Saturday Night Genealogy Fun -- Who Is #42 on Your Ahnentafel List?

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans:

It's Saturday Night again -

Time for some more Genealogy Fun!!

Here is our assignment this week from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musing:

1)  Have you identified #42 on your ahnentafel list?  If not, how about #21 the mother of #42?  If not, how about #10 on your ahnentafel list?  Do you even have an ahnentafel list? 

2)  Anyway, tell us about your #42 ancestor (or #21, or #10, etc.) - full name, parents, spouse, children, birth, baptism, death, marriage, burial, etc. 

Here's mine:

In my database, I placed my daughters into the number 1 position. If I check out who number 42 is with me in the number one spot, it comes to George Wilson Lancaster. I’m working on a project about that family and am not ready to write about him. So, I put my husband in the number one spot and his number 42 is his third great-grandfather, Edward Nicholas.

At this writing, I didn’t know much about Edward, except for his marriage to Susanna Phillips on 3 April 1809 in St. Agnes parish in County Cornwall, England.[1]

English records give information about the wedding. First, the Banns were read for three Sundays starting on the 5^th of March through 19^th of March.[2] Then the priory James Bennett married them in the presence of Phillip Roberts and Roger Daniell. It is really a shame that the marriage record does not list the parents of the bridal party. This would make finding their baptismal record much easier.

Their daughter, Mary, was baptized at St. Agnes on 19 September 1811.[3] According to Mary’s headstone at Walnut Ridge Cemetery in Jeffersonville, Indiana, her birthdate was 28 August 1811.[4] She married my husband’s second great-grandfather, Thomas Davey, 23 May 1832 at St. Agnes parish, also by banns.[5]

There is enough room for a child to be older than Mary and I have found some possible children of Edward and Susanna Nicholas at St. Agnes from baptism records. These are baptism dates only:

• Isaac, son of Edward & Susanna Nicholas on 17 Sep 1809.[6]
• Mary, daughter of Edward and Susan Nicholas, 19^th September 1811.[7]
• Sarah, daughter of Edward and Susanna Nicholls, 10^th of September 1813.[8]
• Edward, son of Edward and Susanna Nicholas, 24^th August 1815.[9]
• Susanna, daughter of Edward & Susanna Nicholas, 17 January 1818.[10]
• James, son of Edward & Susana Nicholas, 13 August 1820.[11]
• Simon, son of Edward & Susannah Nicholas, 25 May 1823.[12]
• Simon, son of Edward and Susannah Nicholas, 3 July 1825.[13]

In all of these records, Edward and Susanna lived at Grover and he was a miner, which was very common trade in this area of Cornwall. Since there are two Simon sons, it is likely the first died and I should check burial records for his death.

Here is the community of Gover south of St Agnes

A few years ago, we visited this parish but the church was newer than these records. It is still very small and a quaint place. We also toured a local museum and learned some about the mining in the area.

Street in St. Agnes

Churchyard at St. Agnes

A burial record in 1837 points to Edward’s death. A forty-nine-year-old man from Grover was buried 4 February, suggesting a birth at about 1788.[14] That works, with a man at age 21 marrying in 1809.

In checking Ancestry, there is a tree with Edward and Susanna that has some of their children but not the last two.[15] Also, she has Susanna dying in 1877 but when I looked at the source, it listed her as Susanna Phillips, and she did not die in Cornwall. However, it is possible that families could have moved closer to London where there were jobs, especially when the mines died out. Mary and her husband, Thomas Davey, did that in the 1830s.

I visited two research centers in Cornwall, but they didn’t have much to help this early research, except what is already online at FamilySearch. If I ever get really serious about this, I’ll return to do more.

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[1] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," database & images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org: accessed 16 May 2012), Cornwall, St. Agnes, Marriages Banns, 1799-1812, p 80, Nicholas-Phillips, 1809; citing Cornwall Church of England, Parish Registers, Cornwall Record Office, Truro, Cornwall, England.

[2] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Marriages Banns, 1799-1812.

[3] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1788-1812, p 175, Mary Davey, Baptisms 1811.

[4] Find a Grave, database and images (www.findagrave.com/memorial/61829097/mary-davey : accessed 29 May 2021), Mary Davey (28 Aug 1811–1883), memorial 61829097, Walnut Ridge Cemetery, Jeffersonville, Clark Co., Indiana; maintained by Lisa Gorrell (contributor 47484703).

[5] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Marriages, 1813-1900, p 274, Thomas Davey and Mary Nicholas, 23 May 1832.

[6] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1703-1812, p. 153, Isaac Nicholas, 1809.

[7] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1788-1812, p 175, Mary Davey, Baptisms 1811.

[8] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1813-1821, p. 15, no. 119, Sarah Nicholls, 1813.

[9] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1813-1821, p. 57, no. 451, Edward Nicholas, 1815.

[10] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1813-1821, p. 105, no. 840, Susanna Nicholas.

[11] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1813-1821, p. 166, no. 1324, James Nicholas.

[12] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1821-1825, p. 237, no. 1894, Simon Nicholas.

[13] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Baptisms, 1821-1825, p. 300, no. 2397, Simon Nicholas.

[14] "England, Cornwall Parish Registers, 1538-1900," Cornwall, St. Agnes, Register of Burials, 1813-1838, p. 275, no. 2195, Edward Nicholas.

[15] Ancestry Member Tree, “Nicholas Family,” owned by BettyNicholas88, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/person/tree/37268202/person/19063291724/facts : accessed 29 May 2021).

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