Looking Backwards – The ‘Good’, the ‘Bad’ and the (Very) Ugly

I’ve been continuing digging into my past on an Ancestry website and, so far, have come up with around 500 ancestors mostly on my Mother’s side. I’m still hitting a bit of a brick wall on my Father’s side of things so I’m concentrating on what I can find rather than banging my head too much. So far, as I expected being (as far as I know) a peasant from a long line of peasants it’s all been pretty mundane. Most of my maternal family have been solidly working class with most of the men (that I know of) holding general labouring jobs and most of the women – in between birthing an outstanding number of children – being servants or dressmakers. But going back a ways I did find out a few that stood out.

First the ‘Good’. I say ‘good’ because this was the first Sir I came across. His name was Sir Matthew Herbert (1536-1603) who was born in South East Wales. He was, apparently (and I say ‘apparently’ because I’m still not 100% sure that all of this is real as tracing back my family for 500 years is still freaking me out a bit), my 12^th great-grandfather. He seems to have been a Member of Parliament during the reign of Queen Mary and her sister Queen Elizabeth I. Being a Catholic this must have been quite a stressful time for him!

The ‘Bad’ here isn’t really that bad (at least not yet!). What I mean by ‘bad’ is that the two following ancestors were both supporters of the Monarchy of Charles I during the English Civil Wars (1642-1651). The first that popped onto my ‘radar’ was Hannah Parnell Rand (1609-1694) who was ‘apparently’ my 10^th great-grandmother. Apart from having an outstanding name I was intrigued by her birthplace – Arundel Castle in Sussex. This was indeed a full-on castle which was interesting enough – although her family didn’t own the castle as far as I’m aware. What was more interesting to me was where and when she died – in Essex county, Massachusetts in 1694 when it was very much still a British colony in the New World. Arundel castle was held by Royalist forces during the war and was held under siege for 18 days in 1643 when Hannah was in her early 30’s. I haven’t confirmed yet that she was present during the siege but it wouldn’t surprise me. I’m speculating that she was likely part of the castle owners ‘affinity’ who were royalists (and no doubt Catholics). How and why she ended up in the New World 50 years later I can only, again for now, speculate. I’m guessing that after the Royalists lost the war and Charles was executed that they felt they could no longer liver here – especially under Cromwell’s reign – so moved, as many seemed to have done, to the colonies and a new life. By the time of the restoration in 1660 I’m guessing that Hannah and her cohorts had put down deep enough roots that they decided to stay.

The other ‘bad’ I actually know much more about. I’ve even found a portrait of him (below). His name was Sir Thomas Allin (1612-1685) and he was ‘apparently’ my 10^th great-grandfather. Not only was he around during the Civil War but her fought in them as an Admiral in the Royal Navy (and commanded the Mediterranean fleet) on behalf of Charles I [so another royalist damn him!] and also in the seemingly never ending wars with Holland around that time. I think he’s definitely my biggest ‘fish’ so far!

Now to the (very) ugly…. I have long maintained in conversations about historic slavery that, coming from a long line of peasants, my ancestors were much more likely to have been slaves (indentured probably) rather than to have kept them. Apparently I was wrong. My 13^th great-grandfather was one Thomas Padmore (1610-1661). The red flag was that he died in St Thomas Parish, Barbados. So, 17^th century Barbados….. Which meant sugar, which meant plantations which meant….. yup, slaves. I haven’t done much of a deep dive into this element of my family history yet but it appears that the Padmore family had a sugar plantation known as Bagatelle which covered 213 acres. This means that the plantation is highly likely to have used slaves even if the Padmore’s themselves didn’t technically own them – which, to be honest, they most likely did. To say that I was less than impressed by this revelation is somewhat of an understatement. Having Royalists in my family tree was bad enough but slave owners too? Not good…… It certainly gives me more to dig into though which is always good. Next time I’ll let you know some of the smaller mysteries that my brief investigations have brought up.