Wiltshire -- Week 69 -- Two Months Left

This week was a welcome break from the previous week.  Things were somewhat normal.

Monday, we spent the day doing our little errands and some cleaning.  Katja Goodlet our special friend and somewhat of a new mother, came over for a while and Annie especially enjoyed holding the baby, Jonas.  However, Annie was especially interested in trying to verify some genealogy information at The National Archives that we had previously discovered while in Chorley.   The National Archives is only open on Monday for staff use and even then, it closes at 5. We went over to work in the quiet atmosphere of the archives.  We become involved and didn’t get away until 6:30!  We may have created a “monster” when it comes to tracing family history.

We did the usual shifts at the Family History Centre on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.  However, Annie also spent time on Tuesday and Wednesday, getting ready for a little home teaching social with the Carters.  They have two little girls and a little boy – Grace, Ruby and Ben and they are from America.  Anyway, we invited them for a swim at the club house and dinner afterwards.  Annie also spent time on Tuesday evening doing her visiting teaching.

Thursday, was a busy day at the archives and we even had a missionary couple, the Fowlers, join us for some special help with their family history.

Friday started early.  We knew that we would be going to Bath with other senior couples from the mission.  We also learned that Katja needed a ride to the airport to spend the week with her mother in Austria.  So we thought we could easily drop her at the airport on our way to Bath.  Things worked out well.  We got her to the airport and made it to Bath in plenty of time to join the others.

Bath Abbey

Tourist @ Roman Baths

 

Roman Baths

Tourists @ Baths; Abbey in Rear

Following a wonderful lunch, we spent the rest of the day on a free walking tour of Bath and paying to see the old Roman hot baths and ruins.  It was a great day.  We finished it off with pizza and then driving to Swindon for a three night stay.

We chose Swindon because it was somewhat centrally located to the Smart and Stagg ancestral homes.  We decided to see these places because they were between Bath and our London home and because The National Archives was closed from Saturday through Monday due to what they call a “bank holiday”.  At best we have been able to figure these bank holidays are kind of like the US Monday holidays – Equal Rights, Presidents Day, Memorial Day and Labor Day.  Anyway, rather than spend the day at home in London we decided to see some ancestral sites.

Saturday we spent the day in the Wiltshire archives, now housed in Chippenham.  It was a very rainy day, with little impact since we were indoors.  We had fun finding old places on maps and doing some research in parish registers, monumental inscriptions, and other records.  We made lots of copies and kept waiting for the weather to break so we could get on with our site visits.  We visited Neston and found the headstone and home for Paul’s 2^nd great grandfather, William Smart.

William Smart in Bushes

Headstone Disintegrating

Neston Parish Church

William Smart Home - Neston

Ridge Farm, Neston Park Estate

We visited Lea where Paul’s great grandfather was born and christened.  We even had dinner at a pub next to the church in Lea and had a good conversation about the US and about Mormons.

Lea Parish Church (Abel Smart)

Restaurant/Pub next to Lea Church

We visited Minety where William Smart was christened and where his father and mother were married.  We lucked out in Minety and found someone watering flowers in the cemetery who just happened to know where the key to the church was and who kindly allowed us to go inside.  Needless to say, we had a great day and a very full one.

Minety Parish Church (William Smart)

Minety Church Interior

You can guess what we did on Sunday and you might be right.  Swindon, the place we are staying, has an LDS Church.  It was less than 5 minutes from where we were staying.  It’s a pretty building with a large congregation.  We thought that maybe it should be divided, but they say they need a few more members and they are about to add on to it anyway.  They are quite active in indexing and we really enjoyed our visit there.  We do enjoy our Sundays and meeting with the wonderful saints here in England.

Following Church, we decided to take a little drive (1½ hours) to the south of Swindon.  We ended up at the parish of Whitbury.  For the Staggs that are reading this, Whitbury was the last place the Staggs lived before emigrating.  It is also the christening place of your direct line ancestor, David Stagg.  What a quaint village!  We don’t know all about it in the late 1800s, but today it is still very rural and mostly a horse breeding area for racing horses.

Is There Really a Whitbury?

Whitbury Parish Church Interior

Whitbury Parish Church & Visitor (David Stagg birthplace)

Whitbury from Parish Church (John & Mary Stagg home)

Once we got to Whitbury, which was in Wiltshire but is now in Hampshire, we obviously had to make the trip back to Swindon.  It just so happens that the famous landmark called Stonehenge was somewhat on the way back.  So we made it a point to see it on the way back to Swindon.

Stonehenge

 

Guess we’ve pretty well covered another week.  We want you all to know that the gospel, our families and our friends means everything to us.  We are so pleased to serve but very anxious to see you all in the near future.  We gave the mission home a date for our returning home as July 23^rd.  We haven’t heard if they are able to get the tickets for then.

Happy Birthday to Brinley and Bryton this week.

  

Know this, that we are doing our best to serve and to work hard.  May the Lord’s choicest blessings be yours,

Grandma and Grandpa, Mom and Dad, Annie and Paul, Sister and Elder Smart

Thatched Roof Cottages outside Swindon

Week 68 -- WHAT A WEEK!!!!

