Tackling the London Traffic

We decided to tackle the rental car return early- rather than try to navigate through London rush hour traffic on the day of our flight. With multiple maps and verbal directions from Alice and Zach, we started off. We made our first 3 turns successfully, then ended up on the A40 going in the wrong direction. We got off and tried to make our way back onto the A40. We could see the ramp, but couldn't get to it. After much stress, and some directions from a Pak man, we got back on and made it to the M4. We made one last bad turn off the rotary at Heathrow and John decided to back up the ramp to get back to the rotary rather than find ourselves back on a motorway going the wrong direction. We didn't make any new friends, but did mange to get to the National car return.

We took the tube back to Queen's Park – 2 transfers and a horde of holiday makers and teens heading to the big festival in Notting Hill.

It was great to get back to Alice and Zach's – sans car – and relax for the evening.

From Lowestoft to London

Time to depart Lowestoft. John managed to get us some coffee – after an hour of walking the town. We headed off, watching the traffic jams heading away from us- towards the coast for the long bank holiday weekend. With time to spare, we decided to make a stop in Chelmsford to see the cathedral where Thomas Hooker preached and lectured. His themes were too liberal for the Bishop and so Hooker and a group of sympathizers set off in 1632 first for Holland and eventually Boston, finally settling in Hartford, CT. Using the Park and Ride, we got into the city and found the cathedral.

It was quite grand in scale- but lacked the beauty of the Lowestoft church.

Back on the road with London in our headlights. Not sure what to expect, we made our way into London – with multiple maps in hand and keeping our eye on the road watching every sign. The British have an odd and very irritating habit of signing to places and not to cardinal directions. So, if you're on the A40 and want to go west, you need to know the towns that you're heading toward – and the towns on each successive sign may change. Add to that the cars with no compass! We did great until we missed the turn for the A5 and were suddenly trying to navigate the streets of London, hoping to find a street name that we recognized. We finally saw Dyer Street and figured out that we could make a few turns and find Brooksville Avenue. We arrived to an empty house – except for Lewis, their 2 year old black lab. John tormented him by talking to him through the mail slot. We waited and finally left a note on the door and headed for the local pub. We had no sooner gotten our first drink than we saw Alice and Zach walking down the street with their luggage. Their train had been delayed for 2 hours.

We had some drinks and dinner at the house and met Lewis, who had, with proper introductions, become our new best friend.

St Mary's Church in Lowestoft

With our records in hand, we headed to the Church of St Margaret. We had some idea of the gravestone locations, so we wandered about Section VIIIb and found the tomb of Will and William Neslen, but couldn't find Richard and Margaret (Samuel Neslen's parents). We moved our search to section VII and immediately found the tombstones of the Liffens, Margaret's parents.

With a funeral going on in the church hall, we borrowed a bucket and scrubber and set to cleaning off the graves as best we could How strange to see the graves of Samuel's grandparents. His grandmother lived into her 80's and saw the entire family leave for the States. We knocked on the vicar's house and his son let us into the church. This was the church where Samuel and Eunice Neslen were married and where most of their children were baptized.

We took once last walk through the cemetery and stumbled on the grave of Richard and Margaret Neslen and of Samuel's brother, Richard, who drowned in the Oulton Broad at the age of 21. What luck!

Just down the street from the parish church was a huge LDS ward house. We tried to get in touch with the local Family History Library, to no avail and the ward house was entirely surrounded by a huge cast iron and locked at the gates with very solid locks.

We walked from the hotel to the waterfront of Oulton Broad which was packed with families picnicking, playing on the swing sets, eating ice cream. We stopped at the Lowestoft Museum, a local collection dating from the Bronze age to today, with a bit of everything in their old cases. They featured a large collection of Lowestoft Porcelain (the "famous"? Lowestoft Porcelain). The old factory was on Bell Lane where the Neslen's lived. The volunteers at the Museum were interested in our family quest and although there are no Neslen's left in town, there are a few Liffen's. They gave us the name of Stanley Liffen, an 80 year old gentlemen who is the Wesleyan Methodist minister.

We spotted an Indian restaurant for dinner- the Balti. Expensive, mediocre food and filled with boat folk.

