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/AUT.2ACEB/1199.1.2 Message Board Post: I live in Australia and am from the line of Emanuel Downing. The dates would be wrong - at least one hundred years out-for a Downing to have been sent from Downing Street to Australia. My branch of the family arrived in Australia 1868. I also noted on this Board a reference to George Downing having a lease to the land on which Downing Street was built. He was the freeholder and acquired the leaseholders interest and then was able to build on the street. The question of the ownership of the land is perhaps interesting-unless there was a long lease given to the Government they would have extinguished ownership by possessory right, if they had not bought it. It would be good for all of us who are descended from Emanuel if there had been a lease of some hundreds of years! Sadly I do not think that this is the case. As a matter of interest George was the second graduate from Harvard. A copy of his portait hangs in Downing College. The original is at Harvard. I also suspect the George was not a nice person-perhaps a good thing that his direct line ran out. Rowan Downing QC