The Beardsworth family name

Introduction

A few years back, my younger daughter gave me a present, ‘Dear Dad, from you to me’ , one of those gift shop gifts which are very well intentionedy, but, alas, time is so short that they can often gather dust and never be completed. I decided a while ago that I wouldn’t let this happen, and would aim to complete it for Sophie, Alice and Tom, so whenever they want to, they could find out a bit more about their Dad. So, I have set up a private blog, to which only family have access, and have been posting to it since our summer 2013 holidays. Many of these postings are personal, and best kept private for the family only, but those which are less private will also be posted on my main blog.

I got into the family tree bug some years ago: for a while, it was a passion, an all consuming passion. Having done most of what I could so, I have then only looked at it very occasionally, when the mood takes me. Today was one such day.

Previously, I could only get the Beardsworth name back to Richard, born 1764, Preston. This isn’t bad- it is about a century before the first census (1841). Today, I decided to have a look around, particularly on the female line (tracing females is harder, due to marriage).

Luck favoured me today: I noticed the name Blackhurst repeated itself, and then fitted the jigsaw together by seeing that during at least two generations, a Blackhurst married a Beardsworth: this link meant I could work round gaps in the main Beardsworth line, and hey presto! was able to join them up. Before long I had taken the Beardsworth name back to 1615, James I’s time: Richard, 1615-1680, is our first Beardsworth descendant.

Beardsworth line

Richard 1615-1680, Longton

John 1647-unk

Samuel 1688-1760

Richard 1712-1777

John 1736- unk

Richard 1764-1854

Richard 1806-1881

David 1837-1903

David 1873-1949

John 1902-1975

David 1931-2016

John 1960- and Allan 1962-

Tom 1993-

So, if Tom has a son one day, the bookies’ favourite names are Richard, David or John. Or maybe not.

Penwortham, Longton, Preston

For almost three hundred years, the line was in Penwortham and Longton, districts of Preston. I suspect this is typical of the rural communities. It was my grandfather, John (known as Jack) who briefly left Preston, moving to Wigton, where my father was born, before returning to Preston, which is where he lived when I knew him. [2020 update: not sure this is correct. I instead suspect his wife, my grandmother Alice nee Bragg, moved back to her parents in Wigton to give birth to my father and my aunt, his sister Alice. My grandma had moved to the Preston area to work in domestic service.

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