How can we be sure ... ?

[Olde Crone Holden]

I have at least two examples of "ag labs" on census who were in fact rather wealthy farmers, one leaving a very useful will and the other leaving vast fortunes abroad!

You didn't need to be a land owner to appear in land records, very often being a tenant farmer left lots of land transaction records. These are particularly useful in Lancashire where land was often let on a three life basis and this custom has covered the lack of bmds for me very nicely on a few occasions. One in particular, for ONE FIELD, lol, has an unbroken record starting in 1282 and finishing in 1860. The peppercorn rent never changed in nearly 600 years!

OC

[Janet]

It is difficult sometimes to be absolutely sure you have your tree correct when they move around the villages. I have a similar situation in a small hamlet in Northamptonshire where the family lived until 1825 but have disappeared from that hamlet going backwards to the 1600's, but where the name appears in the early 1600's. In the early days I looked at the surrounding villages, looking for baptisms of a Francis, Jane, William and Elizabeth born to the same couple at specific times and only one other hamlet just three miles away produced what I was looking for. I had decided these people must be related in such a small hamlet, but none had been baptised in that hamlet which was I felt that I had found the right family in this other small place, but could never really prove anything as the line stopped again at 1725, but appeared to resurface in another village about 8 miles away to get married and have one child before returning to the other village. Now it was getting complicated! I assumed these were family and got back to 1655 where I then found a Commonwealth Marriage in Huntingdonshire as per LDS Vital Records but the name on the Vital Records was wrong! One was getting married in Peterborough late 1600's and ostensibly moving to the village 15 miles away to have his family but no proof!!

Up to now I had been doing work in the Northants CRO and found internet records were backing up my initial work. But still no real proof, so I went back to the Northants CRO and looked at other records to find actual Marriage Licences which showed that the marriage I had found in the village 8 miles away was correct because the licence named the place that the groom came from. A will also corroborated that evidence. I also found the actual Licence/Bond of the Peterborough marriage which also gave the name of the village he came from so I knew that was correct. The Commonwealth Marriage was found at the Hunts CRO with the name of the village as well as the county of Northamptonshire given as per Vital Records. I queried the village name with Archivist and we came to the conclusion that the name must have been written as said as the county was definitely Northants! I then looked at gamekeeper records at Northants CRO and that helped me to realise the people I had found were being transferred around the Northants countryside courtesy of the landowners, which then led me on to the estate records, so I am gradually finding that all the villages in which I have found people are linked.

Still no proof? Well my gut feeling is telling me that I am going in the right direction and that the more records you find at the CRO's usually corroborate one way or another, particularly when you can also find records for siblings, and I have found a surprising number of wills made by Ag Labs, Gardeners, even an inmate in a workhouse! The name Francis seems to be a particular link on one side going back from the 20 century back to 1633. Why Francis? One of the villages is associated with a Francis Tresham so...........! Another line has a St John, so I think that family names and why they are family names can often link, as well as going into the history of the villages of your interest.

Janet

[clematised]

My Ag Labs turned out to be Tennant Farmers and a wealth of information can be found in the Wills I got for a few pound from the National library of Wales found on line and readable too as well as marriage bonds so well worth a look there if you have Ag labs in Wales.

Edna

[Sylvia C]

Ag labs and lace makers in Buckinghamshire, who became cotton mill workers in Lancashire


I've looked and looked online and not found much

Even the one Ag Lab who became a gamekeeper eventually moved to Lancashire to work ................ and then died when he fell out of a railway carriage by opening a door that had not been properly secured, so he fell out on to the track side instead of the platform. His inquest did merit a long write-up in a very short-lived newspaper (ca 2 years) ...... it didn't make it into the paper that is still in existence in that town.