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Dale Burton 19
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Date: 12/01/2004

I have been looking at your website and its very impressive.

My ggg (i think thats enough g's) grandmother was an Elizabeth Custance born
about 1802 in Sutton in the Isle of Ely, Cambs. I can see no immediate connection with anything you have here but I am willing to give you all the info I have if you can make use of it on your site.

Btw, I am from Melbourne Australia.

Regards
Dale Burton

Mark Custance 18
Location: Taiwan
Date: 12/01/2004

First of all I'd like to say well done for an excellent website.

I'm afraid my knowledge of my grandfather is very sketchy. Unfortunately he died before I was born. I think his name was Wilfred. I know he was born in London in the 1880s and served in the navy before and after the first world war. I know he died in the 1950s. My parents are no longer here so information is a little difficult to come by. However, I'm very interested in our genealogy and will do my best to dig up more facts if I can. I will scan some photos and send them to you presently.

Please do put my details on your Contacts page.

I married in Taiwan 12 years ago and have lived here on and off since.

Once again thanks for a great website

Beat wishes
Mark

Gillian Brown 17
Location: London
Date: 02/06/1999

Here as promised are some photocopies of my branch of the Custance tree - in fact there is not very much, because I forgot to bring the right file with me to work, but I hope it's still of some interest.

In the hand-written family tree, you will see Marjorie Wilson Brett written in red at the lower right. She was my Granny. She married Harold Hickman, and had one daughter, my Mum, Jeanette Custance Hickman. She married Neville Howarth, and had 2 children, my brother Richard and me - my full name is Gillian Custance Brown, nee Howarth. So you can see that the Custance bit has come down the female line
from Emily Custance , my great Grandmother! My daughter Ann (born 1988) is Ann Custance Brown.

I always tell her that there may be a few Ann Browns knocking around the place, but only one Ann Custance Brown, and its nice to have a name to hand down the distaff side!

The print-outs are from Family Tree Maker, and. I wrote them some time ago, really for my own interest and as an extra to the main bit of Family Tree Maker - so there may be a few obscure references.

I have some information on the career of Henry Custance the jockey (1842-1908), which I can send you later. He won the Derby and was a very successful jockey. We have a copy of his book "Turfing Recollections". Obviously, if he had been riding today, he would have made a fortune, but as it was, he made enough to buy a pub (the George Hotel in Oakham) and he became a racing official, and sometimes was described as a farmer, so he may have owned land as well. He married and had a family as you can see from the Tree, but his second son George Custance 1872-1896 ended up in the Rutland Lunatic Asylum, where he died at the age of only 24 - I don't know what kind of mental illness he was suffering from, the death certificate has only TB as the cause of death.

George Custance 1839-1916 had a career with the Post Office, as you can see from the notes. He worked at Mount Pleasant Post Office (Islington) for a large part of the time. His 2 daughters were both on the stage, Emily the elder was my great-grandmother, and the younger was Ernestine, always called ""Nessie""by the family.
Nessie had a varied career, and married at 17. On the certificate she declared herself to be 26 years of age!
The marriage sadly did not last, and she married secondly a musical comedy actor called Dobbell Lyle "Dobbs", who was called up for war service in World War I, caught pneumonia at Aldershot whilst on training manoevres, and died. For Samuel Custance's ancestors, I have fewer personal details, but I will send you the stuff I have. Samuel was one of a very large family, his parents were Henry Custance and Mary Morden. Henry was an AgLab, he died of a heart attack when he was in his local pub....

Ernest Walker 16
Location: Dorset
Date: 24/07/1999

My ex-daughter-in-law Marie Walker of New Zealand has passed on to me and my wife your vast quantity of literature relating to the Custance Family. We find it all most interesting, adding to quite a number of facts previously known to us; our information referred more to George Custance and to Charles, who as far as we are aware emigrated to Canada, and with whose descendants in Toronto we still communicate.