Exploring the Lowestoft of the Neslens

We got up to catch the train to downtown Lowestoft- a short 4 minute train ride, but worth every penny – avoiding the traffic and the parking in a British town. We quickly found the library and the Town Records office which housed a large family history section. The librarian, a large woman with thick, bright green eyeshadow, was at the desk. She was a great resource. She quickly pointed us to the directories, the tithe apportionment books and we were off on our search for the Neslen's in Lowestoft.

We not only found maps and property records, but also found the church records on births, baptisms, marriages and burials – and a listing of the gravestone inscriptions in the Church of St. Margaret. It turns out that for most of his life, Samuel Neslen was a member of the Church of St. Margaret (the church of England). Later in life, he converted to Wesleyan Methodism and was a preacher at the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Lowestoft. Then he met the Mormons! Kerry found a small pamphlet written by a Mr. Larter detailing the history of the Mormon Church in Lowestoft.

With some basic information in hand, we took off on foot to find what was left of the houses and churches. We found that Chapel Street and Bell Lane (now Crown Street) where the Neslen's lived appeared to have been demolished. With no addresses, we weren't able to determine if the remaining houses could have been one of theirs, although they were of the right vintage.

We found that the Wesleyan Methodist Church had been demolished and a new building housing the elderly had been put up in it's place. The architect tried to keep the lines of the old building but ultimately, it's still a 1960's building.

We found Rant Score, where the Mormon's held their first services. The "scores" were streets cut into the limestone hills leading down to the sea. The original "church" was in a stable on Rant Score.

The old part of Lowestoft on High Street is still intact and many of the old buildings remain. It was eerie to imagine Susannah and C.V. walking these same streets.

It was time to head back to the hotel after a successful day. We stopped at the George Borrow Pub, an old railway pub. We were immediately befriended by "Scottish Curly" Dressed in an old white t-shirt with a huge gut, he was having a pint in the pub/hotel. He visited Oulton Broad four times a year – coming from his house in Scotland. We heard tales of his life in the army as a parachuter. Catching about 70% of what he said (that Scottish accent is deadly), we made our escape, stopped at the local Indian take-away and got dinner for the room.

To the coastal town of Lowestoft

We checked out of the hotel and did a walk-around of the Barns Hotel. The property is on lands belonging to the Whitbread estate on the River Ouse in the Cardington section of Bedford. (Alice Whitbread married Gerard Spencer in 1600 and became parents of the New England Spencer brothers. The main buildings were restored in the 1980's and converted into the hotel.

Another garden center breakfast. We pinched a knife and some mayo packets to make sandwiches for our drive. As we were leaving, we met a couple with a shitz-tzu like dog. She described it as a shitz-tzu p poodle mix – "You can call him a shi-poo or a poo-shit!"

On the drive to Lowestoft, we saw the "Park n' Bite" in the layby (translation- a roach coach in the parking area by the road).

We arrived in Lowestoft to gray skies and outrageously heavy traffic. We found our hotel, the Wherry Hotel, right on Oulton Broad. The hotel was a lovely old Victorian with tiny rooms, but lots of character. We ate our sandwiches in the lobby, waiting for our room to be ready then stopped at the library to get a lay of the land and check email.

We checked in at 3 PM, stopped into the hotel pub for a drink and had an early evening "carvery" at the hotel. Our first British "carvery" was a once in a lifetime-never to be repeated experience. The carvery is like a small buffet- roasties (roasted potatoes), jacket potatoes, chips (fries), overcooked veggies and the choice of 3 hunks of meat- pork, beef or turkey. We marveled at the fact that the UK has some of the most wonderful Indian restaurants, but their traditional food is awful.

Following in the Spencer footsteps

After our regular breakfast at the garden center, we looked at our options for the day. A trip to Althorp, Lady Diana's home, was one possibility- but at $25.00/head entrance fee, we opted for a trip to Sawston to see if we could track down some of the Hannah King story.

With drizzle, gray skies and blustery wind, we stumbled onto a sign for the library – but arrived to find that it wasn't open until 3 in the afternoon. We made a few inquiries and were told to try the Parish Council just down the street. "Ask for Margaret". We found Margaret and the mother lode of information about the town of Sawston. She was interested in history and her own family history, so had done a lot of work on the town. We only had limited information on the King's – an address of "Dernford Dale". Margaret gave us a map and we set off to see if we could find the farm house. We turned down a dirt road marked "Dernford Farm" and found a gorgeous old Georgian house at the end of the road. Next to the farm house, we met Simon, a worker in the business next door. He told us that the owner of the house was Audrey Gregg, a woman in her 80's and very hard of hearing. We knocked on every possible door, with no luck. But, we did get a chance to wander around the house and through the gardens, filled with plum trees and pear trees. It brought back memories of reading Hannah's diary and her love of her gardens in her home in Sawston.

