Topics this issue include;
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| 1. Something a little different When you receive this month's eNewsletter, you'll probably notice that rather than your own name/email
address being shown in the 'From' box, it will probably say either "Powditch eNewsletter Recipient"
or eNewsletter @ powditch.plus.com (without any gaps either side of the @)
The reason for this, is because, as I believe you are already aware, I have always in the past sent
each eNewsletter individually, to ensure that email addresses are not shared with, or become known
to, others (this 'policy' having been made in November 2003, following a majority decision by the then
eNewsletter recipients).
Due to various reasons, including the time to actually email individual recipients (with over 200
eNewsletters now being sent out every month), and having taken advice from various parties including
my ISP, etc, I will be trying an alternative means of sending this issue, and, dependant upon the
success of same, I will let you know in the next eNewsletter whether I will be continuing this 'new'
method of mailing, or returning to how I did it before. All I ask is for you to bear with me on this
occasion.
Thank you.
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| 2. Powditch Family Gathering 2006 - only 10 days to go to the first day (14 September) First of all, if you haven't already booked to be part of this year's Gathering, or to meet up with those
who have already booked to come, or if you would like to be with us - even for just one day, or even for
the Saturday night's Family Meal (or the Sunday morning's Family Church Service) - there's still some
space for us to fit you in, and you'll be made more than welcome.
Everything now is in place and ready for the Powditch Gathering weekend, and speakers, venues,
guides etc have confirmed that all's OK from their end.
One 'problem' which did present itself just over 1 week ago (but which, thankfully has now been
resolved) relates to the Anchor Inn (the venue for the Thursday Registration, and our family meals on
Thursday (14th), Friday (15th) and Saturday (16th)), when Joc Wingfield from Morston, rang me on
the afternoon of August 25th, to let me know that in the early hours of that morning, the Anchor Inn
had had a terrible fire there, and that the building had been burnt down!
Fortunately, although 4 members of staff had been sleeping in the room above, all got out safely, yet
not without trauma, as although the Chef managed to jump to the ground (just missing some sharp
railings), the other 3 left in the building (including Kate, the Restauranteur's daughter) were unable to
get out by themselves, and by the time the Fire-brigade (3 tenders from different areas) turned up
(apparently within 8 minutes of being called), she and the other two girls had been affected by
smoke-inhalation. Following their being taken to hospital and being thoroughly checked over, all were
allowed to return home, although I'm sure that you'll agree with me, the event must have been a really
terrifying one for them.
I have spoken to Kate since, and have given her our love and best wishes, although due to the state
of the Anchor Inn and its restauarant, I have to say that it will be many months before the building and
everything else will have been restored (especially as it's a 'listed' building), and they're fully back in
business.
Because of Joc Wingfield's prompt attention to alerting me to the above (for which I was and am
exceedingly grateful), and thanks to his suggestion re a possible alternative venue, I have now (as at
Sunday 3 September) been able to confirm with the host of the Red Lion at Stiffkey, that we will be
holding all our family meals there, on Thursday 14th, Friday 15th and Saturday 16th September.
For details re the Red Lion, and its location in relation to Morston (Stiffkey's actually not far from
Morston, being on the coastal road to Wells-next-the-Sea), as well as for all other information re the
"charming 17th Century Coaching Inn", please click on the following link, which will take you to their
website, as well as to much else about the hostelry, including some past sample (very mouth watering!)
menus (http://www.stiffkey.com/)
Whilst I have advised the majority of those who I know are definitely coming to this September's
Powditch Family Gathering about the Anchor Inn's misfortunes, and our alternative venue for meals,
should anyone else have considered coming to the Gathering, either for one day or more, or just for
the family meals (one or more), I hope that the above information will allow you to re-arrange your
timings etc (and come to the right place!)
Besides the above, I just want to say that whereas our Registration was going to be held at the
Anchor Inn, Registration has now been arranged to be held at Morston Village Hall (timings as per
the itinerary previously sent to everyone, but also available on the Powditch website at
It might be that the talks and meals for each evening may have to be slightly rearranged to allow for
travelling between Morston and Stiffkey for our evening meals, but if they are altered, it will only be by a
maximum of 15 minutes, but I won't be able to advise anything further, until I've discussed same with
our evening speakers, which hopefully will be within the next couple of days.
