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Kate,

Can we help? These are my wife's ancestors and I have further ancestry for them.

John Milner Stubbs

I don't want to overload this thread with my personal posts, and this is not a recent discovery, but I have had passed down to me a soldier's rolled leather pack that belonged to my 8 x gt grandfather who fought in the English Civil War with Cromwell's Parliamentary Army in the 1640's and 50's.

The leather roll contained a razor and a whetting stone for sharpening his razor, knife and sword. This was important as they cut their hair short and were clean shaven, and so became known as Roundheads, as distinct from the King's forces who favoured the aristocratic flowing locks and goatee beards of the Cavaliers.

We also found that on my father's side of the family they had been "Greaves" (sort of gamekeepers) of Knaresborough Forest in the 1200's, 1300's and 1400's, which in those days linked with the Great South Yorkshire Forest and Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire.

We now know that the Robin Hood legends were based in Yorkshire, not Nottingham. It was his enemy the Sheriff who was based there. Little John came from near Huddersfield; Robin probably did his poaching around Brighouse.

So did my ancestors spend their time chasing around after the likes of of Errol Flynn and Kevin Costner?

Cooksons in Cheshire

We have Cookson ancestors who lived in the areas of Great Barrow, Tarvin, Tarporley, Clotton, Utkinton, Little Budworth, Sandbach, Winsford and Cuddington - probably many more too.

Most of them were millers and farmers, and one of them - James Cookson - was very wealthy. He lived at Utkinton Lodge but owned Hockenhull Hall, Holmestreet Hall, Park Hall and Woodford Hall near Winsford. When he died in 1877 he left money to build the church at Cotebrook.

Anybody out there got any connections or Cookson ancestry?

Cheers,
John

Our Swaledale Milner ancestors were always having the "n" dropped, especially in the census returns although BDM entries usually got it right. The usual mistaken entry was Miller or even Millar throughout the 19thC. My uncle William Milner was known throughout his life as Billy Miller no matter how much he protested and some of my cousins are now Millers even though they were descended from Milners.

The thing is that Milner was the usual Swaledale surname derived from the Viking word for a corn miller. If you look on the surname distribution maps the majority of Milners are from the Dales. At one time the Milners were one of the 12 big Swaledale clans but they nearly all left when the leadmining slumped.

Cheers,
John Milner Stubbs