Grave hunting in Kildwick

Ok, so family history research - grave hunting is difficult with 2 littlies in tow but I attempt it the other week with my 2 year old & my 7 month old. 

This is Kildwick Parish Church in West Yorkshire...

It is a very historical church dating back to 950AD (Kildwick Parish Website, accessed 6th April 2016) and the Leeds-Liverpool canal cuts through the grave yard.

My ancestors didn't live in the village of Kildwick but in other the villages lying within the parish  boundaries, ie Cononley, Cowling, Glusburn etc. I have many ancestors who were baptised & buried here in the 1700s and early 1800s.

Sadly, I did not get enough opportunity to have a good look at many graves because my 2 year old kept running off in the opposite direction and they both fought against taking naps & I forgot the double pram! But we had a nice picnic in the sunshine in the grave yard :) 

Here is the evidence with a picnic selfie with my toddler beginning to feed me the babies food when I was concentrating on taking the photo - he missed my mouth & plastered it on my face instead!

Next time, I will drag my husband along to watch the kids while I peruse some of the old graves & fathom out their old, worn inscriptions.

Some of the beautiful grave stones...

Historic discoveries on my doorstep... Tong Village & Fulneck's Moravian Settlement

I love local, social & family history...

As I was looking for walks in my local area to try and improve my fitness levels, I discovered a walk on the AA walks website called Tong & Fulneck's Moravian Settlement.

Tong is a village about 5 miles south west of Bradford. It is a beautiful little village with a church, pub sweet cottages, farms, Tong Hall (the manor house), hotel, ice cream parlour, farm shop, a cricket ground and large garden centre on the outskirts. It has always been a small place that inspires me with interest for 2 reasons:

1. My 5x great grandmother, Agnes Mitchell, was born in Tong and baptised at St James church in 1784.
2. It is a beautiful quaint little village in the countryside between two large cities (Bradford & Leeds), yet it has managed to keep it's historic feel and green fields.

In doing some recent reading about Tong Village, here are a few things I have discovered:

• "Tong" is derived from the Old English tang meaning fork, probably deriving from the fact that Tong is situated between two valleys (Pudsey Beck and Cockersdale) and the fork in the becks.
• St James chapel, is a 12th century building on the remains of an earlier chapel indicating that Tong was probably a pre-Conquest settlement.
• Tong Hall is a 17th century manor house which is also probably on the site of an earlier building.
• The Lord of the Manor discouraged new developments to prevent over population which is probably one of the vital reasons why the village is still a village with surrounding farms.

But going back to the walk, what was "Fulneck's Moravian Settlement"? I had never heard of it...

Fulneck's Moravian Church

The AA website informed me that the Moravians were "...Pre-reformation dissenters from the Roman Catholic Church..." who came to establish a community in West Yorkshire, which was initially named Lamb's Hill and later became Fulneck.

WOW...that was a something on my doorstep which I never knew about!! 

The Moravians were the first Protestant church in Europe which began at the end of the 14th century in Bohemia and Moravia - the people wanted to worship God in their native tongue & not Latin and adopted a doctrine of "justification by grace through faith alone". They started sending out missionaries in the early 18th century, one of these early Moravian mission settlements was in Fulneck. 

Fulneck Moravian Settlement

I wanted to know about this group of people and their settlement, as well as to do this walk and visit Fulneck...

In doing some more reading about Fulneck, this is what I discovered:

• The land was given by Benjamin Ingham (an evangelical Anglican clergyman) to Count Nicolaus Ludwig von Zinzendork (a Moravian Bishop) to establish a Moravian settlement in 1744.
• John and Charles Wesley (who began the Methodist church in the UK) were initially associated with the Moravian Society in London.
• The school which was built as part of the community is now a well known public school.

My husband and I decided to do the walk this weekend, which we thoroughly enjoyed despite the occasional heavy rain showers and I think the landscape and views from the Moravian settlement have not changed at all in the nearly 300 years since the Moravians first settled there.

Information from:
Wikipedia - Tong Vilage
The AA - Tong & Fulneck's Moravian Settlement
Wikipedia - Moravian Church
Wikipedia - Fulneck Moravian Church

More Grave Hunting in Herne, Kent

Ok, so not much Family Tree research has been happening over the past few months, hence why the silence (other than the Book of Me) on this blog recently. I hope to get back to things again when life returns to some kind of normality...whatever that looks like!!!

St Martin's Church, Herne, Kent
(Image taken by Ruth Hogan, 24 Mar 2014)

A few weeks ago, my husband and I were doing a southern tour of some of his relatives as we do not get to see enough of them. As part of this tour we went to visit his Aunt and Uncle who live in Herne, Kent. It was great to see them but I was able to spend some time scouring the graveyard at St Martin's Herne Parish Church as this was the parish in which my ancestors lived in the early 1800s.

St Martin's Church - Font
(Image taken by Ruth Hogan, 24 Mar 2014)

The Redwood family, my great, great, great grandmother, Jane Redwood, was born in Herne, Kent in 1827. Many of the Redwood's were baptised at St Martin's Church. This is the font in which the baptisms would have taken place. My great, great, great grandmother was baptised here on 7th October 1827 at only about 3 weeks old. Jane's parents James Redwood and Sophia Homans were married at the same church on 13th October 1818.

William & Ann Redwood's Gravestone in
St Martin's Church Graveyard
(Image taken by Ruth Hogan, 24 Mar 2014)

There was one grave to the Redwood's in the graveyard which was in a pretty good condition compared to some of the others, but unfortunately since coming home and researching William & Ann Redwood it appears they were not from my Redwood lineage that I have discovered so far. I did not look for any of the other family surnames from Herne, such as Homan and Sutton, but perhaps we will go back there again one day.

It was a fun trip to see the church in which my ancestors were baptised, married and buried, as well as spend some quality time walking on the beach with my husband's aunt, uncle and their dog, Rosie.