Bridget Hewitt

As always, dancing with the ancestors is an intricate dance with many varied steps. One misstep and . . . SPLAT, you're on the floor. This is something you should always remember when doing your own dancing with your ancestors. 

Here's what I initially knew about 11 x Great Grammy Bridget Hewett. She married Henry Clitherow. This has been documented time over time. They had a number of children, one of whom was my 10 x Great Grandmother Anne Cletherow. 

I hadn't bothered to look past 11 x Great Grammy regarding her parents. I decided to do so today. The Ancestry trees - always suspect, please always verify through other sources what you find on Ancestry - indicated she was the daughter of William Hewett and his wife Alice Elizabeth Leveson. 

Great! I have a starting point. A bit of Googling - Google is your friend - later and here's what I found out about William and Alice (Leveson) Hewitt: they had a number of children, all who died in infancy except their daughter Anne.

Have you figured out the issue? 

Well, in case you haven't, I'll point it out: William and Alice had a single child to survive in adulthood, and her name was not Bridget. In fact, their daughter's marriage to Edward Osborne is well documented.

So, I did a bit more research and found out that William Hewett indicates he had a brother Thomas. Well, a bit more Googling and I had the last will and testament of Thomas Hewett which lists his many bequests, one of which was to Henry Clyderow (a variant of Cletherow). The next bequest, right after the one to Henry, was to Thomas's daughter "Bridget Hewett". 

AH-HA!!!!

So, suddenly, with a wee bit of work on my part, I was able to disprove that Bridget was the daughter of William and Alice Elizabeth (Leveson) Hewett, and prove that she was the daughter of Thomas Hewett and Julian Amcots, daughter of Sir William Amcots.

So, when dancing with the ancestors, take just a bit more time to double check your facts and do some additional research. And, whatever you do, never take Ancestry trees at face value. There is far too much information out there that's easily obtainable with a few quick searches on Google or some other search engine.