Finally, details of local (to Morston) Hotels, Guest Houses or places providing Bed & Breakfast, are
provided by the Glaven Valley website, at
with the Bed & Breakfast page being accessible from
Villages not too far away from Morston are Blakeney, Cley and Wiveton, and all details for those
places appear on that website.
Ang and I are really looking forward to seeing you at Morston.
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| 3. Welcome Over the past few months, I've made contact with several Powditch family members and descendants
through the GenesReunited website (http://www.genesreunited.com/)
Whilst many have kept contact only through GR, I have also been pleased that others have also made
contact direct with me, especially where our joint interests, connections and research have been
mutually beneficial.
For instance, since the last eNewsletter (No.36, for July 2006), I have been in correspondence
(via GR) with Stuart Howell (whose ancestry includes Dunham, Blake and Powditch), Annette (who
lives in Cornwall, and who is the sister of Ian Powditch), Alison Dixon (who has an interest in Mary
Powditch of 1801), Allen Gosney (whose father-in-law's sister was the late Iris Powditch nee Jarman
of Cardiff), Phillip Edney (of whom more about soon), Judith Shaw (whose Elflett ancestor from
Wighton, Norfolk, married Mary Porrett/Pondich [Powditch] at Bale, Norfolk, in 1610), Susan Osborne
(daughter of Frank and Daphne Osborne and descendant of Rose Emily Powditch), and Susan Wilson
(whose mother-in-law's mother was Gladys Powditch from Belper, Derbyshire).
Last week, I was absolutely thrilled to receive an email from, Macarena Lara Powditch (France) who
emailed me in respect of her grandparents, and my details re them. Macarena Lara wrote;
"It was really amazing to find all the family history, but a little amendment should be done, my grandmother's name was ARMINDA Costa, married to Thomas Hirst POWDITCH. Congratulations, you have done a really good job !!!!"
I have already replied to Macarena Lara, and I look forward to being able to help her further.
Having previously mentioned Phillip Edney (UK) as someone I contacted through GR, I thought that
I'd better explain why I'd written (see above) 'of whom more about soon'.
Phillip had posted his mother's name (Joan Powditch) on the GR website, and when I first saw her
name, I was alittle 'confused' for although I had a few Joan Powditch's within my databases, Powditch
was their married (rather than maiden) surname. When I therefore first contacted Phillip, I wrote;-
"Please excuse a few questions, but who was Joan's parents, and did she have siblings by
the names of Nora L., Crispin C., Ethel M., and Doreen M.? Also, what was Joan's middle
name ('M')? I have noted from my Powditch birth database that Joan's mother's maiden
surname was Richards, but having just scrolled through the Powditch's I have on another
database (on my website) I'm just beginning to wonder whether this branch of the family has
slipped through my net, or whether I do have details, but they're hidden in one of my 100s of
folders!............"
Following Phillip's reply to me, he and I have been in constant contact with each other. All I will say at
this stage is that his branch of the family are (or rather, were), a 'lost' branch , and so much lost, that
Phillip's side of the family have never had contact with, and had not known about, their Great-
Grandfather's brother and his children, nor about any of their cousins who are still alive (and probably
not living all that far from him!)
With apologies that I'm not adding his details (other than what's above) in this eNewsletter, I do
assure you that the full details will be provided within September's issue, together with some extremely
exciting information re Powditch research by one, or possibly two, past family researchers.
Anyway, whilst all (except Philip Edney and Macarena Lara Powditch ) are not yet in direct contact
through my 'normal' email address, they are nevertheless welcomed to this latest edition of the
Powditch eNewsletter, and I do hope that I'll soon be able to welcome them on board 'properly'.
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| 4. News It is with great sadness that I heard only last week from Fiona Buchanan, that Roie (Poppy) Box from
Auckland, New Zealand, had died, aged 91, her funeral having taken place at St Andrews Church
Epsom on Saturday 2 September.
