Small world coincidences

[Davedrave]

Last week I had a wonderful week’s holiday which incorporated some family history. I visited some places in the Glouestershire Cotswolds connected with my maternal side, and a couple in both Warwickshire and Worcestershire too. I was travelling alone, and enjoyed long chats at times with people I met, but I certainly had fewer than ten such chats, more like half a dozen. On three separate occasions I came across somewhat surprising coincidences.

In Beaudesert churchyard in Warwickshire (a place that is essentially part of Henley in Arden) I was searching for the gravestone of my Hickin great great grandparents. I got chatting to a couple who were tending a grave, During the course of our chat, we found that we were both visiting from the Leicester urban area, and that I was looking for my Hickin grave, and that the husband of this couple had a Hickin sister in law from Henley.

In Worcestershire I visited Dormston and Kington, where my Laight ancestors were from, though I could not seem to find the headstone of my ancestor Thomas Laight, who farmed at Cockshot Farm, between the two tiny neighbouring villages. (The fact that the headstone was mistranscribed quite some years ago suggests that it was probably already becoming eroded when that transcription was made, and that it is almost certainly one of the several now entirely unreadable gravestones in the churchyard.)

Some days later, at Symonds Yat in Herefordshire, chatting to another couple, it came out that I had visited Dormston and Kington on my way down to Gloucestershire. And the lady told me that she lived in Cockshot Lane in Kington!

In Gloucestershire, in the beautiful village of Naunton, I got talking to a lady leading a group of ramblers, who were having a lunch break in the churchyard. It came out that we were both there for reasons connected with family history. I was looking at my Beacham connections. The lady told me that she was looking at her Fidoe connections in the area. I was then able to tell her that my ancestor Rebecca Beacham, widow, married John Fidoe, widower, in Naunton. We then learned that both I and the ramblers were visiting from Leicester.

[coombs]

In February 2004 I was the the FRC in Clerkenwell and got talking to a lady who over heard me mutter "Coombs" for births in 1889 when using those huge ledgers for my great grandmother's birth. She said she was researching Coombs in Somerset, and also mentioned actress Pat Coombs.

[Treetotal]

Thanks Coombs and Dave for sharing your coincidences, both very interesting.
My Father was born in St. John's, Nfld. I never thought to ask questions when he was alive, so my Sister and I went to St John's to learn more about our ancestors. When at the archives, we found a marriage record for our Great Grandparents and asked if we could buy a copy. He said it would take a week and we were only going to be there for four more days. He then suggested that we go to the church where we would be able get a copy straight away. When we went there the man was very obliging and came back a short time later with a copy. We weren't charged but we made a donation to the church. As he passed it over to us, he pointed to vicar!s name and said "That's my Great Grandad" we said that he had made our day and he said, we had made his day too.
Carol

[coombs]

I guess you could call it a coincidence, as I was born and raised in Norfolk, near Norwich, to Essex parents who had some Suffolk, Oxfordshire and Durham blood, with some London. When researching my ancestor Elizabeth Helsdon born 1784 in Bethnal Green, I found her parents were called Dennis Helsdon and Susan Fradine (of full Huguenot descent). It transpired the Dennis Helsdon baptised in Feb 1756 in Norwich, Norfolk was the same guy who was my ancestor's father. Several of his siblings had moved to London en masse circa 1780 and married down there. So all the time we visited Norwich from Rollesby (20 minute drive away) we were "coming home".

Also many of my Suffolk ancestors had wills proved in the Norwich Consistory Court and marriage licenses applied for at NCC. Suffolk was also in the Diocese of Norwich, like Norfolk was.