The week in Chorley, Lancashire started out with our attending the LDS Church in Wigan, as we mentioned in last week's blog.  Wigan is full of history for Annie's family. We spent Sunday evening in the Chorley Family History Center working on our power points for Saturday's family history fair.  We also met with the planning committee from Chorley Stake to finalize the event.  We were more than impressed with the quality of leaders and their depth of planning and promoting this fair. 

Wigan Library

Monday and Tuesday we spent the days in the Wigan library to find out more about Annie's family.  We searched non-conformist church records and we located some distant branches of the family there.  Paul spent the days tracing streets that the Windus and the Ascroft families lived on.  He was successful in finding their locations which helped to link more information as the week moved forward. . He also learned where to find  further records to help us.

Research at Wigan Library

Wigan is famous for it's meat pies.  We enjoyed one of their meat pies for lunch on Monday.  Wigan residences are known as "pie eaters".  Most people think this is because of the meat pies, but  history tells that it really refers to"humble pie".  Due to the mine strikes of 1926, Wigan miners were starved back to work before their counter parts in surrounding towns.  It is said that they ate "humble pie" in returning to work first.

Wigan Pie Eater

Wigan Town Hall

St Aiden, Billinge Parish Church

All Saints, Wigan Parish Church

St Thomas. Upholland Parish Church

We spent Monday evening back at the Chorley FHC working on our presentations.  Tuesday evening we walked around the center of Wigan town and found the Wigan parish church where many ancestral christenings and marriages took place. We made it back to Chorley in time to do a session in the Preston Temple before we went to bed very tired.  We were blessed to be asked to be the witnesses on the session.

Wednesday and Thursday we traveled to Leigh where the Wigan Archives is located.  Annie has been trying to find the birth of Fanny Rimmer who married Henry Windus in Billinge, in 1791.  She looked at the original Wigan Parish records for the late 1700's and early 1800's.  She found the birth of John Windus (Winders)  son of Henry and Fanny.  We learned two important new facts from looking at the original

Wigan Archives @ Leigh

records that are not in the indexed information of this birth.  We found he was listed as the 3rd son.  We only know of William and John.  Now comes the challenge of finding more children.  We also learned that Fanny's Parents were Richard and Ann Rymer.  This is a big step in locating Fanny's birth.  We then found on Ancestry.com that there is a Richard and Ann Rymer that had children in Ormskirk.  Ormskirk is between Billinge and Halsall.  Halsall is where Henry was born and so it all fit together.  There were 3 children listed with a 5 year break between 1765 and 1770.  These are the probable years that Fanny would have been born, since Henry was born in 1768 and they married in 1791.  Annie thinks Fanny might be a child of theirs that has not been indexed correctly.  Annie's self appointed next job is to look through the microfilm of the original records (at LFHC) and see if Fanny is there.

Paul found  two old maps showing the streets that the ancestors lived on. He also found some fun court records dealing with Henry Windus and Fanny.  We also noted that Henry's being in the Navy was due to a conscription assignment given to the local communities by the government.  More fun documents

Parish Records at Wigan Arichives in Leigh

We visited the Lower Ince Cemetary after the Archive closed on Wednesday.  We had records of 3 ancestors being buried there.  We located the area that their graves were and even the exact location of two, but there were no head stones.  Sunday we had arranged to spend Wednesday evening with a Wigan ward member, Brother Aspee.  He volunteered to show us around Wigan, Billinge and Upholland.  Annie was so excited to see all 3 Parish church's that were the place of baptism and marriage of many ancestors.

Thursday evening Paul worked on his power point presentation while Annie rested.  She was totally exhausted.  All of the family history research stuff is hard work for her, but it is Paul's fun, Annie has enjoyed it, but it does tire her out.

Friday we were on our way to Preston to the Lancashire Records Office.  We had two things we wanted to find and get copies. One was a will of a Richard Rymer in Wigan about 1820.  It proved to not help us.  The other one was a court ordered removal of Fanny Windus and her son William to leave UpHolland and return to Halsall due to the fact that she needed government help. Her husband, Henry was serving in the Royal Navy and could not provide.  All Annie had to do was say to Paul, "I don't think she actually went even when they told her to".  That was his invitation to find out the truth and he followed court papers through the rest of 1797 and found that Annie's premonition was correct.  He found Fanny's appeal of the order and then another court hearing where the judge said that the order was "quashed, anhilated and made void".  Henry was in the Royal Navy and Fanny had the right to stay. Needless to say we spent the entire day at the records office.

Lancashire Records Office

Friday evening we went to Avenham  Park and  the River Ribble where Heber C Kimmball , Orson Hyde, Willard Richards and Joseph Fielding performed the first LDS baptisms in England.

River Ribble

Small part of the Chorley FH Fair

Saturday we participated in the Chorley Area Family History Fair.  Paul taught 3 classes and Annie taught one class.  We both spent a lot of time helping with questions and problems, It was an amazing event where about 400 people attended.

