... .

I do hear this story a fair amount.  A young woman A had a child B.  When B grew up she,when not yet married, had a child C.  A raised C as her own.  Is that a possibility in your family with the 51-year old mother?  And the child C always thought A was his mother. 

And why do you think the woman was 51?  How many records have her as that, just one? It could be wrong.  Also the husband could have married twice and the second wife was older than the first who had had the child you are interested in.  Oh, never mind, men tend to marry women who are younger and younger, not older the second time around.

[Redroger]

see if you can find a marriage record. I made a connection from Somerset to Dorset simply because of a note that the groom came from a Dorset parish while his bride csme from Somerset. Took me back from 1718 to 1614.Lucky find.

[amondg]

On Freereg
Sarah Needham a widow married John Warth single at Walsoken 15 November 1809
witness John Needham

Sarah could be his widowed mother or then again a widowed sister.

[Redroger]

On Freereg
Sarah Needham a widow married John Warth single at Walsoken 15 November 1809
witness John Needham

Sarah could be his widowed mother or then again a widowed sister.

You need the original register entry. In the case I quoted above, there was nothing on Free Reg, only on the original at Taunton.