Thanks to Ancestry.com and its free weekend of New England records, I came up with a few new names to add to the Carter line. The one that caught my eye was Thanklorde "Thankful" Perkins, my 8th great grandmother.
She was born 20 Jun 1612 in Stepney, Greater London, England and died in 1681 in Malden, Middlesex, Massachusetts. Here's a story I found about her: Posted by: Vickie Elam White, Date: May 12, 1999 at 06:41:55 The woman who married Ralph SHEPARD in St. Bride's Church, London, was Thank-the-Lord PERKINS, not Thank-ye LORD (the letter often mistaken for a y was actually a combination letter called a thorn, it stood for th). Their 21 May 1633 marriage record, complete with copies of their signatures, appear in a book by John Brooks Threlfall called Twenty-Six Great American Colonists To New England & Their Origins. This matter has been discussed in other genealogical publications as well, although I don't have the citations handy right now. She was consistently referred to as Thanklord or Thankslord SHEPARD in Massachusetts records. "Lord" was part of her given name. It was very common for staunch Puritans of that time to name their children thusly. Other names of that time were Hate-evil, Fearnot, Be-courteous, Fight-the-good-fight, and even Fly-fornication! Boy, am I glad naming customs have changed! :-) Anyway, even if the marriage record hadn't been found, it is evident that she was not a LORD. Thank-the-Lord's name doesn't fit the naming pattern in the LORD family, which didn't use Puritan names. She isn't mentioned in the will of Dorothy (BIRD) LORD, nor are any SHEPARD grandchildren mentioned, despite the fact that this will is very detailed and carefully written and did include other grandchildren. And there was no known association between the LORD family of CT and the SHEPARD family of MA, despite the fact that the LORD family, from all appearances, was very close-knit. Thank-the-Lord was born ca 1612, yet there is no room for her among the children of Thomas and Dorothy (BIRD) LORD, who were married in February 1611 and had children born/baptized in January 1612, September 1614, and November 1616 (among others). The parish registers for Towcester, Northamptonshire (where the LORDs lived), includes the baptisms for the other LORD children but nothing for a child with a name even remotely resembling Thank-the-Lord. And the registers are complete, not missing entries in this timeframe. Even if the 1612 date for Thank-the-Lord is off a bit, it doesn't fit. Anyway, her name was PERKINS on her marriage record. This was probably her maiden name, although I suppose it could be said that she may have been a widow. The jury is still out on that. But you can safely say that she was not Thank-the LORD.
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