Day 316: New ancestors, ha
Jan. 25th, 2021 11:54 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eve_primeI'm the kind of American who has oodles and oodles of known ancestors, but there are always mysteries. One of them was the ancestry of my most recent immigrant ancestor from England, Lydia Ann Smith, who was born in 1845, came over in 1854, and at the age of 14 walked across the U.S. to end up in a small logging town in northernmost California, where she married my Grandpa Ben's grandfather, then they moved to Oregon.
Lydia was born in Ramsbury, Wiltshire, the daughter of Alfred Smith and his wife Emma Clayton. Emma was born in Suffolk, and after Alfred died young, she came to America with Lydia and her younger son John, then remarried. But we didn't know anything further back than that, and the name "Smith" is hard to track.
The other day I came across a Mormon genealogy website, and they had a photo of Lydia, whose face is shaped strikingly like my mother's. Today I thought I'd take a closer look. Assuming things are accurate, and who knows?, they've traced Alfred's family tree back as far as a Wiltshire resident in 1505!
This evening I looked up even more loose ends. I found some Normans, a guy who fought at Agincourt, and a guy who was a court jester to Elizabeth I! This stuff is always fun.
Also, I was pleased to see that after decades in Nebraska, Emma eventually made it to Oregon, by 1900.
Lydia was born in Ramsbury, Wiltshire, the daughter of Alfred Smith and his wife Emma Clayton. Emma was born in Suffolk, and after Alfred died young, she came to America with Lydia and her younger son John, then remarried. But we didn't know anything further back than that, and the name "Smith" is hard to track.
The other day I came across a Mormon genealogy website, and they had a photo of Lydia, whose face is shaped strikingly like my mother's. Today I thought I'd take a closer look. Assuming things are accurate, and who knows?, they've traced Alfred's family tree back as far as a Wiltshire resident in 1505!
This evening I looked up even more loose ends. I found some Normans, a guy who fought at Agincourt, and a guy who was a court jester to Elizabeth I! This stuff is always fun.
Also, I was pleased to see that after decades in Nebraska, Emma eventually made it to Oregon, by 1900.