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General => The Common Room => Topic started by: Andesine on Wednesday 16 January 08 20:58 GMT (UK)
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I kid you not. Narcissus Manpowder is the name. :o
OK, bit of background to this and me as I'm new here.
I started doing my family tree back in the early 80s when a Great Aunt died in Plymouth and whilst clearing the house we found piles of old paperwork. For the next 5 years I spent hours in record offices, vestries etc researching the Benneys of Cornwall and Devon with some considerable success.
Along the way I kept getting sidetracked by various interesting things. Most of them I managed to bring to a conclusion so I could move on but one of them is still bugging me to this day.
In the Hearth Taxes I found a Benney who was renting a dwelling owned by a Narcissus Manpowder. Now with a name like that it just had to be followed up. Trouble is I found absolutely nothing else.
When all the records started to go online I figured at last I'd be able to find more about him but, nothing. Well, almost nothing.
There is a reference to a Manpowder family in a Coat of Arms in the old mansion of the Glanvilles at Kilworthy, near Tavistock:
Hen. Manaton de Harwood, m. Martha Andrews, Lyme Regis. Arms : Sable, a saltire Argent between four cross-crosslets Or. About different parts of the house are thirty-six other coats, shewing the descent of the Manatons and their alliances with other houses, such as Buller, Hockmore, Manaton, Edgecumbe, Manpowder, Ilbert, Carminow, Roscarrock, Courtney, Kingdon, Trecarrol, Tremaine, Hunt, etc., etc. Kilworthy, and most of the property in and about Tavistock, now belongs to the Duke of Bedford.
and in an extract from a baptism in Twyford Hampshire:
14.07.1832 Twyford House
Christened by Revd Charles Shipley, Rector of Manpowder, Dorset
Given the family and the rented cottage seemed to have connections with Devon and Cornwall, Dorset seemed like a pretty good bet but the village is called Mappowder and I can't find any info that it was previously Manpowder.
There seems to have been a large manor there, the house there now is believed to have been built on a previous building that nobody knows much about.
So my question is, does anyone know if Mappowder was previously Manpowder and has anyone else come across Narcissus?
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Hi Andesine,
I've never come across Narcissus as a name before so looked it up on Familyhistoryonline. It seems to have been most popular in the West country
A Narcissus MAKEPOUDER (as transcribed) married Anstace PHILLIPS at Poughill, Cornwall 12th January 1657/8
There was also a George MAKEPOUDER baptised at St Keverne in 1614 - father Richard Makepouder
There are also a few MAKEPOWDER s listed, in Cornwall and Somerset.
No Manpowders or Manpouders anywhere on Familyhistoryonline.
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The IGI has a Narcissus MAKEPOWDER, son of Trystram christened 1575 at Holsworthy in Devon, and another one marrying Katherine Vinicombe 1700 at Crediton in Devon.
There are no MANPOWDERs or MANPOUDERs on the IGI either.
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Andesine ... can you give us some dates ?
(And a warm welcome to Rootschat by the way !)
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I don't have all the documents to hand at the moment but we're talking 1664 Hearth Taxes. There's no info on his age just that he owned the property.
I'll see if I can find the actual record. If I'm not back in half an hour, send someone to pull me out of the mountains of boxes. ;D
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Will do !
We all have mountains of boxes, so appreciate the problem ...
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;D I'm more organised than I thought.
Hearth Taxes 1664
Tintagel
Narcissus Manpowder gent whereof one in ye Mill House 7 stopt up 3 + the Mill House now in possession of Richard Benney
Hmmm the Makepowder/pouder records. I suppose they could be misspellings for parts of the family fallen on harder times but if they were Gentry I figure the scribes would have got it correct.
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There is a will of Narcissus MAPOWDER 1628 in the NA ...
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documentsonline/details-result.asp?Edoc_Id=967168&queryType=1&resultcount=1
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Also a ref. in Google books (very useful site ... do you know it ?)
http://www.rootschat.com/links/02ju/
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Whoa! Brilliant!
