The Swindell Family Connection
|•|The name is popularly thought to mean pig valley. |
|•|Places called Swindale. |
|•|Where the surname was found in antiquity. |
|•|Summary and conclusions. |
| Introduction |
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The object of delving into the origin of a family surname is to be able to target genealogical research more effectively.
|Surname |
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|Famous family |
|Region |
|Trade guild |
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If you can link a surname with a region, or a well-documented family, or a trade guild etc you might be able to find the earliest surviving records and work your way forwards, to join up with today's quality registration records, and living memories.
|Swandal Swendalls Swind Swindal |
|Swindale Swindall Swindals Swindel|
|Swindell Swindells Swindels |
|Swindil Swindilah Swindily |
|Swindill Swindlah Swindle |
|Swindleah Swindles Swindley |
|Swindolls Swinhill Swinley Swingle|
|Swingler Swinney Swyndels |
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This study uses documented sources, anecdotal accounts, and targeted searches of the WWW to look into the distribution of the various spellings of the family surname. If the name was confined to a single region of Britain in antiquity then then there is a strong likelihood that our most distant ancestors lived there. If the name existed all over Britain then a different strategy must be followed.
|Baptisms Births |
|Census Enumerators Booklets |
|Court rolls Deaths Deeds Diaries |
|Directories Electoral register |
|Family lore Hearth tax Histories |
|International Genealogical Index |
|Land transfers Marriages |
|Military records Phone books |
|Pipe rolls Published accounts Rates |
|Subsidy Rolls Wills Window tax WWW |
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Written accounts, diaries etc. are extremely valuable in this research, but beware where they just repeat long-standing suppositions and speculations. Unjustifiable suppositions should be sorted out from family lore passed down through many generations which can give valuable clues and can't necessarily be ignored. This may be hard to do, but remember that repeating something again and again does not make it any truer.
The WWW must be treated with particular caution.
Targeted searches are used in this study to look for the surname in all its versions in each county of England, to find where they were in past centuries. But you can't assume that all counties are equally represented. It depends on the keenness of genealogists and archivists, and their use of web publishing.
The WWW also holds an awful lot of quite unjustified claims and statements. Question what you find, and get back to original sources rather than baldly taking it as fact.
I hope the strategy described here proves useful to people working on other surnames. Many mysteries still remain, but some hypotheses are presented to help answer them.
|Click on one of the key paragraphs on the | | Starting point |
|right, or page down and read on | | |
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| Objective study | | Places called Swindale in Britain |
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| Conjectural | | Where do the oldest records say the Swindales/Swindells used to live? |
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| | | Where else might the name have come from? |
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| | | The swingle connection |
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| | | Surnames and placenames outside Britain |
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| | | What does Swindale mean? |
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| | | Summary and conclusions |
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| | | Contributors, references and acknowledgements |
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| Starting point |
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|Swindale |
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|Swindell |
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The most common, and intuitively reasonable, notion is that the Swindell/Swindale surname came from a place called Swindale. This derivation was given by all the authorities examined, and all the Swindell/Swindale/Swindle etc families known to the compiler, including those of both the principal contributors to this web site.
|The reasoning behind this is that a placename can also be a surname if:- |
|• |a waif, stray or bastard was accepted as a liability by the parish under the poor laws, and having no surname of their|
| |own they were given the name of the parish or a place within it CLICK FOR MORE |
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|or • |after moving elsewhere, a person was associated with their place of birth CLICK FOR MORE |
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|or • |the place was associated with a noble or landed family CLICK FOR MORE |
|Swindale |
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|Swindell |
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But apart from that, it is a commonly held notion that many, if not most, surnames evolved from place names - these are called "locative" surnames.
To test the assertion of a link between Swindell/dale as a surname and a particular place called Swindale you must trace records associating a significant group of Swindell/dale families with the precise locality.