One thing which the Canadian cousins told us about and which we have not found mentioned anywhere else was that Charles Custance discovered a coat of arms including an upturned glass presumably wine. Have you heard anything about this?
I wish I had more details on Charles; I presume he is the one listed as having been born in 1834?
I am writing because as you will understand, Marie is not in the direct line, nor in fact a member of the family now, but she spends 6 months each year-in U.K. working as a carer to earn a living.

She also visits her own relatives in Scotland, and has made great strides in Genealogy as a hobby. She visits us each year. My wife and our three sons are Custance descendants;
in fact, our youngest son bears the name Richard Custance Walker. My wife's mother was Florence Annie Custance, one of six sisters and a brother, issue of Joseph Ibott Custance sub-postmaster at Finchley after having been a carpenter in Islington. This branch seems to have been connected with the villages of Stagsden and Pavenham-we have an old photo/p.c. of the latter showing the Cock Inn. I have been told that Pavenham is almost absorbed into Milton Keynes; I would have liked to have made a trip to that area, but we don't motor far afield these days.

I wrote up both of my parents' family trees in 1938 and revised them in 1982, dealing with the Custance side in the Fifties when one cousin from Canada came over to visit Florence Annie above)-my ma-in-law. I have found your facts and photos quite exciting, and I shall be passing much of the info to my son who bears the name.

Janet Weeks 15
Location: London
Date: 25/10/1999

Many thanks for your letters. I'm planning another visit to my friends in Lancashire soon and maybe I'll have a chance to look at your web page.
I have continued, on and off, with my trawl through Norfolk parish records in search of our ancestors, but not with any success. Most recently, I went through the two parishes of Longstanton. Nothing. Then I tried Bodham. The records there are from 1672 but with a lot of years missing. I found Adam and Susanna Custance who, in 1705 had a daughter, Anne, but she died in the same year. In 1711, they had another daughter, Abi...(maybe Abigail), who was born in March and baptised on 15 April. Then the records dumped to 1729.

My mother didn't know the answer to one of my questions: how did her mother in Huntingdon meet her father, a farmer in Sussex? I have discovered a possible answer. Cornelius Custance lived in Kennington close to Thomas Tobitt, a carpenter and my grandfather's uncle. I think it's possible Francis and Eveline met when visiting their respective relatives. I went to have a look at the two addresses in Kennington but Thomas' street has disappeared and little remains of Cornelius' road. The area was bombed extensively during the war and there are now large blocks of council flats obliterating the former roads.

While I was at the Lambeth archives library I had a hunt for the birthplace of Elizabeth Drabwell but found nothing.
You've done well with the descendants of James and Elizabeth Custance. Congratulations. I looked up Custance in my 1994 residential phone directory (the last all-London one before BP broke it up into areas). There were 9 Custances + Custance Baker or Baker Custance, but no S.E. and none in the Islington or St Pancras areas.

Good hunting - and best wishes.

Steve Custons 14
Location: Victoria, Australia
Date: 25/10/2000

Hi Graham - remember me. I came to see you some time ago now. I found your excellent site by accident. I must say I am impressed. Did you design it yourself.
You may remember that I was stuck on a John Custance who was Born around 1775. I know not where. He married in Westwell, Kent to Christiana Fitt and died in Willesborough Workhouse in Ashford, Kent. One possibility is that he was born in the Somersham area of Cambridgeshire. Have you any thoughts on where I might look for his birth?
I have tried settlement certificates for Kent but I have had no joy.

Speak to you soon.
Steve Custons

John & Jacky Custance 13
Location: Cardiff, Wales
Date: 24/05/2001

We have just signed your guestbook. It seems that you are doing great things in the field of Custance genealogy.
I thought that you might like to know some of my detail:

John Custance born 1788 - died 14/3/1832 Gardener, Denston Suffolk
William Mark Custance born 19/01/1817 - died 22/11/1897) Tailor, Ely
John Edward Custance born 29/9/1841 - died 1905 Tailor Ely/Ampthill/Bedford
Harry Custance born 1880 died - 1914 Tailor, Peterborough
Harry Vernon Custance born 16/03/1942 died - 19/08/1968 (father) Town Clerk
John Vernon Custance (me)
Jonathan Edward Vernon Custance (son)

