Along The Pilgrim Trail ~ James Chilton and Canterbury, Kent, England

Along the Pilgrim Trail, #13

St. Paul without the Walls, Canterbury, Kent

Vincent and I recently took the General Society of Mayflower Descendants Historic Sites Tour of England, Wales and The Netherlands along with 41 other enthusiast participants (known as "The 43").  We traced the footsteps of the Separatists and the Mayflower passengers and crew all around these countries with some amazing tour directors, guides, historians and authors.  We were given access to places off the usual tourist trails, and behind the scenes.  We had a wonderful time, and I will be blogging about it over the next few weeks.

It is possible that James Chilton (about 1556 - 1620) was born in Canterbury, Kent, England.   He was made a freeman in 1583 in Canterbury, and was described as a tailor. His eight children were born and baptized here, at the church of St. Paul-without-the-walls, and then removed to Sandwich where he had three more children.  The name of his wife is not on any record. This church gets its curious name because it is outside of the original medieval walled city of Canterbury.

Sometime after 1609, when his wife was charged with a secret burial of a child, they left for Leiden, Holland.  He was recorded in Leiden when he sought the services of a local doctor after being stoned in a religious riot in 1619.  His oldest daughter, Isabella, married Roger Chandler in Leiden on 2 July 1615. Another daughter, Angel, married Robert Nelson in Leiden in 1622, and remarried in Leiden to Daniel Pietersz in 1636, and to Matthijs Tilligem in 1637.  A daughter, Christina, married Joris Abrahamsz in Leiden in 1635, and to Dionys Van Steenstraten in Leiden in 1636.

James, his unknown wife, and their youngest daughter, Mary, went to New England on board the Mayflower.  James and his wife died that first winter in the New World, but his daughter survived.   James Chilton is famous for being the oldest passenger on board the Mayflower, about 64 years old.  Isabella and her husband Roger Chandler came to Plymouth around 1629.

Canterbury Cathedral

While we were in Canterbury with the Mayflower Tour we also visited the famous cathedral. It's gorgeous exterior was under scaffolding, but we enjoyed the church very much. This cathedral was the site of the murder of St. Thomas Becket in 1170, and is now a holy place and the mother church for Anglican community.  It was a place of pilgrimage for many years.

The place where St. Thomas was martyred

Steps worn by centuries of pilgrims

Robert Cushman (1577 - 1625), who grandfathered, many Mayflower descendants, had apprenticeship records near Canterbury Cathedral at the church of St. George the Martyr.  He was apprenticed to a grocer in 1597.  This church was destroyed in World War II by German bombing, but the tower still remains.  It was also where the playwright Christopher Marlowe, and contemporary of William Shakespeare, was baptized.  There was a plaque to Marlowe, but no signage for Cushman here.

Robert Cushman was in Leiden, Holland with the Separatists.  He spent much time preparing the group for their colony in the New World, and was a purchasing agent for the Virginia Company. He wrote a book "Cry of a Stone" in 1619, which was published in 1642, an account of the Separtist's years in Leiden.  He came to New England in 1621 on board the Fortune, with his son Thomas Cushman, who married Mary Allerton in Plymouth in 1636.

St. George The Martyr church tower
home church of Robert Cushman

CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE
Dramatist
BAPTISED IN THIS CHURCH
26TH FEBRUARY 1564
DIED AT DEPTFORD
30TH MAY 1598

Part 1 of this series "Babworth, Nottinghamshire":

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-babworth.html  

Part 2 of this series “Scrooby Manor, Nottinghamshire”:

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-scrooby-manor.html  


Part 3 of this series "Gainsborough, Lincolnshire"
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-gainsborough.html  

Part 4 of this series "Harwich, Essex, home of the Mayflower"
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-harwich-essex.html   

Part 5 this series "Upper Clatford, Hampshire"

https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-stephen-hopkins-of.html

Part 6 of this series "William Mullins of Dorking, Surrey":
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-william-mullins-of.html

Part 7 of this series "Edward Winslow of Droitwich, Worcestershire":
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-droitwich.html

