This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Classification: Query Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/jMQ.2ACIB/21.40.44.49.1.1.1 Message Board Post: The Cowpers many times married into powerfull families and would use the wifes maddan name as a middle name for their children. My line is of the Earl Cowper and William Cowper the poet. Many of the Cowpers of my line were ministers, millitary, and in politics. They do not alway stay in the same county for many generation. The Earls line can be found in Warwickshire, London, and Hertfordshire. The family estate was called Panshanger Hall and was in Hertforshire. They also had a house in London in the St. James park area, which now is embassy role. Sir Charles Spenser Cowper also owned the what is today call Sanderingham. Queen Victoria bought the property in 1862 from him for 260K pounds. Park House was another family house. It is now the home of the Spensers. By all of this you can see the difficulty in tracing with such a mobile family with births, marriages and deaths in different counties. I had to make certain assumption in tracing my line because I ran into a ! dead end in Warwickshire. In 1990 my wife and I visited England. What we found there was My father looked like the 2nd Earl Cowper, My Grandfather looked like the 3rd Earl Cowper and I am have the likeness of the 6th Earl. My youngest sister looks like Lady Desburough, the last of the Cowpers to live at the Family Estate. She was also the Grandmother of the current Lord Gage. Lord Gage inherited family painting and furniture. I have not checked to see how close your search is to these areas but, if you are close you may want to check these other counties. Larry Cowper ltcowper@yahoo.com