We really have been on a back burner for some years now. We are stuck at Denston, if you get what I mean

Norman Custance 12
Location: St.Albans, England
Date: 06/12/2001

Hi Mike
I have had your request for information passed on to me by my cousin Graham. I have not as yet sorted out the Custance's in Kingstone, Bourne, Chesterton etc. so any information is welcome. Obadiah, married in 1902 and died age 72 in 1940. His children, Zillah b 1908 and Lucy b 1910. I have copied some extracts from the 1881 census, some of which varies with your Email to Graham. Also some other info you may find interesting.

Dwelling: The Green
Census Place: Kingston, Cambridge, England
Source: FHL Film 1341395 PRO Ref RGI 1 Piece 1656 Folio 8 Page 10

Charles CUSTANCE Male 74 Married. Born Kingston, Cambridge, England
Rel: Head. Occupation: Farm Servant
Sarah CUSTANCE Female 65 Married. Born Foxton, Cambridge, England
Rel: Wife
Thomas CUSTANCE Male 28 Single. Born Kingston, Cambridge, England
Rel: Son. Ocupation: Farm Servant
Obadiah CUSTANCE Male 13 Single. Born Kingston, Cambridge, England
Rel: Grandson. Occupation: Farm Servant
William CUSTANCE Male 6 Single. Born Kingston, Cambridge, England
Rel: Grandson. Occupation: Scholar

Dwelling: Field Road
Census Place: Kingston, Cambridge, England
Source: FHL Film 1341395 PRO Ref RG11 Piece 1656 Folio 9 Page 12

Charles CUSTANCE Male 34 Married. Born Kingston, Cambridge, England
Rel: Head. Occupation: Rag & Bone Collector
Harriett CUSTANCE Female 35 Married. Born Knapwell, Cambridge, England
Rel: Wife

Extract from the Kingston Parish Records.
April 6 1828 David Custance, son of James Kidman of Caxton, labourer, and Nanny Custance of Kingston, servant. (He married Elizabeth Halliam in Godmanchester in 1860 and I think he worked in my Great Grandfather's bakery shop in Huntingdon 1880/90).

Nov 29 1832 Charles Custance* m Sarah Thurley
Witnesses... William Cato, Mary Thurley & Thomas Custance.

Baptisms
19 Jan 1834 Louisa, daughter of Charles & Sarah Custance
24 July 1836 William, son of Charles & Sarah Custance
14 Nov 1839 Rebecca, daughter of Charles & Sarah Custance
22 Oct 1843 Joseph, son of Charles & Sarah Custance
17 May 1846 Charles, son of Charles & Sarah Custance
8 April 1849 Elizabeth, daughter of Charles & Sarah Custance
24 Oct 1852 Thomas, son of Charles & Sarah Custance

End of records.

*Note. As Charles witnessed marriages in Kingston he may have been the Parish Clerk. He died aged 79 in 1886.

Miscellaneous Kingston recordings.
Burials:
James Custance 1813, 7 weeks
Rebecca Custance 1823, 5 years
Rose Custance 1832, 57 years

Baptisms:
Ann Custance 1805
Rose Custance 1812
Elizabeth Custance 1821
David Custance 1828
William Custance 1836

Mike Loker 11
Location: England
Date: 03/12/2001

I have been searchinq your family website but could not make any connections although the area of Cambridge is correct and I found the 1881 census entry but that is all.

Hear is what I have perhaps you could assist.

Charles Custance born 1807 Kingstone, Cambridge an agricultural laborour, married Sarah Loker born 1815 Foxton Cambridge

Children:
Thomas Custance born 1858
also possibly granchildren from a son already left home ?
Obadiah born 1868 Kingstone Cambridge
William born 1878 Kingstone Cambridge

Thanks for your assistance
Regards
Mike Loker

The Custance Website

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