#52Ancestors: William JEFFS (est.1675-1732/33), Warwick, England

Continuing the #52Ancestors year-long challenge by genealogist Amy Johnson Crow, here is my son-in-law's 8th great-grandfather, 9th for his and my daughter's children, William JEFFS (birth est 1675-?) from Warwick, Warwickshire, England. I'm referring to him as William-2, as there are several Williams in this family.  

Apparently the surname JEFFS comes from the time of the [1066] Norman-French, Geoffroi, later spelled Jeff. The final 's' is shortened from the old patronymic 'son', i.e., Jeffson became Jeffs.  

Warwick is a medieval town, on the River Avon, and the St Mary's Church the JEFFS family attended has a 174ft high tower, seen in the photo here. Information can be found on several sites by googling the church. The image here was uploaded to Wikipedia by the photographer, Matthew Field [matthewfield.com].

From digging through page after page of several different versions of early Parish Registers in Warwick [St Mary's Church], I've managed to find a few details. The first item is that I can only find one family named JEFFS [or variant] in the Parish. That's good news for research, in that Jeffs individuals found are likely to be William's family - children or parents, possibly siblings. No siblings of William-2 found after an exhaustive review of several hundred pages and two different registers!  

I believe I've found William-2's father, also named William-1 [of course!], who was buried 14 Feb 1728/29. I never found a "Widow Jeffs" buried, however. Still, it shows he was living near or with his son William. As mentioned before, I've estimated William-2's birth year to be approximately 1675.  And I'm assuming he was born in Warwick region. 

William-2 married Mary [unknown surname] in approximately 1700 in St Mary's Church, Warwick, although I have yet to find the marriage in the register. I'll keep on looking in the other nearby churches in case they married in Mary's original church. 

William-2 and Mary had the following nine children, all christened at St Mary's Church:
    1.  Sarah [ancestor], bap 21 Jun 1702, d. 23 Nov 1755; m. 13 May 1727 to
            Richard PARSONS; 3 known children
    2.  William-3, bap 26 Mar 1704; m. est 1725 to Mary ___; 1 known child
    3.  Thomas, bap 20 Oct 1706; m. unknown; 1 known child 
    4.  Mary, bap 20 Mar 1707/08; m. unknown; 1 known child
    5.  Elisabeth, bap 6 Jan 1710/11
    6.  Anne, bap 2 Apr 1714
    7.  Alice [Alce], bap 2 Sep 1716
    8.  John, bap 20 Nov 1718; m. est 1745 to Elizabeth who was buried
             26 Jul 1750; their son Samuel also died in same month.
    9.  Richard, bap 24 Nov 1721

It is clear I need to continue searching for more details of the JEFFS children, and also for additional historical information of the region. For example, in the Burial section, one month I saw there were 23 burials, where normally there are 2-8 burials per month. Epidemics? Harsh winters? Inadequate resources in the family for food and heat? 

Four years after his father died, William-2 was buried, 16 Feb 1732/33., aged approximately 58 or thereabouts. I have no idea of the cause of his death, nor if his wife were still living. So far, I have not found a will, but that is not unusual for this time period. 

As usual when researching 'ordinary folk' in the early 1700s there are limited resources to check. To date I've found no court cases, no wills,  nor any additional church records. I can check the Hearth Tax rolls from 1662-1672 to see if there are any JEFFS men in Warwick or very close by. And also check the Victoria County books for Warwickshire to see if any JEFFS men are mentioned at all, as well as to check the region for trades, challenges, and more.  

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If these are your ancestors, I am happy to share what little I have on these ancestors. And if there are errors, please do let me know, via calewis at telus dot net, or in the Comments below and I will get back to you either by email or in the Comments. I appreciate the opportunity to correct any issues in these family trees.

Blogger - or my computer - is still not letting me "reply" to your comments, for some unknown reason. If I don't reply to your Comment, please know that I'm totally thrilled you came to read my post and commented!  You truly make my day!! 

52Ancestors: Richard PARSONS 1704-1767, Warwickshire England

Continuing the #52Ancestors [52 weeks] challenge by genealogist Amy Johnson Crow, here is the 7th great-grandfather of my son-in-law, Richard PARSONS of Warwickshire England. 

Luckily for this particular challenge, images of the parish registers of baptisms and marriages for St. Mary's Church of England, in Warwick Warwickshire, are available on FindMyPast, some also on Ancestry. See image on right: [2006-02-10 M.Field:St. Mary's church in Warwick UK the tower as viewed from the top of Warwick Castle, taken and uploaded by Matthew Field http://www.mattfield .com]

Parts of this very large church are approximately 1,000 years old, with old gravestones on one side of the church grounds. 

Richard was the third of 4 children found to date of Robert PARSONS and Susanna [unknown].He was baptised November 25, 1704 - baptism register snippet is on the left. He had an older brother, Robert, an older sister Mary, and a younger brother Samuel. There may be other siblings, but they have not been found clearly in baptisms. Several possible siblings include perhaps a Thomas and a Samuel, who both show up having children baptised in the same church, around the same decade/s.  Richard's father, Robert also seems to have two or three possible siblings living in Warwick, a Thomas and a Samuel, which common names seem to indicate a relationship to be researched if possible.

On May 13th, 1727, Richard married Sarah JEFFS, daughter of William JEFFS & Mary [unknown] at St. Mary's church. Sarah was the eldest daughter, with sisters Alice and Ann, and brothers, William, Thomas, and Richard.  This is a little difficult to read, but hopefully clear enough.  It is a poor copy and I need to do more work to clarify it - this was taken from Ancestry, but I have a copy from FindMyPast, which is the same image.

Only 2 children are found on baptism registers for Richard and Sarah:
   1.  Thomas, [ancestor] bap 2 Jun 1728, d. possibly before 12 Feb 1786; m. Mary [unknown], approx 1752, in Oxhill, a tiny village about 14 miles south of Warwick; only 1 child known [ancestor].
  2.  Mary, bap 9 May 1730; no further information found to date. 

Below is a snippet of Thomas Parsons in the church register:

It is possible that Richard's wife Sarah died within a few years after Mary was born in 1730, which would explain why I cannot find any further children. However, I need to dig further in burial records to be sure. I found that he church burial register has more info about the costs of : the burials, opening the ground, passing [the coffin] through the church, etc., than clearly writing down the names and dates of the deceased!  I've put this on my to-do list.

I have no information about Richard's occupation nor his father's.  Living in the city of Warwick, population about 96,000 in 1700, this family likely were involved either in trade of some sort, or farm work. I had hoped to find a will with some details that would indicate his occupation [work tools, land].  Perhaps the Hearth Taxes would give details.  More items on the to-do list.

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If these are your ancestors, I am happy to share what little I have on these ancestors. And if there are errors, please do let me know, via calewis at telus dot net, or in the Comments below and I will get back to you either by email or in the Comments. I appreciate the opportunity to correct any issues in these family trees.

Blogger - or my computer - is still not letting me "reply" to your comments, for some unknown reason. If I don't reply to your Comment, please know that I'm totally thrilled you came to read my post and commented!  You truly make my day.