So first you have to identify where the place called Swindale is, and if there are several of them find which is the most likely candidate. And there is also the possibility that the same name may have arisen independently in more than one location.
|Swingle |
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|Swindle |
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But the surname might not have evolved from a placename at all - some sources suggest it came from Swingle or Swingler; a swingle was an agricultural implement used in flax production.
These and a number of other possibilities are examined here.
| Places called Swindale in Britain |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
Seven places in Britain today, all on the same latitude in the north of England, bear the name Swindale or Swindale Beck, and a solitary Swine Dale is found on the island of Westray in the Orkneys, off the northern tip of Scotland (Ordnance Survey's gazetteer of 250 000 placenames - Ref [20]).
|Click on one of the key paragraphs on the | | Swindale in the parish of Shap |
|right, or page down and read on | | |
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| | | Swindales in Edendale |
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| | | Swindale Beck, Brough |
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| | | Swindale Beck near Hilton |
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| | | Swindale Beck near Knock |
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| | | Swindales off Weasdale in Lunedale |
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| | | Great Swindale |
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| | | Little Swindale |
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| | | Swindale near Moorsholm, North Riding |
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| | | Swine Dale on the island of Westray, Orkney |
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| | | Other possibilities |
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| | | Distribution of Swindale placenames |
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| Swindale in the parish of Shap [1, 2] |
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|[pic] |
|Westmorland |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Swindale |
|Click map to see full size |
The largest, and historically most populous, Swindale lies south west of Shap on the eastern fringe of the Lake District, in the ancient county of Westmorland, now in the modern county of Cumbria.
This is the one most often cited as the origin of the surname.
Some genealogy web sites examined called it Swindale Beck or Swindale Chapelry, but word constructions like these are seldom, if ever, used in England to name hamlets, villages and towns.
|• |Swindale Beck is found in road atlases of Britain based on the Ordnance Survey. |
| |Road atlases normally list villages and towns, but there isn't one in the dale. |
| |Whoever chose the features to show in the atlas considered the beck, the tumbling, stony stream running down the dale, |
| |to be more significant than the dale itself or either of the remaining groups of farm buildings. |
| |However, the valley is named as Swindale on the 1:25 000 scale OS maps and larger. |
| |None of the other Swindales in the Ordnance Survey gazetteer have roads associated with them, which is presumably why |
| |they are not shown on road atlases. |
| |Some road atlases call the beck Swindale River, though it would never be known as such by local people. |
| |The settlement in the dale would never have been known as Swindale Beck. |
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|• |Swindale Chapelry stems from mis-readings of descriptions published on the WWW such as Mannix & Co., History, Topography|
| |and Directory of Westmorland, 1851 [12], which describe the status of Swindale church in the local parish hierarchy (see|
| |below for more). |
| |The settlement would never have been known as Swindale Chapelry, but the term would be used when talking about the cure,|
| |the area over which the incumbent of the chapel has responsibility. |
It would appear that the only reason why so many people mention Swindale Beck as the origin of their name is that it is the only Swindale to be found in road atlases. Swindale Chapelry was probably found in a search of the WWW, but it is plainly erroneous.
Swindale is a glacial valley down which the Swindale Beck flows some 3 miles (5 Km) to its confluence with the River Lowther at the village of Rosgill about 2 miles (3 Km) north west of Shap. At its narrowest the dale floor is only about 200 yards (185 metres) wide, with the hills on both sides rising steeply some 800 feet (250 metres) above the valley floor. The plateau above the head of the dale bears the name Swindale Common and a rocky slope above Swindale Foot is called Swindale Foot Crags. The Swindale Beck is for much of its length only a few strides wide, and shallow and stony enough to ford in hiking boots without getting your socks too wet.
The dale is unusual for a Lake District glacial valley in having two significant bends.