Part 8 of this series "The Fullers of Reddenhall, Norfolk":
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/10/along-pilgrim-trail-fullers-of.html

Part 9 of this series "John Howland of Fenstanton, Cambridgeshire":
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/11/along-pilgrim-trail-john-howland-of.html

Part 10 of this series "Tilley and Sampson of Henlow, Bedfordshire":
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/11/along-pilgrim-trail-tilley-and-samson.html

Part 11 of this series "William Bradford of Austerfield, Yorkshire":
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/11/along-pilgrim-trail-william-bradford.html 

Part 12 of this series "Francis Eaton of Bristol":
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/11/along-pilgrim-trail-francis-eaton-of.html 

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Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Along the Pilgrim Trail ~ James Chilton and Canterbury, Kent, England", Nutfield Genealogy, posted November 14, 2017, (  https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/11/along-pilgrim-trail-james-chilton-and.html: accessed [access date]).

Weathervane Wednesday ~ The first time I've seen THIS animal on a weathervane!

Weathervane Wednesday is an on-going series of photographs I post weekly.  I started out by publishing only weather vanes from the Londonderry area, but now I've been finding interesting weather vanes from all over New England.  Sometimes these weather vanes are whimsical, or historical, but all are very unique.  Often, my readers tip me off to some very special and unusual weather vanes.

Today's weather vane is from somewhere in New Hampshire.

Do you know the location of weather vane #320?  Scroll down to see the answer...

This unique alpaca weathervane can be seen atop the Someday Farm's barn in Canterbury, New Hampshire. We were here during the May 2017 New Hampshire Open Doors tour, when businesses and artisans all over the Granite State hold open houses for touring and shopping.  There are NH Open Doors tours every fall and spring. 

It was fun to tour this alpaca farm, to see the newborn alpacas and to feel the super soft yarns and knitted items made from this yarn.  The owner of the farm said she remembered the day her custom weathervane and cupola were raised by crane over her new barn.  I told her I had never seen an alpaca weathervane.  Have you?   

Some Day Alpaca Farm website http://www.somedayfarm.com/

New Hampshire Open Doors https://nhopendoors.com/


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Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Weathervane Wednesday ~ The first time I've seen THIS animal on a weathervane!", Nutfield Genealogy, posted July 19, 2017, (http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2017/07/weathervane-wednesday-first-time-ive.html: accessed [access date]).

A Visit to the Canterbury Shaker Village

Welcome to the Canterbury Shaker Village in Canterbury, New Hampshire

The Shakers were known for their pacifist, celibate religion,
and also for their simple, rural lifestyle

This is the schoolhouse of the Canterbury Shaker community.
The Shakers took in orphans, hoping some would stay
to expand their community population.

The outhouse of the orphanage

The schoolhouse interior

Besides farming, the Shaker community had many industries such as
furniture and box making, seed catalogs, medicines and syrups, home made brooms, etc.
This is the bee house

This is the interior of the syrup house (not maple syrup, but medicinal syrups)

The workshop for canning syrups and other food products

Shaker boxes are still made here, and locally, and sold in the gift shop

The Shakers invented the flat broom, and there were many steps involved
in the manufacture of these brooms.  They were so popular that they sold extra brooms
for additional income.  You can still buy these brooms in the gift shop. 

A demonstration of flat broom making, and the machinery that the
Shakers developed to make these brooms is still in use.

Beautiful Shaker chairs for sale in the gift shop

The Canterbury Shaker Village website  http://www.shakers.org/

Yes, I had Shakers in my family tree!  Click here to read a blog post from last Tuesday that lists the Shakers I found in my family tree, and how you can see if there are any Shakers in your family.  http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2015/06/tombstone-tuesday-shaker-cemetery.html"

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Published under a Creative Commons License
Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "A Visit to the Canterbury Shaker Village", Nutfield Genealogy, posted June 19, 2015 ( http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2015/06/a-visit-to-canterbury-shaker-village.html : accessed [access date]).