Hi John, Please excuse my delay in replying to you immediately after your excellent response to my questions: 1. Thank you for your descrption of Greater London area which I could easily follow with a Political Map of England, showing the various areas surrounding London in red that you called out-a much more vast area than I had originally imagined > In addition it contains the original City of London, >sometimes known >as the Square Mile, . >This is the >historic "London", most of it within the ancient walls. >Lewisham is south of the river in what used to be Kent, but now part >of the >county of [Greater] London. 150 years ago it was still pretty much a >village, I altered your description a bit for brevity as much as possible, as it is the historic London within the ancient walls, called the Square Mile that I am particularly interested in. 2. >The Guildhall is the ancient civic centre of London, in the City. I >visit it >sometimes when I go up to town, to do a bit of research at the >Guildhall >Library, which is a part of a new building at the edge of the >Guildhall's land, >and contains many of the old City of London archives. parish registers >etc. >Coleman Street, as you say, is a very short block to the east of the >Guildhall. The name goes back to the 12th >cent., and >may have been the name of the man who first built it, or there could >have been a >church dedicated to St Coleman there at one time. The road is still >quite >narrow, This is the particular area that I am interested in as my ancestry traces back to the St. Stephens' , Coleman Street church of 1637 where my James Clark (the immigrant ancestor of my straight Line) attended that church with Theophilus Eaton, and his friend Rev. John Davenport + the others of that Puritan congregation. That church was in some way associated with St. Olav church a short distance away. In 1983-84 when I had begun my interest in gen., I was able to find that the Coleman St. St. Stephens was originally a Jewish synagogue in say 1292 A.D. and it had been a church from that date until 1940 when it was bombed out of existence during WWII. It had been a synagogue during its earliest history, only. The St. Stephens church was subject to fire several times, I believe. Christopher Wren, the famous Architect of his time, designed, and rebuilt that church among the many others he had done in the City. At Seattle Library, I was fortunate to have found pix and sketches of that church showing the outer configuration, and much of the alter and inner furnishings of it which I made copies of. Rev. John Davenport had had to flee to the Netherlands at times to protect himself from persecution by the powers that be as the group was non-conforming to the expectations of the time. Eventually, in 1637, the group, many of whom were London merchants, were able leave London with the leaders Davenport and Eaton aboard the Hector, after some delay by authorities, for Massachusetts. The Hector was a 250 ton brig. - it and another ship unnamed in records at MA Bay Colony transported some 250 Puritans to MA. in that year. By 1638, many of that group were Founders of the New Haven Colony, and the village of New Haven, CT. I was able to get a copy of a line drawing of the 1641 map of New Haven which showed the names of the various colonists who settled there, with Eaton to be the Governor, and his friend John Davenport heading up the colony and the establishment of plantations, etc. The map actually shows the plantation of my direct Line, James Clark in 1641. When we visited London, in 1971, I recall seeing the Guildhall, though we didn't go inside. Here I was right in the area of my immigrant ancestor, but it would be 1984 before I was to learn that fact after I was bitten (by accident !) by the genalogy bug - and with great reaction! I did recall some of this information in my various history classes over the many years, but little did I know that I could relate to it more than I had ever anticipated. Then, in the late 1980s when we took a tour to London, and with the knowledge of the Coleman Street site, I was unable to take the time to really visit that area except to say that I took a city tour on a bus, and as we slowed only slightly, I looked out that bus window and there I saw the plaque on the Wall referring to Coleman Street annex or some such designation - that's all it took to pull off 2 shots from my trusty 35 mm Pentax, and through the bus window I was able to get 2 very good shots of that plaque and quite sharp and readable. That was all that was left from the Coleman Street, St Stephens church site that had been attended by my immigrant ancestor of 1637. A friend of mine however, did make it a point to visit Coleman Street earlir than our Tour trip and got pix of the street and of the street sign reading Coleman Street, to add to my collection. >> 3. Are you interested in genealogy, >I am indeed, . . . . . . . the surnames DRIVER and KEYWOOD which are among those >that interest >me,. . . . the chance of establishing a family link is quite slender. >Two of my >grandmother's Keywood brothers emigrated to the USA in the earlier >part of this >century, and ended their lives in Tacoma, which is why I became >interested in >that part of the world. I do not know if they have left any >descendants, but >one of their daughters, Gladys E. Keywood, married a Clyde WILLIAMS. >My other >interests include STAPLETON and my mother-in-law's family name CLARKE John, I am hoping that someone who reads this might see some surnames that might possibly have a tie, or suggest some sort of tie. Send us as much info re your Tacoma branch that you can muster and we will try to help you, as there are a lot of Tacoma folk that read this. I, too, have ties with Tacoma, with my SCOTT Line - just recently, even though I have not had success so far with my SCOTT Line, I was very successfull with my ATKINSON Line when I subscribed to ATKINSON -D@rootsweb.com and with my 1st query CONNECTED to my Atkinson Line in California, and was able to learn the surname of my Grt Grt Grandmother, Elizabeth SWIFT of Co. Down, Ireland who came to PA. at age 11 in the late 1800s, and even what ship she came over on. And I am told that there is much info about her + pix of her which I will eventually receive. Thanks to the Rootsweb system, and various other search media, I am finding that playing clues, and diligence works - & about the time when you "give up" can be the most opportune time in gen. I may even find my Scott Line, yet ! >> 4. John, I noticed that you had a Clarke surname that you mentioned - your mother-in-law's family. If you could supply some info about that, I could see what I might be able to do with it. If it is England, then I probably wouldn't be much help, however. I can't be sure of the parents of my Immigrant ancestor, James Clark. There are some who "claim" to know the parentage, but to my knowledge, none has been really proven, so I keep it up on the "shelf" for more proof in the future, if it happens. > if you're ever here again is the Museum of >London , not all that far from the Guildhall. I haven't been able to visit it - a Tour is one thing, but being on your own is another. I prefer the latter. In 1984, I purchased a copy of American Ancestors and Cousins of The Princess of Wales by Roberts & Reitwiesner pub. by Geneal. Pub'g . Co. Inc. of Baltimore MD. I had no idea at the time, that I was to find several of my Lines in that 194 pp. book. My Gibson Line, Tuttle Line, and Lathrop/Lothrop Lines were all in there and even some Clark ties. All these Lines came over in the 1630s, all with large families, so you and I may be distantly related, and we don't know it - yet! LOL (LAFFING OUT LOUD!- my spelling!) Please keep in touch John, and I hope that someone sees someone out there sees a DRIVER, KEYWOOD, WILLIAMS, STQAPLETON, CLARKE, et al and we can be as informative as you have with me re Greater London. Our Seasons Greetings of course. Write again asap. Carroll in Snohomish WA. 30 mi NE of Seattle - about 3000 pop within the city limits they say but seems more like the 30,000 that surrounds us ! Oh, yes, John this is the burg where the cemetery has been "dis-used", abused, desecrated, uncrated, abandoned, unrecognized, invaded, and built upon despite the remains beneath it ! Judged to be available for further invasion in a county Superior Court decision. Snohomish Cemetery, aka Pilchuck Cemetery, aka Indian Cemetery ! Amen ! & & & 30 & & & ___________________________________________________________________ You don't need to buy Internet access to use free Internet e-mail. Get completely free e-mail from Juno at http://www.juno.com/getjuno.html or call Juno at (800) 654-JUNO [654-5866]