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I love Devon threads. ;)

Just in case the two-L Allan isn't looking in just now, you might send him a private message (click on his name) to catch his attention.

Got any Hills? :D

Hi Westward Ho! (you forgot the '!')
I am related to the Hookways, sometimes referred to as Hookaways (Devonshire dialect played a part when the adjudicator asked I suspect), and also have many names but not so many connections. It is a name prevalent in the Bideford area generally, but it seems nowhere else. If I can help you I can give you access to my tree or send you a gedcom file. Your call.

Hello Janey.

I can certainly understand how Sylvia could jump to the conclusion that newbies here would want everything laid out for them on a plate, with no need for hours of research and its many trials and tribulations.

I'm retired, and so I have plenty of free time to explore my family tree. The only stumbling block is the ongoing cost of remaining a subscriber to Genes and Ancestry while loose ends still remain to be tied.

I'm not a Gentleman Farmer with endless finances to play with while my serfs toil in the fields for nothing more than a daily bowl of cold gruel.

Time is Money - and my clock is ticking.

Just yesterday I had to blow $100 at the vets to get my cat cleaned up and injected after it had been attacked by a local feral.

Thanks for the links!

Regards,
Allan

I have to disagree with my good friend and countrywoman Sylvia -- I didn't see evidence of sloth on your part. ;)

And you certainly have the good sense to recognize those Ancestry trees for the total nonsense they are. (I spent an evening this past weekend commenting on tree after tree, asking the owners to please remove my Cornwall ancestors from their tree, since I could guarantee them that my grx4 grandfather the parish clerk in the mid-1700s did NOT have a son who was born, married and died in Tennessee, despite the vague similarity between their surnames ...)

One resource you might not have encountered -- the Devon Family History Society. It's not my favourite by any means, but it's all there is. Cornwall has Online Parish Clerks who strive to make info accessible and who make themselves available to inform and advise ...the DFHS sells CDs and printouts ...

Anyhow, here's the link:

http://www.devonfhs.org.uk/

I'll have to leave you to yourself to try to figure out their ways of selling research request results, since I find it incomprehensibly complicated.

There is a discussion board:

http://members.boardhost.com/devonfhs/

and there are in fact very helpful people there, but it doesn't archive messages so anything you post there will be gone in a few weeks, unlike here.


Gentleman Farmer -- mine (for those in the know: Ada Hill/Monck the Actress's husband Mr. Coke/McCock) was on 50 acres in Cheshire in 1881, with a wife, three kids and 8 domestic servants, 4 of whom were grooms. By 1891 the wife had disappeared, the husband had a newer younger wife, and he was lying about his name, his kids' names, and all their places of birth. The ponies, said I. And sure enough, the London Gazette reports his bankruptcy not long after the 1881 census. ;)

Oh ... try being desended from Hills of Cornwall/Devon ... my batch of whom, of course, adopted a fake name themselves ...

Since publicly describing my Hookway line as a "boring lot" I've developed a crushing guilty conscience and a sense of shame about it.

To all those Hookways of days of yore - I offer you my sincere apologies!

Ah, now I feel better. Hopefully they won't come to haunt me.

I think I've managed to connect an unbroken line of Hookways from my good self to a Gilbert Taylor of 1673 to 1732 in Sandford Devonshire.

What I'd really like is to add stories to these characters so as to bring them to life, and make them more interesting for my niece who I'm doing all this for.

Thank you Sylvia and jax for your interest.

Allan

I've got Ag Lab, lace-maker, draper's assistant, tailor's apprentice, tailor. master tailor, master builder, surveyor, building contractor, yeoman, Gentleman Farmer (ha! I like that one!).

or ag labs with lace makers for wives ................. and all re-use the same christian names


Such a habit can be very useful if there are some unusual names in the fmailies, but otherwise ....... we all have to suffer through!



that's why we start with the most recent and work slowly backwards


Good Luck!



sylvia

I think you will find most of us have boring Ag Lab ancestors with endless amount of children all with the same names as the previous generation.

good luck with the Russian and French side

jax

You're right... 'Ancestry'.

My brain has long since gone into meltdown from spending hours, and days, and weeks, trying to make sense of all the names I've harvested off these ancestry sites.

My English family tree has proved to be an incredibly boring lot who did nothing but plant potatoes and turnips while keeping their womenfolk permanently bare-foot and pregnant in front of the kitchen sink - generation after generation.

And of hundreds of these 'Hookways' they named the boys either John, James or William -- and the girls were either Elizabeth, Emma, or Mary.

And when they ran out of these names, they would call the next few children by the same names so they'd have two Johns or two Williams etc.

I've called it quits on booking up any more Hookways. It becomes pointless after the first 50 or so.

I'm going back to my Russian and French branch - much more interesting.

Thanks for your interest Sylvia and jax.

Allan

I do not quite understand what you mean by

"The Hookways information at Ancestors is hopelessly wrong."

Is this on a tree on ancestry?

jax

snap sylvia

Allan


what do you mean .................. at Ancestors


is that an internet site?



If you mean ancestry .............. the family trees on there are owned by individuals, and nothing really to do with ancestry.

The Hookways information at Ancestors is hopelessly wrong.

If you check out the John Hookways in particular you'll see the dates are wrong, the 'John' sons are wrong, they're married to the wrong people, etc etc.

What an unholy mess.