Sunday morning we attended sacrament meeting in Chorley and then headed home by way of our own choice detour.  We went to Ormskirk and Halsall.  Ormskirk was probably where Fanny was baptized,  (Hope to confirm that this week).  St Cuthbert, Halsall  chapel is where William Windus,  the father of Henry was the minister.  Some interesting information we found is that the minister serving with William Windus was Henry Mourdant. William's son Henry was actually named, Henry Mourdant Windus -- wonder why.

St. Cuthbert, Halsall Parish Church

Ormskirk Parish Church

One of the highlights of this trip was enjoying all of the beauty of this part of London.  Flowers were blooming.  Green trees and fields were everywhere.  England is truly a beautiful country.

Beautiful flowers outside
Accommodation Center,
Preston Temple

Our favorite view of the Preston Temple
through the arch in the walk way.

Happy Birthday this week to Madalyn.              



We know that we must all "Hasten the Work" in these latter days.  This includes hastening the temple work for the dead.  We know our calling to help with this is what the Lord wants us to do.  We love our work.  We are grateful for this opportunity. 

Love you all and miss you tons,

Grandma and Grandpa, Mom and Dad, Paul and Annie, Elder and Sister Smart

Flowers in UpHolland Church grounds

Could this be why Paul isn't in more of our pictures?

Lancashire -- Week 67

Hello once again to our family and friends,

Another week has come and gone and they seem to be flying past quickly.  Seems like we are asked regularly about when we want to go home and what arrangements should be made.  We are thinking that with all the traveling they are asking us to do that we will likely come straight home after our release.  We also keep getting asked to do more family history teaching and training – sometimes we are getting requests for later in the year.  We simply tell them that we won’t be around that long and that they should contact our leaders that will remain behind after we are gone.  Believe it or not, it is a little sad to turn them down and tell them we won’t be around!

Well, enough of that, let’s move on with one more exciting week and our activities of the week.  Monday was one great day!  It was a holiday here (they call it a “bank holiday”.  Guess they can’t think of a President (or King) or cause to name them after, so they simply use the term “bank holiday”.  Anyway the missionaries from the other mission that serve in the Family History Center decided to come into our mission (they are in the London Mission, not the London South) where Richmond Park is located and view a supposedly impressive collection of flowers in part of the park.  The area within the park is called Isabella Plantation.  The park consists of some 40 acres, and this “plantation” was within the park.  We saw some deer in the park and then entered this fenced off area that had an absolutely gorgeous flower garden – huge.  Great day!  We capped it off by returning to the city of London and eating together at a bbq place that offered ribs and pulled pork.

Isabella Plantation

Isabella Plantation

Isabella Plantation

Isabella Plantation

Isabella Plantation

Isabella Plantation

Missionary BBQ

Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday morning were fairly typical days at the Family History Centre and working with the staff and patrons.   However, in the back of our minds, we know that we had a forthcoming seminar on the weekend in Northampton and that we would be gone the following week researching and getting ready for another seminar in Chorley, which is where the Preston Temple is.  So there were the usual handouts and power point presentations, etc.

Northampton Stake Center

Northampton Conference Banner

Northants FHC - Notice Worker at Back of Picture

We forgot to announce the arrival of our new little ones.  Best count that we can give is five or six.  The staff of the TNA say six, so we'll take their word for it.  Baby Cygnets!  Check them out! 

Spring at The National Archives

Friday afternoon we headed for Northampton, about 1½ hours north of London.  We arrived in good time and checked into our hotel.  We then traveled to the LDS Church, just to make sure that we knew where to go the next day.  Had a great meal at a nearby pub and settled in for the evening.  Saturday we had a good day with nearly 200 people at the Church, many of them non-members.  Paul taught two classes and Annie and Paul had several individual appointments to help individuals with their personal family history problems.  All seemed to go well and by 4 pm we were off to Chorley (where the Preston Temple is located).  It was another 2½ hour drive.  We experienced lots of rain on the way, but were feeling pretty good when we saw the lights of the temple.

Today is Sunday.  We’re actually in the Family History Centre doing this blog.  We were going to go to Church here in Chorley, but decided to go to Wigan and attend the ward there.  After all, Wigan is the place that Annie’s ancestors lived.  It was a great meeting and there were some really wonderful people there.

Wigan Chapel

We still got back to Chorley in time to visit the Church.  The building is as big as any stake center in America.  It has four wards that meet in it.  Because it’s near the temple it is beautifully landscaped and well taken care of.  This whole complex consists of the Temple, large MTC, huge stake center, family history centre, housing for temple workers, housing for temple patrons, distribution center and buildings for maintenance and other administrative offices.

Accommodation Center at Temple

Chorley Chapel next to Temple

                                     

Preston Temple

Lancashire is beautiful country.  We look forward to doing some research and visiting the areas where Annie’s family came from.  We look forward to participating in the family history seminar this next weekend.

Hope this finds you well and happy and enjoying the blessings of the gospel.
Our love and sincere best wishes to all of you,

Mom & Dad, Annie & Paul, Grandma & Grandpa, Sister and Elder Smart