Robert Gilderdale

This Robert, and his wife Grace, are first visible through their daughter's birth in Luddington, Lincolnshire in 1691. Although it runs completely against the grain to go outside Yorkshire for the Gilderdale family roots, there are some clues that lead to Lincolnshire.

1) There is a Lincolnshire family in the late 1500's including Thomas, John, Elizabeth and Margret Gylderdaile (or Gildardaile, or Gilderdaile) in Whitton, which is a few miles east of Luddington. A family of Gyldersonnes lived in Winterton, just to the South, and one member there is christened Gylderday in 1591. The fact that there are no Gilderdale records throught the bulk of the 1600's may relate to the end of the surname being flexible, with the Gilder being the common part.

2) Until the 1620's Luddington was beside the river Don, which linked it to Thorne. After the 1620's the Don was re-engineered to meets the Ouse a few miles to the north. However the Trent still provided easy access to Hook, and Howden, two of the centres of eighteenth century Gilderdale activity. The third is Thorne - which, though in Yorkshire, lies to the southwest. As such although in a different county, Luddington is within a transportation loop that could link it to these other towns.

3) The river Don being seen as important to the family's history might explain why several members of the family subsequently give their name as Gilderdon.

In putting together the early Gilderdale tree prior to Simon Gilderdon/dale (the Gilderdale in our line that one can work backwards to with confidence), I have used the following method. I have gone decade by decade, and tried to map birth places (which move consistently further up the Ouse from a hub at the junction of the two rivers as the century goes on). I have also taken the approach that where there is a birth record for someone with a Gilderdale name, and then a marriage record between 20-30 years later in the same region, then they are probably the same person. Where possible these have been backed up by reference to naming conventions. These methods are risky, but the aim has been to have as few unaccounted for names as possible. In other words the family tree that emerges is what I see as the most likely given the evidence I have available. It will doubtless change as new evidence emerges. Hence it is a working theory which needs to be tested rather than established fact and it is important that anyone reading this understands the difference between fully verified parts of the tree, generally those after the 1760's and the more speculative parts.