Working on my genealogy this morning I found a reference remotely connecting an ancestor to Herman Melville’s novel Moby Dick. And this novel of course makes me think of that magical island of Nantucket. One of the daughters of Isaac Morrill, my 9th Great Grandfather, married a Folger and Mary Morrill Folger is mentioned in the novel.
All Things Nantucket June 17, 2017
Current Reading – June 2017 June 6, 2017
Non fiction – full of footnotes – fascinating reading! Increasing my knowledge and understanding of the early settlers of Essex County Massachusetts. And I’m finding a number of familiar names which I will follow up and see if they are actually my ancestors.
Ancestor Count Milestones June 2, 2017
My latest statistic – five thousand seven hundred, 5700, ancestors on my family tree and still counting on June 2 2017.
I keep finding more ancestors to add to my tree. Ancestry.com keeps growing and various other genealogy resources are being revealed. The digital age!
More specifically I’m trying to be sure I have identified all the ancestors who emigrated to North America. But this work results in pursuing many other ancestors and their stories as well. The pursuit of knowledge!
A gold mine of information
4 more books I might acquire – when I was visiting the East Coast last week, my cousin and I shared some of our research and these books are part of her library. She is deep into genealogy research and far more trained than I am. She volunteers at the New England Genealogical Research Institute once a week. We spent a bit of time exchanging and sharing information but other activities intervened and called upon our time. A return visit when we might have more time to focus on our shared genealogy interests is called for – maybe a visit to the Saugus Ironworks and the Peabody Essex Museum.
Mobility & Migration East Anglian Founders Of New England 1629-1640 May 20, 2017
This book has a great deal of information re my ancestors. I’ll go into detail in future posts.
The Plantagenets And My Genealogy May 11, 2017
I am enjoying reading this book about English history. On first encountering it one would think that it would be a pretty tough read, but no, somehow the author has made it flow. Maybe it’s because I am eager to find some of my ancestors. The author, Dan Jones, covers the years 1120-1399. I’ve been able to trace a few of my ancestors back that far.
Mobility And Migration May 7, 2017
This is the latest addition to my genealogy research library. It arrived in the post yesterday. All the information about some of my immigrant ancestors that I have been laboriously collecting from ancestry.com just might be here in this book. My immigrant ancestors originated from various parts of England but my impression so far is that the bulk of them came from East Anglia. The book was published in 1994. The author, Roger Thompson, is retired as university reader in American history at the University of East Anglia.
Here’s the blurb from the back cover:
“During the 1630’s, more than 14,000 people sailed from Britain bound for New England, constituting what has come to be known as the Great Migration. This book offers the most extensive study of these emigrants ever undertaken. Focusing on 2,000 individuals who moved from the five counties of eastern England, it provides historians with important new findings on mobility, family life, kinship networks, and community cohesion.
Roger Thompson reveals the personal experiences and ancestral histories of the emigrants. He follows them across the Atlantic and investigates their lives and achievements in the New World. Distinguishing between such groups as gentry, entrepreneurs, artisans, farmers, and servants, he explores whether the migration tended to be a solitary uprooting from a stable and predictable world of familiar neighborhoods or simply a longer move among many relocations.
Thompson also sheds light on the issue of motivation: Were these settlers pulled by the hope of eventual enrichment or of founding a purified society, or were they pushed by intolerance and persecution at home? Did they see New England as a haven of escape or an opportunity to exploit? Did New Englanders seek to replicate ‘English ways,’ preserving traditional culture and society, or did they embrace change and innovation? Mobility and Migration provides a wealth of new evidence for historians of both early modern England and colonial America.”
There it is – has he said it all??
Binge Reading April 24, 2017
Alexander Hamilton – yes I finished it. A bit slow at times ……but the concluding chapters made it all worth reading. Now I want the music!