Although Poppy had not been in good health for a little while, I was very sorry to learn of her death, for
when I was in NZ way back in 1992, undertaking research into her ancestor, William Powditch
(q.v. http://www.powditch.plus.com/WilliamPowditch/index.htm) I not only met her and her
husband (Selwyn), but she very kindly provided me (later) with a marvellous plan of Cleghorn-owned
land in Auckland (William's daughter, Rose-Ann, having married Thomas Davis Cleghorn in
St Andrews Church Epsom on 29 July 1848 ; their marriage having been the first ever held in that
Church.
My especial thoughts are with her sisters, Beryl and Jean, with her cousin, Peter Oldham, as well as
with all her relatives, including Maureen Johnston and Fiona Buchanan. Theirs has been a very
close-knit family, and Poppy's loss will be much felt by all.
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Whilst I do have other news for this section, I will save it (if you don't mind) to the next issue, especially
as I might have even more details to add by then (and it's quite interesting too, especially if you are
a Royalist!) However, if you're coming to the Powditch Gathering, you will hear the News there before
the next edition of the eNewsletter (another incentive to come?)
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| 5. Whata mistaka to maka - or was it? One of the wonders of the Internet, and especially of Search Engines (Google etc) is to input a name
or something you're seeking, and once the 'Search' button is clicked, the world and his wife suddenly
land on your desk(top).
I've often been amazed just how many pages appear after looking for a particular topic, and I just
wonder how many people actually take the time to look through each and every page (sometimes
shown to run into 000s!)
Personally I tend to fade out after the 20th page, although I have been know to exceed 50 pages when
there's something really important I'm seeking, but the width and depth, together with the detail that's
available is absolutely mind-boggling, especially when after clicking that 'Search' button, the results
appear instantaneously, and the message says that it found 236,000 entries in 0.026 secs ! Wow, I
blink slower than that!
Whilst trawling the web a few weeks ago, looking for a Powditch from the Chilean branch of the
family, with a connection with the Byron who sailed from that country in the 1800s, I came across
another Byron (of whom I already knew about) who sailed with Lord Anson in the 1700s in the Pacific
Ocean. Amongst the many pages I looked at, I came across a really fascinating mention of an
important document in Australian Archives which related to the Log Books (1739-1743) of one Philip
Saumarez (1710-1747) who had sailed with Anson and Byron etc on the ship "Centurion", which ship
had captured (after a battle) the Spanish ship, "Nuestra Senora de Covadonga", which had been
carrying at the time, treasure in coin, and other treasure, said to have been worth (at the time - 1743)
some £400,000 (or, as was stated in a 1974 publication) 'a colossal sum whose modern equivalent
might be about £3,000,000' !
So why my excitement re the above? Well, according to the Manuscript Section of the National Library
of Australia, there was, amongst the said Log Books (Log 3: 1 July 1742-8 May 1743), a "Letter by
C. Powditch inserted", and as you can imagine (especially in view of the above, as well as I hadn't
come across a C. Powditch prior to the late 1700s) I just had to obtain a copy of the relevant
document (the only problem being that I had to have the whole of the document copied and not just
the inserted letter).
Having contacted the National Library of Australia, and having paid my A$13.20 (which later
increased to A$26.00) I was thrilled when less than a week later, this fat padded envelope was
delivered (fantastic service; far quicker than most similar services over here, and it had to be sent
halfway round the world!) and I was able to open it and look through the thick wad of papers (all in
mid-18th century writing).
Not wanting to rush things, I decided to look through the Log, page by page, and thus not only at
some stage come across that Letter by C Powditch, but also to discover what part this person had
played in the capture of that Spanish galleon, and whether he had been one of the recipients of some
of the treasure! ......and then I found the letter, written indeed by one 'C Powditch' and addressed (on
the reverse) to one 'Hon and Rev T R Keppel'.