We met Margaret back at the Parish Council office and she gave us mounds of information, including the Church records showing all of the King family They show Thomas King as being a farmer of Dernford, which Margaret said would imply significant holdings. The town in the 1800's was primarily based on farming, then later paper making and leatherworks.

She also told us the story of Thomas Evans, the tyrant of Saltston. He paid his men in money and partly in beer – sold in his pub. So, if you didn't drink, you didn't get your full pay. He was church warden for the local church and when the non-conformists began to build their own church, his men would go at night and knock it down.

The town also has a tradition of "town peas". John Huntington had a field sown with peas for the poor of Sawston. Every year since the 1500's, the towns people have a day of free pea-picking.

Unfortunately, Sawston Hall, the manor house of the town, is currently being renovated and made into a hotel, so we couldn't get onto the grounds or in the house. Margaret told us of the monk holes where the monks would hide to escape persecution during Henry VIII reign.

St Mary's Parish Church in Sawston -

Armed with a bag of papers about Sawston, we headed back to our Bedford. Hankering for another Indian dinner, we stopped in Sandy at the Ghandi Indian restaurant. It was dark inside, but the door was open. We walked in and John knocked at the kitchen door and was greeted by a half naked Indian guy – wearing a towel coming straight from the shower. He told us to come back at 5:30. We opted for a take out of doner kebab and took it back to the hotel.

The Spencers in England

Rather than an 8£ pound continental breakfast ($16 US), we drove to the local garden center where they have a large café. Breakfast- fried egg and toast with a latte was only $8 for two (although, one piece of toast did cost $1.00)

Our first stop was in Blunham at St Edmund's Parish Church. This is one of the earliest known Spencer churches, serving the Spencers of South Mylls. John Dunne ("For Whom the Bell Tolls") was a one time rector of this parish church.

From Blunham, we drove to Edworth to the Church of St. George, just south of Biggleswade.

To get to the church, which is now decommissioned, you have to pass through the farm of the Smyth family. They have a 4000 acre farm that has been in the family for over 173 years. The farm house was a beautiful Georgian surrounded by lovely gardens. The Smyths have the key to the old church.

This church has the oldest known connections with the New England Spencers. John and Ann Spencer have a memorial brass plaque on the wall of the church.

The church was built using clunch, a porous local stone, which over the years has been penetrated by water, causing considerable damage.

We stopped at the White Horse Pub across from the Whitbred Estate. We had another boring English lunch – tomato soup for a mere $8. We tried to get to the Whitbred Estate but the office administration people explained that it would take mountains of paperwork and approval from the family. So, we snapped a photo from the driveway and we were on our way. The Whitbreds who remained in England became one of Bedfordshire's most prominent families. Samuel Whitbread, the former Whitbred brewery chairman, is now the Queen's representative in Bedfordshire.

Our last family church was in Upper Gravenhurst, St Gile's Church. We arrived to find that it had just been decommissioned in July and it's fate was unknown. At this church, Alice Whitbred married Gerard Spencer in 1600. They were the parents of the Spencers of the Great Migration.

As we were taking photos outside the church, the incredibly talkative man walked by and told us the story of the town's attempt to save the church and then proceeded to tell us all about his travels in the U.S. With an excuse that we had to meet friends, we left Upper Gravenhurst and headed for the tiny village of Cople.

The All Saint's Church in Cople didn't have direct Spencer family connections- it was the church of the Spencers who migrated to Virginia. There was a funeral just departing the church so we got a chance to see the inside before they locked it up.

After a brief visit, we stopped at the Five Bells Pub across the street for a drink.

We met a wonderful couple from the next village in for their nightly drink – Jenny and Tom Tonsell. We were craving Indian and asked the pub owner where the closest restaurant was. He brought out a take-away menu and offered to serve our take-away in his restaurant. He also owns a restaurant in Kathmandu and one of his employees, Hari Bagale was in the UK. We agreed that a trip to Nepal would be part of our India adventure