Just a handful of Ginns have turned up in my English research pre 1800 who had connections with, or allegedly sailed to, the American colonies or the West Indies. Most of them seem to have disappeared when they got there. Only two of them have a mention in American records on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean - and the only one of those who actually went (the other just held land in Maryland) is the strangely named Tralucia Ginn the Quaker, who seems to be quite well known .
A year or two back I gave my research to a correspondent and fellow researcher, Esther O'dell (nee Ginn) in the States, who has put the gist of this on Family Search, but it is probably best that I also tell this story here with all the documentation.
Years ago now, likely in the 1990s I extracted the wills and administration records of the Ginn or Gynn family of Swavesey in Cambridgeshire, England. These go back to the reign of Elizabeth the 1st, the late 1500s, when Shakespeare was still producing his plays.
I found a Thomas and a William Ginn, worked out the story of Thomas and could not trace anybody forward from him save one daughter. Also years ago, I extracted the will of a William Ginn in Cambridgeshire who I knew was a Quaker. About six years ago I made two astonishing discoveries - one linked Tralucia Ginn to this later William - a man I affectionately call "The Quaker Baker", and one that linked him to Shakespearian Swavesey.
The Swavesey registers do not survive for much before 1600 - but there was clearly a William Ginn the elder who died in 1617 and had two sons, William jnr and Thomas. Who these are, as yet I have no idea but have not ruled out a link to Hertfordshire given how far that family were roaming by the 1500s and the fact that they were in Huntingdon by the 1560s.
William jnr married a Dorothy and had two daughters (Elizabeth 1611 and Joan 1613) before dying prematurely in 1616 leaving Letters of Administration below (Cambridgeshire Archives) with Dorothy remarrying a Richard Blunt in 1621.
So it is Thomas that we are concerned with here.
Thomas Ginn was a Husbandman, ie a smallholding farmer who married twice. His first spouse was an Eleanor, their marriage predates the surviving registers and I know nothing about her - save that she and Tom had a son William in 1612 who died and a daughter Mary in 1615. Eleanor sadly died in 1618. Tom then remarried Unica Gyfford (a form of Eunice and meaning "unique") at Swavesey in 1620.
It is from these small beginnings of Thomas Ginn marrying Unica Gifford that all this springs.
You see Thomas and Unica had three children: Unica 1621, Joshua 1626 and William 1629. With Mary, their half sister - there were four children sitting around the dining table in the Hall.
original (signed) will of Thomas Ginn 1633 (Cambs. Archives)
Thomas Ginn would have had a hard life. As a Husbandman rather than a Yeoman he would not have had the wherewithal to pay for labourers to assist him, but would have worked his own few acres and likely hired himself out as a day labourer to others. With a life of unremitting grind he could feed his family and put enough aside to leave his children a few pounds to give them a start in life.
Thomas Ginn died in 1633 - he was probably about 45. He left a will , the original of which survives (above - Cambridgeshire Archives). Thomas left his land and £60 to his eldest son Joshua, £20 each to daughters Unica and Mary and son William. His widow was required to sell his house and lands when the children came of age.
Unica his widow died in 1641. She also left a will, the probate copy of which is in part above (Cambs Archives).
Unica was a religious lady - her children were not yet of age and she wanted them to become responsible, godly adults. So she left money to all of her children, and a chest and ten shillings "to buy a bible with" to each of the boys. William received the chest that his father had had.
Thomas and Eleanor had one surviving child and Tom and Unica three, namely
Mary - she married John Charlton at Fen Drayton in 1640
Unica - married John Crosby (of Oakington) at Cambridge St Edward in 1642. There is a surviving Marriage Licence at Cambridge Archives. They had a fair number of children before Unica died in 1655 in her 30s
Joshua - never married. On one remarkable day at the Cambridge Archives some years ago I linked three generations of this family together and Joshua appeared as if my magic ! He went to Cambridge with his brother, indeed my suspicion is he lived with William and family. We do not know his occupation but I suspect he worked with his bro. You will recall that he was the eldest son - he had the lands in Swavesey which he had apparently kept and he died prematurely in Cambridge in 1665, it could have been plague which was rife at the time, we are not told. He was 39. His original will with his signature is below (Cambs Archives).
Joshua Ginn left his lands in Swavesey to his brother and made small bequests to the family of his half sister Mary and to William's daughter Elizabeth. Indeed, exceptionally, William and his then wife Margaret are noted in his burial entry.
William - the Quaker Baker - see next post
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