Got to be worth £3.50 for that will.
You're going to laugh but no, I've not used Google books before and I'm a web developer. You'd think I might have found that one by now. Sheesh! ::)
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http://books.google.co.uk/
All sorts of goodies !
If you get into Canadian FH, there's also this, similar ...
http://www.ourroots.ca/e/
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Canada great, I have a Benney who sailed off over there and ended up Governor of Nova Scotia. I've found the connection the other side, she has all their tree but neither of us can find the shipping info.
The Will is downloaded and amazing. I'll print it off tomorrow and try to extract all the bequests. From a quick look they're all over the country to all sorts of people, including the poor of Wolverhampton.
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Lydart thanks so much. This looks like it will be a gold mine. It's pretty tough to read on the screen and I'll double check a printed version tomorrow but it appears to say...
to my wife the said pish of Holsworthie,
Crumbs, seriously wealthy.
I've also now found a whole load of Mapowders so it looks like the Manpowder in the Hearth Taxes was wrong. It also seems to link into Mappowder in Dorset rather nicely.
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Oh RUDE WORDS!!!!
My Benney family surname has about 20 different spellings, you'd think I'd have looked for Mapowder wouldn't you.
http://www.surnamedb.com/surname.aspx?name=Mapowder
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Have you checked out the Dorset OPC pages for Shaftesbury St James ?
http://www.dorset-opc.com/ShaftesburyFiles/St.James/St.James.htm
There are the following marriages ... and may be more ...
1629 Thomas BRUER & Sarah MAPOWDER were married 23-Dec
1630 Robert MAPOWDER/CLARKE & Petronilla LACIE were married 30-Jun
1635 Giles RANDOLL & Joan MAPOWDER were married 27-Apr
... and I'll leave you the fun of searching through their other lists for baptisms and burials ...
It would be worth you putting 'Mapowder' into the main Dorset OPC search facility ... as I say, I'll leave it up to you !
(I'm enjoying this ... its the name that's caught my attention !)
Have you also tried putting his name into Google ? He occurs in 13 entries, but one is from the reply I gave you about the NA yesterday ! Google is obviously on the ball !
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Thanks very much. Yes great name isn't it and oh so tempting to go charging off researching them rather than concentrating on my own mob. Sigh. Soon maybe. :'(
I must be strong. I must be......
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Job ? Employment ?
Thats no excuse ... come on, we all want to know more about this man with the fascinating name !
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Hi Andesine,
I see from previous replies that you've seen that Narcissus was the son of Tristram Makpowder and was baptised in Holsworthy in 1575. I've also been side tracked by the fabulous name - my link to him is via his great niece Elizabeth Mapowder (grand daughter of his brother Gideon) who was my 7 (if I've counted right) times great grandmother. It's fascinating to have such a lot of information. I've also learned that Narcissus son Anthony studied at Exeter College Oxford. The record says matric 1637-8, admon 4 July 1641 - need to find out about terminology. The family wealth didn't help my 7x great grandmother who was resettled back to Holsworthy from Parkham in North Devon as a pauper later in life. This is much more usual for my family tree! Happy Hunting.
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Matric means "matriculated".
Matriculation is your formal admission as a member of your COLLEGE, which is what happens when you "go up" and the beginning of your studies.
You do not actually become a member of the UNIVERSITY until you graduate and "go down", at the end of your studies ... and I'm guessing (don't know for sure, because they do some things in pretty queer ways at Oxford) that "admon" is "admission" ... to the university, upon graduation.
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Thank you for the translation - it's very helpful. This is the first Oxford student I've linked to in the family tree. This part of the family is fascinating - there are also links to MPs and the law and some detailed wills. Should keep me busy for a while!
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I just looked at this because I was beguiled by the name!!
Surely Narcissus Manpowder must merit inclusion in a novel or book of some kind - unless he is already in the Harry Potter books?
( though from the South West, could he , in fiction, perhaps have a liaison with a certain interestingly named Hosetta Wimpenny - my Northern grtgran?)