Men & Armour for Gloucestershire in 1608 (General)

by jhopkins , Friday, August 24, 2018, 03:55 (2065 days ago)

I would just like to thank MPGriffiths for posting the url for this resource, in the thread "Presenting to a church in 1547". http:///www.coaley.net

I have often wondered how long my family name (Hopkins and variants) has been in the Forest, and the resource shows how common my family name was in Gloucestershire in general and in the Forest in particular in 1608.

I have not been able to get back beyond 1774 (approx) on this site for my own particular ancestry because there is no record of my gt gt gt grandfather's baptism, but this list shows that people of our name were there at least in 1608, and presumably before that.

The list (Men & Armour for Gloucestershire in 1608) shows that little changed in some ways, even for emigrants. Presumably the King could call on the men on the list when needed. My great grandfather emigrated to NZ in 1860, and in 1917 three of his grandsons (my uncles), were fighting in Flanders, called on by King and country just as before, but not from the Forest - instead "from the uttermost ends of the Earth".

The only difference over 300 years was that England had expanded to a vast empire from which soldiers could be recruited/conscripted, and the country provided the weaponry, not the individual soldier.

Thanks again MPGriffiths for such an interesting reference.