Way Back Wednesday: Emanuel BEERE and Ursula TWIGGES

Emanuel and Ursula lived in the small town of Modbury in South Devon, England.  As I have only just discovered them, I don't know much about them, but I do know that they had the following children baptised:

Jane christened 15 January 1611, Rabage (female) christened 2 January 1617, and George christened 28 December 1618.  I descend via George.

Thomas MacEntee's recommendation of Evernote came into play this weekend.  I had clipped a particular website, so I could find it again – and some kind soul had transcribed the baptismal registers back to 1602, including Emanuel, Ursula and their descendants.  I could have cheered (but I restrained myself to doing the Genealogist's Happy Dance around my front room).  Back and back and back I went, gathering names and dates of brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers – and I am sure relationships exist that mean there were cousins and uncles and aunties there as well.

And yes: the URL for this site has gone into my Research Toolbox – another Thomas MacEntee suggestion...

Modbury St George, by Charlotte Stackhouse

(Further information is held at the Modbury Heritage website)

MODBURY is a small ancient market town, consisting chiefly of four streets, diverging to the cardinal points, and pleasantly situated at the foot and on the sides of three acclivities, in the heart of a fertile district, 12 miles E. by S. of Plymouth, . . . Its parish contains 5977 acres of land, extending westward to the navigable river Erme, and including 143A. of woodland, 181A. of orchards, 144A. of waste, and 85A. of common. Its population amounted in 1801 to 1813 souls, and in 1831 to 2116, but in 1841 they had decreased to 2048. . . . The woollen manufacture was formerly carried on here extensively, but here is now only one small serge factory. The town consists chiefly of small old houses, but is highly salubrious, . . . The parish has many scattered farm-houses and five corn mills; and the small hamlets of Caton, Leigh, Brownston, Penquit, and part of Ludbrook. . . . Modbury Church (St. George,) is a spacious and handsome structure, with a tower, containing six bells, and crowned by a spire, rising to a height of about 134 feet. . . . The vicarage . . . is in the patronage of the Masters and Fellows of Eton College, and incumbency of the Rev. N. Oxenham, M.A. . . . "
[Devonshire Directory, William White, 1850]