Genealogy Chat

Five Wills arrived yesterday (well done, Chester Records Office, only 4 days instead of ten). See below for added complications. In a minute.

To recap: My Thomas Green (GP2) married Mary Trafford. I thought he wa the son of William and Ann Green, but his marriage cert said he was the son of John Green.(GP3) Lots of you helped to try and sort this out. Thanks to Kate for the tip-off about six Wills on the Chester RO site, I sent for five and they arrived yesterday.I don't think I am much further forward! The Will of Thomas Green(GP4) who died in 1838 names his five children, one of whom is John Green, and this is the John Green whom I am 99% sure is the father of MY Thomas. No surprises there. Thomas's Will does not name a wife, nor does it give an address in Gawsworth! GRRRR.He left 1/5 shares to each of his five children. PUZZLE: There is absolutely no mention of any Real Estate in his Will. I assumed that this meant he was merely a Tenant Farmer, but the later Will of William Green, a Yeoman, who died in 1878, makes no mention of Real Estate either, and he MUST have been a Landowner to be a Yeoman. I know that for centuries the law of Primogeniture was in force, and that the eldest son automatically inherited any Land and Buildings. Does anyone know when this ceased to be the case? And surely, even if it WAS automatic, it must have been documented somewhere? ANOTHER PUZZLE: An earlier Admon, of Thomas Green, who died Intestate in 1817, gives Probate to 'Thomas Green, his natural and lawful son' What does this phrase mean legally? I always thought a reference to a 'natural son' meant he was illegitimate - how, therefore could he be also lawful? Or is this just legal-speak to describe a child of his marriage? (If he's illegitimate, then I've been barking right up the wrong tree altogether, cos the Thomas I thought he was, was baptised well after the marriage of his parents). Amy Green, bless her, made a lovely Will on her death-bed, thoughtfully naming eight of the ten children I thought were hers, giving me her daughter's married names and several grandchildren';s names too - but she left the bulk of her Estate to her illegitimate grandson, the comically-named Thomas Moreton Green Thumpstone. I would appreciate any thoughts on the above puzzles. Olde Crone

Natural son means related by blood, not adopted and not necessarily illegitimate (I googled) Heather

Thankyou for that, Heather - phew! the family honour remains intact! Olde Crone

Hi Old Crone I get very confused over this point and have to sit in a darkened room to work it out, but I THINK that real estate did not have to be mentioned in wills. You do get manorial records which have copies of wills in them, where people change the natural succession to the uses of their will. What you can do, post 1796, since they presumably are leaving reasonable sums, is look at the death duty registers. The beauty of these is that they show the amount of tax to be stumped up, and this varies, depending on the relationship. (Two females in my family had to pay over the odds, because they were illegitimate!)

Brenda Brenda Thankyou for that information. Sorry about the darkened room, but just imagine how I feel!. All the Wills are after 1817, so I will chase up the Death Duties, without much hope, I have to say, as four of them left Estates valued at less than £200. The fifth, William Green, Yeoman, who died in 1878, left the shortest legal document I have ever seen.His Will is five lines long, gives £25 each to two women 'with whom I now reside' and all the rest to his Grandson. I am wondering if he had disposed of everything before making his Will, in order to avoid Death Duties! Oh, well, onwards and upwards - or backwards and downwards, as the case may be. Olde Crone

Oh, how annoying that is! It reminds me of my g-g-g-grandfather, who had 14 children, and seems to have been pretty well off (employed 22 men), so I was sure his will would list all his descendants who were still alive when he died, and guess what - he didn't leave one at all! Like you, I can only assume that he had managed to give everything away to avoid death duties. It does make it all so much harder to sort out for us, though, doesn't it? Kate.