If I ever manage to untangle all the misinformation, I'm going to make a personal donation of the corrected Hookway tree to Ancestors and here to save others from spending hours and days on a fool's errand because of false information.

Sylvia-in-Canada...

Just for you... I've filled out my Family Tree with all the names I have so far.

Took me over 3 hours to do.

:))

Allan

Quinsgran - thank you.

Everything you Santa's Little Helpers tell me gets saved to my file for later reference.

Best wishes.

Allan.
I googled Hookway One Name Study. Looked at Hookway Group on Facebook
Grace Hookway mentioned her family came to New Zealand 3-4 generations ago from Bideford
Alex Mitchell nee Hookway did a study and has 3,000 Hookway names all joined together she says

sorry Allan


I did not intend to "scold" you

I hoped to give you a little bit of advice


as you did seem to be wanting to rather take the easy way ...... and I think ALL of us have been caught at some point by being a wee bit lazy


You have 7 sheets pf paper ..... not sure what A4 size is, we don't have that elsewhere in the world!




I have 2 file drawers, and 3 boxes all filled with sheets of information


Plus very large files on my computer, for at least 15 different surnames,

and a book in progress for my daughter on one of her father's lines that starts back in 1620


I hate to think how much information and paper I have filed in the last 7 years!



have you incidentally looked on the beta.familysearch site?

www.familysearch.org/#form=advanced-records


This is the LDS site, and is one of the premier places to look as you need parish registers, and so far as I know GR does not carry such records, and ancestry is limited.


also look for Online Parish Clerks to see if there is anything for Devon


also consider looking for a local Family History Society (FHS) .... google for those





and another little piece of information for you


don' expect to get a response from GR re the VIEW button not working ..... they only work 8am to 4 pm, Monday to Friday!


not very useful for those of us who live overseas.




sylvia

Hello Sylvia.

Me lazy? Are you kidding?!

I've been working on this night and day for weeks now...

I now have 7x A4-sized sheets of paper covered in graphics of my family tree - with 98% of this coming from my own time and efforts.

If you read my post above, you'll notice I told TootyFruity that I have all of the names he listed for me here.... all from my own work.

So please don't jump to snide conclusions too quickly, my dear.

I now have around 100 names in my family tree - again, nearly all my own work.

Of the Hookways I now have 20 names, and I only asked the board here for some help because both Ancestor.com and Genes Reunited have not been solving the problem of the 'spare' Hookways I have which don't seem to connect with the ones that I do have.

Messages from you that scold me for some assumed laziness doesn't really help the situation I'm faced with, or contribute positively to the spirit of helpful cooperation here between us members.

Regards,
Allan

Allan

we ALL face the same problem that you do


.... think how much worse it is for someone who has Taylor or Smith, or Jones in Wales


You have it easy!



But, please, please, please


do NOT depend on someone else's work


You hae no idea as to whether that that tree or information has been thoroughly researched and proved.


As an example, I had a brother who was 10 years older than me


There was (maybe still is!) a tree around that has my brother married to my mother, and with me as their child ................. all birth years correct


so if you look at it closely, my 10 year old brother was married to my 35 year old mother when I was born


My father had completely disappeared



............ and that information was put together by a second cousin who published it in a One Name Study Group, that was put on a cd, and circulated around the world!



Believe me, it is much more fun, and much more satisfying, to sort it all out yourself, rather than taking the lazy way out




sylvia

TootyFruity - I posted off a message to the staff today that the VIEW button on someone's family tree wasn't working.

The Sarah Hookway and Robert Taylor Hookway 'twins' info is interesting. I don't have Sarah as Robert Taylor Hookway's sister.

I have 9 of Robert Taylor Hookway's (b. 1841) siblings - but not a 'Sarah'. She may have died soon after birth. I've got a few of those.

I get a lot of contradictions while researching the Hookway tree.

Everything proceeds normally until suddenly another research result contradicts what I've found out elsewhere.

A case in point is...

John Hookway m. Nancy Perkins (b.1780 , b.1780)

Their son: James Hookway (1806 - 1852) m. Mary Jane Taylor (1813 - 1869)

Mary Jane Taylor's parents are ... Robert Taylor & Sarah -- (b1794, b.1793).

Mary Jane Taylor's sister is... Sarah Taylor (b.1818)

Mary Jane Taylor and husband James Hookway (1813-1869 , 1806 - 1852) have son... Robert Taylor Hookway (b.1841)

The problem is that half my results say that James Hookway's wife was called Mary Jane Taylor ... while elsewhere it says it's a 'Sarah'.

Very confusing.

Allan

Hi Lynne! Nice to see you again. :)

Yes, I've asked, but no replies yet.

One of the problems is that so many of the Christian names are the same.

I've even got children of the John Beer and Mary Taylor Hookway couple who have the same name of 'William'.... William Henry Beer and William A. Beer.

And then I've got people who have married cousins etc of the same surname.

To be honest, I think back then in the 19th century the Bideford area was a bit like what we saw in the movie 'Deliverance'. A lot of banjo players of doubtful parentage...

Best wishes,
Allan

(No, I don't play a banjo!)

Allan as Lynne suggested search the trees on the site but even so you will need to check all possible leads rather than rely on someone elses research. Just in case they have gone down a blind alley

Did you know that Robert was a twin


Births Dec 1840   (>99%)
Hookway  Robert Tailor    Bideford  10 43   
Hookway  Sarah    Bideford  10 43