The narrow, single-track, minor road serving the dale is unfenced for much of its length and ends half a mile (1 Km) short of the head of the dale. In recent historical time this road was no more than a cart track, and it continues as footpaths over the fells to adjacent dales.
|[pic] |
|Swindale © Andrew Leaney [21] |
|Click photo to see more |
The farmstead of Swindale Head lies at the top of the dale, and Swindale Foot lies a mile (2 Km) further down where the dale begins to widen out onto the valley of the River Lowther (farmstead names following this pattern are very common in Cumbria and the Pennines). Most of the the half dozen or so house sites in the dale were strung along the half mile (1 Km) of the road in the central, narrowest part, above Swindale Foot, and this was the pattern of settlement in recent historical time.
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
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|Site of chapel and school |
|Click map to see full size |
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|Click the picture to see a history of Swindale |
|chapel |
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In 1703 a school was built in Swindale, and nearby in 1749 a chapel of ease, administered by the vicar of Shap. Small schools were built in sparsely populated, isolated situations till well into the 19th century, and children often walked considerable distances from outlying farms and hamlets to attend them.
The 18th century embraced a period of rapid population growth in rural Britain, followed by migration to the growing towns and cities after the onset of the Industrial Revolution. In 1777 the parish of Shap, of which the settlement in Swindale was only a very small part, had 182 families, and throughout the 17th and 18th centuries the parish never had more than 1,000 inhabitants in total.
Around 1850 there were 13 inhabited houses in Swindale, with a population of 54. By 1854 this had dropped to only 8 habitations, and at the turn of the century there were only 3 occupied houses, namely Swindale Head, Truss Gap and Swindale Foot, with a total population of 10. In 1894 the chapel in Swindale was described as having seating for no more than 40 people, and in 1938 it was demolished as part of the construction of Haweswater in nearby Mardale.
CLICK HERE to see a newspaper acount of the farewell service at the chapel (see Ref: [2]).
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|Haweswater © Ann Bowker |
|Click photo to see more |
Swindale was overshadowed by the larger and more populous Mardale running parallel a mile (2 Km) to the north west. Mardale was originally administered by the vicar of Bampton, and like Swindale a chapel of ease was built in the 18th century; this later became a separate parish, demonstrating its greater significance over Swindale which remained a chapelry to Shap.
Mardale was flooded in 1941 to create the reservoir known as Haweswater, from the smaller, natural lake that was already there, transforming the landscape and destroying the villages of Measand and Mardale Green and their outliers.
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
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|The dam diverting water from Swindale to |
|Haweswater |
|Click map to see full size |
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Wet Sleddale Reservoir, far smaller than Haweswater, lies at the headwaters of the river Lowther in the adjacent, unspectacular dale a mile and a half (3 Km) to the south east of Swindale.
It is said that Swindale was to be flooded with Mardale to supply Manchester's water needs. This plan was not carried out, but a dam near Truss Gap diverts a proportion of the Swindale Beck through a tunnel to an outfall into Haweswater.
Click on the map on the right to locate the dam. Follow the beck downstream (north east) from the site of the school and chapel to the ford that carries two footpaths across the beck, one from the steep Gouthercrag Gill and the other coming upstream parallel to the beck. The dam is a similar distance further downstream.
The following description was found in Swindale, Gateshead Civic Walking Club [13]
"Swindale - is seldom visited by fellwalkers, although it is a rugged and remote dale with plenty of interesting sights. It is deemed to be too far off the beaten track and is therefore left mostly to walkers living in nearby Penrith and Kendal. There is a fine circuit available which takes in an old Corpse Road, a couple of quiet summits, a long and empty dale, and some striking waterfalls; it is very rare to meet anyone else in the area."
| Swindales in Edendale |
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|[pic] |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|[pic] |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
Three Swindale Becks are found very close together spread along the north side of upper Edendale. The most significant one lies to the north of Brough, the next close by about 4 miles (7 Km) to the north west, due east of Hilton near Appleby, and the last 7 miles (12 Km) north west of Hilton, near the village of Knock.
