An amazing coincidence!

[miss marple]

I just had to share this strange coincidence with Rootschatters.

I have been passing on all the info about our joint family to my cousin, who of course has become hooked as well, and has asked me to research her family on her mother's side (we are related through our fathers, so her mother's family has no connection at all with mine).

Yesterday I was checking out the marriage of her maternal great, great, great aunt in 1848 on Free BMD. I clicked on the page button to check potential husbands, and thought my computer had gone mad – it brought up the page I had been looking at last week, when checking the marriage of my (and my cousins's) g. g. g. uncle on my father's side. When I looked more closely I found to my astonishment that my cousin's g. g. g. aunt was ON THE SAME PAGE! (They were marrying different people, I hasten to add.)

So among the eight names on the same page of the register were the marriages of two of my cousin's ancestors from totally separate sides of her family, who were not to be linked until 84 years later, when her father married her mother.

I thought that was pretty weird!

Jane

[Headbanger Veron]

That's amazing Jane, two for the price of one!!

Veron 

[jimmyv]

I haven't been researching long but love this site for providing the means to hear other folk's stories like yours.  When I first started searching the web looking for clues to ancestors I lloke for my Grandfather and grandmother. I knew quite a lot about them and was able to put in bot their names and their marriage date.  I got a return on a couple with exactly the same names as them and the other man died in the same year as my grandfather.  Now the names are quite unusual, James Storm Veale and Frances Annette Erswell. Both James died in 1929.  The only thing is this other couple were from Ontario in Canada, or at least the man died there, and my grandparents ended their days in Berwick on Tweed.  Its difficult to accept the evidence sometimes, don't you think.  Anyway nowhere near as big a coincidence as yours but thought I would share it.

[miss marple]

Good grief, Jimmyv – I think that's just as big a coincidence as mine! As you say, some of the things you unearth while relative hunting stretch your credibility to the limit. And your story just goes to show how easy it would be to end up following a completely wrong trail – as I've no doubt very many of us have, without knowing it.

Jane

[MarieC]

It's amazing when you find something like this!

I was following up branches of my paternal grandmother's family in England - just going broad, seeing where everybody got to.

I came to one William Lockwood Watson, a mast and block maker in the East End of London, who would have been a cousin of Granny's grandmother.  I thought - William Watson, William Watson - where have I seen that name?  Inspiration finally struck, and I looked up the apprenticeship paper of my maternal great-grandfather, who was apprenticed as a mast and block maker in the East End of London to - William Watson!  Here is another example of a connection, well before there was an actual family connection (when my parents married)!!!

Gave me a spooky feeling, it did!

MarieC

[Sylviaann]

I have found ancestors in a census living in the same street.  Their descendants married about 50 years later.  Perhaps their grandparents knew one another.

Sylviaann

[CarolBurns]

My Dad's Great Grandad, William Thomas and my Mum's Great Great Grandad Robert Griffith lived in the same village at the same time. Some of each family are buried in the same churchyard as well. They probably knew each other better than we realise as William was the local Blacksmith and Robert worked on the farms.

The other big coincidence is on my Dad's side:

His mother was Mary Elma Williams daughter of Catherine Thomas. Catherine's father was William Thomas the Blacksmith

His Father was Hughie Gordon Thomas, son of William Richard Thomas. William Richard was the son of William Thomas.

Both William Thomas's were born around the same time in the same area of Anglesey. Both their fathers were Thomas Ap William

Carol

[SallyF]

I've just found out that some of my ancestors lived in the same town as I live now.  I checked the census, to find..... they lived on my street !! 

I just need the house number now, I'm just not sure I dare go looking for it!!

Sally

[miss marple]

Did you feel mysteriously drawn to your house when you bought it, Sally?! Wouldn't it be amazing to find you were unknowingly living in the same house as your forebears – or perhaps (if your house is more modern) on the same site as their home?

It seems there are all sorts of uncanny coincidences among Rootschatters. I rather thought there might be!

Jane