NO Evidence

NO Edmund Rice Evidence, a photo by midgefrazel on Flickr.

Edmund Rice (1638) Reunion 17 Sept 2011 hosted by the Edmund Rice Association known as ERA

John F. Chandler, President of the ERA, greeted us after an hour of social time and coffee. I got coffee for the lady who was taking the registrations since her name tag said she was from North Stonington, CT (where MY ancestors came from). I think her name is Kathleen. I took her photo.

Mike Rice gave the first presentation. He called it Edmund Rice 101. He wanted to make sure that we knew that many people contributed to the research and data that he was making a synopsis of for his slides. Shown here is my favorite slide. NO EVIDENCE. Look at all the information that is not known and there is more, like when he came to America and what ship. So many books and genealogies are claiming to know so many of these facts. I am re-looking at what is said about MY immigrant ancestors.

My favorite "non-fact" is that no one knows for sure the burial location of Edmund Rice, his wives and some of his children. So, they put his memorial stone in the logical place. He is probably buried there near the site of the first meeting house. It seems fitting.

Mike covered what we do know and what can be supposed from the information. It is not known what year or place Edmund was born. (it is supposed and calculated from a court deposition  of 3 April 1656), We do know when he died and the locations of his homes and some of his sons.

Mike explained open and closed field farming so we could understand what life was like in Sudbury (now Wayland as of 1835). I was impressed with his explanation and clarity of terms like freeman and land ownership and land divided among sons.

What I loved best was the money discussion of understanding that Edmund Rice was a wealthy man before he came to this country. It took a lot of money for him to gain passage and bring half those children with him. He became land rich after he got here. Edmund was a prosperous person.

John Chandler did the explanation of the Rice DNA project. As my husband is a Rice for only 4 generations, this won't do him any good but I would still like to do this, just to experience the process and results. Edmund Rice descendants show that their DNA came from an area of England and not Wales. 

To be continued... [Here 's a link to all of the photos of the day]