When We Were English, Part XIII

by Glenn N. Holliman

Leaving the Lovely Village of Cuddington

Below a photograph of sheep grazing on a Chiltern hillside near Cuddington, Buckinghamshire. This pastoral scene is typical of the landscape around Tring, Cholesbury, Aldbury and Berkhamstead where the name Holyman pops up in parish registers and legal documents in the 17th and 16th centuries.

The folk of Cuddington, including Peggy Cattell and Caroline Stonham, were kind and generous with their information on the Holyman family. Below is Nancy Cattell who showed us around the parish church and village. Notice the thatch cottage on the right. It dates to the 1500s. The last reproduction (bottom photo) gives some idea of what an English cottage looked like in the 1600s, something akin to how our ancestors were domiciled.




Next we try to connect some ancestral dots....