Family history - NOT amateur radio

My father's genealogy can be traced continuously to the mid 1500s in South Devon.  I have an isolated record in an adjoining parish from the mid 1400s.

What I did not realise is if you go back 22 generations our ancestors number more than the entire population of the entire British Isles!

This means we are probably related to everyone alive today if we go back far enough. So, we are probably all related to the English royal family. Some of our ancestors may have moved here from abroad and almost certainly some of our distant ancestors married people who were distantly related.

This is quite humbling.

Family history - NOT amateur radio

One of my Facebook memories today was this post about family history.

Family history - NOT amateur radio

Our granddaughter is doing some homework on family history. I can trace ours continuously back to the mid 1500s with 1 record in the 1400s. I shall have to dig these out!

Family history - NOT amateur radio

My Lapthorn family history can be traced back to the mid 1500s continuously with 1 record in the mid 1400s. 

Back in the 1500s we lived in Hope Cove in Devon. The cottages in the photo are in the same village. 

I suspect my ancestors were hereabouts for thousands of years. There is an iron age hill fort near here. It is quite possible that one of my distant ancestors manned this thousands of years ago.

Very old family photo - NOT amateur radio

My wife is doing a photobook on the history of one side of her family. 

One ancestor is believed to have fought at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. More recently her ancestors have been shopkeepers and run a banana warehouse in Sheffield.  Doing a book is a good idea both for her and generations to come so these memories are captured.

The restored photo probably dates from the late 1800s or early 1900s.

Royal blood? - NOT amateur radio

Many years ago, my brother and I traced our family tree on my dad's side continuously back to the 1500s. We have an isolated record from 1428.

Now, each of us has 2 parents, 4 grand-parents, 8 great-grand-parents and so on.  Going back to the 1500s I would have had about 8000 ancestors. Going back a few more generations and I would have had more ancestors than the whole population of England at that time! So, in all probability I am related to royalty, as are most in England!

If just one of these had not had children, I would not be here today. Sobering and humbling thought.

See https://sites.google.com/site/g3xbmqrp3/history-1