Although I was already aware that on board the "Centurion" there was an "Honourable Mr Kepple,
son to the Earl of Albemarle", I soon discovered, upon reading the C Powditch letter, that far from
C Powditch having been on board the "Centurion", he was actually a Powditch living at Wells-next-
the-Sea in the 1800s (!) and that the said letter had been written to the Hon Rev Thomas Robert
Keppel (a descendant of the line which included the "Honourable Mr Kepple, son to the Earl of
Albemarle"). Furthermore, 'our' 'Hon and Rev T R Keppel' (to whom C Powditch had written), was
one of the "Gentlemen of the British and Infant School committee" which were going to "meet on
Tuesday the 2nd of March", when the Hon Keppel (who was at the time, Vicar of nearby Warham)
was "respectfully requested to attend"
Having titled this section of the eNewsletter, "Whata mistaka to maka - or was it?" I need to say that
the 'mistaka' was both mine as well as that of the 'Hon and Rev T R Keppel', for I believe that it was
he who, after he received the letter, was researching the origin of his own family, and that whilst he
was looking through the Log Books (1739-1743) of Philip Saumarez, he inadvertently used the letter
as a 'bookmark', and had then forgotten to retrieve it!
In 1973, when Leo Heaps wrote his book "Log of the Centurion; based on the original papers of
Captain Philip Saumarez on board HMS Centurion, Lord Anson's flagship during his
circumnavigation 1740-44" (London, 1973), those 'original papers' or Journals, which had been
written daily by Saumarez, had not all that many years before, been "discovered in a dirty cardboard
box in an old cupboard in his ancestral home in the Channel Islands". By 1973, they appear to
have been acquired by the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich, so I'm just left wondering at the
moment how (and why) the important original Logs and papers of one of our (UK) leading Naval
Captains managed to be acquired by Australian Archives (I'm not going down that line of enquiry,
I've enough on my plate at the moment!!!)
I do hope that you've found the above to be fascinating, and if you have an interest in that C Powditch
letter, or of the history of the 'British School' at Wells-next-the-Sea, please drop me a line and I'll
provide more details (Incidentally, 'C' in the 'C Powditch', was possibly Cook Powditch, although he
did have a brother, Thomas, who rather confusingly has been recorded on at least one occasion as
'Charles William Powditch' (a 'Mariner'), so it's also possible that he was the 'C' !
Hopefully by the next eNewsletter I'll have been able to categorically state whether the 'C' was Cook
or Charles (Thomas), although what I can state is that both were the sons of Thomas Powditch and
Mary (nee Walker), and present-day descendants live in Yorkshire (Philip Powditch and family);
Spain (David Powditch); Australia (Geoffrey Powditch); Wells-next-the Sea (Geoff and Peter
Youngman, and Sylvia Goble).
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| 6. Esther Powditch I do apologise for not having any further news to report re Esther, but mostly due to my trying to finalise
everything for this year's Gathering, I've been otherwise predisposed! I do wish to assure everyone
that as soon as I'm 'back to normal' (whatever that is in my case!!!) I will be searching for more
information about her.
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| 7. Follow-up to 'Help!' in the last eNewsletter In the last eNewsletter, I advised that since I'd changed from Symantec to McAfee, the amount of
SPAM-mail had reduced by over 95% per day, although due to a problem between the 1st and
7th August (inclusive), I'd received very few emails.
Because of the latter, I also asked whether, during that period, you'd sent any emails to me, or whether
you'd been wondering why I hadn't replied (!), so I asked for you to "please acknowledge receipt of
[that month's] eNewsletter."
Although I actually only received a handful of replies/acknowledgements, I do want to say a big thank
you to all those who kindly took the time to reply, and for your comments, all of which have been much
appreciated.
I especially want to thank Robyn Lewis in Tasmania for her excellent suggestion re a program called
'MSGTAG' - which not only have I now installed, but I will be advising what it is and what it does in my
next eNewsletter
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| 8. Website updates Since the July 2006 eNewsletter (No.36), I haven't made any changes to the website, although in
October, I hope to get back to updating/amending/adding items etc as quickly as possible, especially
as I have amassed quite a lot of information over the past couple of months
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| 9. .....and finally! As ever, I do thank you ever so much for being a reader of this eNewsletter, and I look forward to
hearing from you sometime, especially if you have any news (either for the website or for the
Powditch and associated families' Archive).
Thanks,
John
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