Family Histories of Wood of Kent, Bone of Hampshire, Lloyd of Cheshire, and Thompson of West Yorkshire

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19 & 19a St Margarets Street Canterbury

Updated 4th March 2022. 2020/2021 was a most interesting year and not just because of the Covid 19 pandemic. The lockdowns caused by this situation has given time for some ancestry research and I have had a number of contacts through the website, with people directly related to me and others more distant.

Jan 2022 saw the publication of the 2021 census by Find My Past. Despite a World Wide Subscription this was onle available as a Pay per View albeit with a discount for subscribers to FMP. I have limited by search to direct and recent family members which produced some interesting information. In particular my maternal Grandparents who were living in a two up two down terraced house in Basingstoke with 6 of their 11 children.

I started to create my Pedigree chart and Family History in 2000 as I began my retirement. Like many others I wish I had started earlier when my parents and grandparents were alive as they could have answered some of the questions that arose. My starting point was to produce an Excel File based on a handwritten pedigree chart that had been passed down to me and to which my Father had added further information. I also had originals of an indenture of my three times Great Grandfather - Thomas WOOD (1759-1809) as an apprentice to William MONROW of Canterbury to be trained for 7 years as a Cordwainer plus Cerificates of the Freedom of the City of Canterbury for his sons. I also had a number of original birth, marriage and death certificates. I started piecing together and confirming the various dates that I had received using Ancestry. co.uk, LDS, and 1837Online (earlier version of Find My Past). It soon became clear that the Xcel file was impracticable so I purchased a copy of Family Historian which I have used ever since. About this time I also took a subscription to Genesreunited and entered a limited pedigree. It was through my Grandfather's name that I made contact with Robert DARLINGTON, husband of Webdy Howard WOOD, a 2nd cousin of mine twice removed.

Robert had also been working on Wendy's heritage and had found David MORRIS a 3rd cousin of mine and a cousin of Wendy who had received documents from his Mother which included a copy of the same Pedigree that I had. He had information that showed it had been produced by lawyers when probating the will of John WOOD (1687-1759) - see copy with his record. When his property was sold in 1864 some 105 yers after his death, a Deed of Conveyance listing his descendants down to great great grandchildren had been set up. That property had been left in Trust to his two children but it was not until 1848 that the trust was examined to determine the names of those who were to share the proceeds. The Lawyers who conducted the examination appear to have made a family tree to establish relationships of the descendants and a copy must have been given to Albert and to George Frederick - grandsons of John WOOD and subsequently passed on down to their sons. Sadly I have not had any communication with either Robert or David for some time - both being in their 90's now.

David had passed on other documents which included his four part Family History plus the "Diary of Mary JACKSON née HOWARD" which again produced a great deal of useful informaion regarding the JACKSON family who were related to us through the marriage of Francis Howard Stanley WOOD, son of Albert (Athelstane) WOOD, my Great Great Uncle to Susan Rose Stanley JACKSON.

We must have been working on similar Family Histories about the same time with Robert having the benefit of information provided by David MORRIS and he kindly shared a copy of his manuscript which gave me a great deal more information which I was able to update using the internet and to enter into my FH programme. He had also produced an article on "JACKSON of Lincolnshire and India". Robert had made contact with another distant cousin - Nikki VINE - who had a handwritten transcript of Mary JACKSON's Diary by George Howard JACKSON from about 1911 - Mary's grandson. I have never been able to make contact with Nikki.

I have spent over 20 years now reviewing all these works, adding to and expanding them.

In addition to the information provided by Robert and David I have used the following sources in my research. I have had a world wide subscription to Ancestry and a World subscription to Find My Past ( A good source of BMDs information on the British in India) I have purchased and used information from the Kent Family History Society, Hampshire Genealogical Society and the Nottinghamshire Family History Society.

I was always led to believe that the WOOD family were descendants of Huguenots and David and Wendy had heard the same story. Whilst their Great Grandfather Albert had done some research and felt he had established a line through the DUBOY's name there is no substantial evidence on this. However I believe that my research has established a connection through our 3 x Great Grandfather Thomas WOOD who married Fancoise THOREL. Her parents were Jean THOREL and Francoise CHARTIER and there is evidence of him being a Church Deacon and Elder of the Walloon or Strangers Church in Canterbury Cathedral in1768. I have been iunable to trace Jean or Francoise back to the Wallooon community.

In this history we are taken far and wide from the time of Thomas WOOD, son of Simon of Chartham in Kent who "on the 19th June in the 15th year of the reign of George the Third and the year of our Lord 1775 and for the sum of 10 pounds was indentured to William MONROW of Canterbury in the trade of Cordwainer for a period of 7 years". Completion of the apprenticeship was the start of a business making boots and shoes based at 19 St Margarets Street, Canterbury which lasted for over 100 years until 1903 when the business finally closed and my Grandfather, Edgar Lancefield WOOD moved to Dover.

I have been contacted over the years, in particular, since I set up the website by a number of people who have added or corrected entries for which I have been grateful.

I am particularly grateful to Marion DELL who has taken time from her writing of an aurobiography of Julia Prinsep JACKSON to enlighten me on the "Free Mariners involved with the Honourable East India Company" and the many members of the JACKSON family living in India in the 19th century.

More recently I was contacted by Sara WOOD and we discovered that neither her husband or I were the sole remaining descendants of Simon WoOOD, as his Grandfather and mine were brothers.

At todays date the Family Tree has grown in volume to some 15128 names and 4909 families.

NOTES:

1. Dates - where dates are complete i.e; dd/mm/yyyy then they are confirmed birth or baptism dates. Where there is definite birth dates available then baptism dates are recorded separately otherwise dates mm/yyyy are taken from ancestry/findmypast registration information.

2. Surnames - surnames in brackets are usually where the marriage has not been confirmed and the spouses maiden name not identified.

3. Sources - primary sources are taken from KFHS transcript CD's, Hampshire Genealogical Society Index CD's, and Nottinghamshire Family History Society Viewer Pack CD. Other major sources are a world wide subscr²iption to Ancestry and a World subscription to Find My Past.

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