Digging up further info on Northamptonshire ancestors

 

                                                            Weldon Independent churchyard, Northamptonshire

After the webinar about weather brought Charles Pratt Chambers to mind last week, I entered him on my Ancestry family tree. Then I went looking for any documentation I already had. I dug deep into this family in the past. I even included them in a report that I wrote on the Strange/Chambers family from information I had found. 

I was able to take my Strange family back quite far because the Reverend Thomas Strange (1723-1784) was a well-known nonconformist minister with links to other nonconformists in England and there was a lot written about him. My research into this family was also helped along in the early internet days through RootsWeb which brought together various Strange researchers. I didn't get nearly as far with the Chambers family line.

Because both the Stranges and Chambers in my family appeared to be concentrated in Northamptonshire, I explored the county and its documented sources in person at one point. The Chambers were also nonconformists, unsurprising when considering the location and family connections. At one point they lived in the village of Weldon but had they been in that location for generations or had they come from elsewhere? This looks like a good time to review the information I've been able to dig up so far and then see if I can get any further back. I'll be sure to add more people to my Ancestry tree for this family line as I go along. Now to interpret the report that I left for myself on the Chambers family. It starts by citing a 1786 will for Joseph Chambers. Looks like one of my first steps should be finding that will among my documents. 

Inspiration from a Highland Historical lecture

 

                                                                            Fields on Islay in modern times

Some of my ancestors came from islands on the west of Scotland, Islay and Skye and maybe some others too, if I ever find a link. That's why I'm interested in many of the lectures put on by Highland Historical Research – see lectures@highlandhistoricalresearch.com if you're interested in what's on offer. Most recently the lecture was Climate Change in the Highlands 1810-20. These were years of cold and rain (snow in August was mentioned), a hard and deadly time in an agrarian society. The years before and many decades after weren't the best for farmers either.

I wanted to watch because my people in the area would have been greatly affected and perhaps that's why they eventually left and went to Canada. Strangely, as the lecturer presented her subject, my Skye and Islay ancestors didn't come to my mind first although they came from the area. My first thought was of the older brother of my great grandfather William Strange Chambers. Charles Pratt Chambers (the Pratt middle name was probably a surname from an ancestor much like William's Strange middle name) was interested in the weather. I have copies of some of his lectures about weather phenomena.

So I had to check Charles Pratt Chambers' dates but I didn't have him on my Ancestry tree. Turns out that Charles wasn't born until 1852 which was not in the time directly affected by miserable weather but the climate change did affect the land for long after the period highlighted in the talk.

So it was a presentation that left me wanting to see how the challenging weather had affected my families on Skye and Islay. I know that some of them at least, worked the land and scarcity of food and the resultant depressed economy would have been hard on others in the community as well. That was a natural result expected from the topic of the talk. But the fact that I now want to update the Chambers part of my family tree because it invoked the memory of my grand great uncle's weather interest was an added bonus. You never know what historical talks might inspire.

Sources:

Society of Highland and Island Historical Research   https://www.highlandhistoricalresearch.com Lecture 34: Climate Change in the Highlands 1810-20 by Karen Dean (unpublished thesis)

Finding family history through place

 

                                     

                                     The Congregational Church at Kilsby where Rev Thomas Strange and family lived                                                                                 one of my Greater London to Southern East Midlands family connections

So far I've only attended two of the RootsTech sessions for 2026. The first was a session on how to use the FamilySearch Research Wiki. In this session the viewers/attendees were advised not to search by name, a common default among genealogical researchers, the wiki gives information about place or locality. So an idea of the area where the family being searched for lived or came from is needed when seeking information from FamilySearch's very informative wiki.

The second session I attended was Diahan Southard's initial DNA presentation. She advised us that knowledge of place and time was key in finding information about ancestors who passed on their DNA to us. So place also matters when building our family trees to make sense of our DNA matches. The various DNA testing companies have different tools to point us in the direction of what places our DNA is related to. At Ancestry they are called ancestral journeys. She also showed us how to toggle through the timeline of these journeys as the migration patterns change over time.

Immediately after the session, I checked out the journeys on my Ancestry account. They can be found under DNA in the Origins section. I now have 3 ancestral journeys which make less sense to me than the original communities or whatever they were called in previous DNA updates. I used to have one that included Ontario which fit in well with the known whereabouts of a branch of my family. Now I have Virginia & Eastern Kentucky Settlers which is no help with my family lines that I can see, Greater London to Southern East Midlands which contrary to expectations is on my maternal side (my Dad's family lived in London for generations) and Eastern Australia which is on my paternal side although the family line which I've traced to NSW is on my maternal side.

The Greater London to Southern East Midlands made sense when I looking into it further as it included Northamptonshire and various people from my family tree were also included although not all of them were from the maternal side of my family tree. The timeline for the Eastern Australia journey only had one entry, no change from date to date. It does remind me that I should track down the family connections on my father's side to see who ended up there. The ancestral journey that still baffles me is the one for Virginia & Eastern Kentucky Settlers but I'm encouraged by Ancestry to keep adding to my family tree and, if I enter a relevant family connection on my own family tree, they will show up in the information for that ancestral journey. Maybe it's time to add more connections to the part of my family tree that could possibly be relevant.