Day 2 - Wickhambreaux

This morning I awoke early to be sure to get down for breakfast at the requisite 8am - 9am timeslot. Bacon, yoghurt, cereal and toast with vegemite (provided by myself). Chatted a bit with two ladies from Germany and headed back to my room to find all my belongings moved to another room. Now it's nice of them to move my stuff but really - tell me or DON'T TOUCH MY STUFF. A quick scrab with the Quopmaster Belinda to calm down in my new pale pink room (same floral lowlights).

Today's mission was Wickhambreaux . Whilst not a definite origin of Keith Morris's mother, Jessie Theresa Thomas' Father Percy Thomas (that's your Great, great, great Grandfather Kate, Daniel and William) - it was in the vicinity so worth checking out. It is a small village around 5 miles from Canterbury.


There's a bus service there - three a day there and two back. The three there are in the afternoon and the two back in the morning. I presume this is so the villagers can make it into Canterbury to shop and return home after they have done so. So I took the 1pm bus with a view to perhaps walking the 5 miles back or catching a cab. On the bus you got the first sense of village life - there was lots of lively chatter on the short journey.

I jumped off the bus and as soon as a did a kindly gent asked me what I was looking for "Just taking a look generally" I answered. I headed for the most obvious landmark the church - built in the 14th Century.

The whole town is full or remarkably beautiful old houses lovingly restored. It was first mentioned in the Doomsday book so there are buildings from many different centuries.

The village green stands in the middle of the town - adjacent to it the church and the old mill. It has been declared an historic village so that no further development of the area can ruin its charm.

Fields stretch around the area which is a rich farming area. In the late 1800s cherries, apples, wheat would be among the items farmed in the area.

The pub, The Rose Inn, is the main social meeting place - as I walked in the room got quiet and everyone looked. I sat at the bar and next to me was the man who first asked me what I was after when I got off the bus - he said hello and we got talking and I told him about my journey. He introduced me to Terence who knew a fair bit about the history of the place. They suggested I take a look at the headstones in the graveyard and if I was to come back they could arrange to view the records book in the church which stretches back hundreds of years. There was no obvious gravestones there with either name of Thomas or Atkinson, unfortunately.

I went back to the pub and chatted to the lads for a while longer and Terence grabbed me a copy of his book Blinky The Frog - which uses the town as the setting for his children's book. It's nice to meet people who are so genuine about their passions for the village, writing, beer and life in general. And I stayed there for a while longer chatting before catching a cab back to Canterbury as the roads were narrow and not safe to walk along.

Good day - but not terribly productive in the quest for knowledge on the ancestor front.