The geology of this area is dominantly limestone, and sink holes are found everywhere. Sink holes are evidence of caverns carved by underground rivers collapsing, and the area is famous for its pot holes.
| Swindale Beck, Brough [1, 2] |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Click map to enlarge |
|[pic] |
|© Alan Swindale [20] |
|The Swindale Beck as it enters Brough |
|Click photo to see more |
The Swindale Beck crosses the ancient Roman road from Scotch Corner to Penrith at Brough, at the head of Edendale, some 20 miles (30 Km) east by road from Shap, but rather less as the crow flies.
Above Brough, to the north, the valley down which the beck runs has the features of a V-shaped valley cut by the swiftly flowing waters of the beck rather than a glacial formation, cutting at its steepest about 200 feet (60 metres) below the surrounding moorland.
|[pic] |
|© Alan Swindale [20] |
|Upper Swindale looking up to Windmore Edge |
|Click photo to see more |
The beck is born at a point 2 miles (3.2 Km) to the north north east of Brough, at the meeting point of a number of small gills draining off Warcop Fell, and in its upper course it passes through a number of areas of shake holes. It crosses the main road in the middle of the town, before passing in the shadow of the ancient Norman castle, built on the remains of an earlier Roman fort, and then flows through meadow land into the river Eden a mile (2 Km) to the west south west at Great Musgrave. For much of its course it is deep and wide enough to be popular with rough-water kayaking enthusiasts in the right weather conditions.
A road meanders roughly parallel to the east of the beck above Brough, heading into County Durham.
The farmstead of Swindalehead House lies close to the beck half a mile (1 Km) below its source, and the farmstead of Woodside overlooks the beck on a high knoll a further half a mile downstream. Swindale Grange was till the end of the 19th century Brough High Mill and stands on the west bank half a mile upstream from the town. The small, scattered hamlet of Helbeck also lies west of the beck about half a mile (1 Km) distant. No other houses or farmsteads are directly associated with the beck above Brough, though about twenty habitations are loosely scattered over a square mile (2.56 sq Km) of moorland to the east.
Swindale Wood occupies the banks of part of the steepest, most inaccessible part of the course of the beck, where it carves through the escarpment overlooking Brough - this wood has increased considerably in size since the first edition Ordnance Survey map, so much of it appears to be man-made. There are no other natural features that bear the name Swindale in the vicinity.
|Three farmsteads to the east of the beck bear the names Windmore End, Windmore Green and Windmore End Farm. These |
|names may be as new as Swindale Grange, or perhaps Swind- and Wind- had the same root in antiquity, and over time |
|they lost or gained the initial S. This could suggest the existence, in antiquity, of a community distinguished by |
|names with the same root. |
|NB. This is pure conjecture, no research was done to examine the possibility, and no further comment is made. |
Below Brough there are no habitations associated with the beck till its confluence with the river Eden.
The valley of the Swindale Beck above Brough is a significant geographical feature, but there is no coherent group of habitations associated directly with it as at Swindale in the parish of Shap, only a couple of farmsteads overlooking the beck at a distance.
The Swindale Beck lies in the parish of Helbeck. There has never been a separate parish called Swindale near Brough, which has always been the centre of administration and trade.
A good description of the area can be found on the WWW in Take a Walk around Brough by Nick Channer [14].
| Swindale Beck near Hilton [2] |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Click map to see detail |
This Swindale Beck lies some 4 miles (6 Km) north west of Brough, and due east of the village of Hilton near Appleby.
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|© Richard Webb |
|Swindale Beck, below Warcop Fell |
|Click to enlarge |
The beck falls some 850 feet (260 metres) in its mile-long (2 Km) course, as it drains off of Warcop Fell in its deeply-cut valley to its confluence with the Hilton Beck at the mouth of nearby Scordale. In all but the most severe conditions the beck can be crossed in a single stride without getting your feet wet.
The evenly-sloping sides of the valley climb almost 1,000 feet (over 300 metres) to crags and moorland carrying names such as Swindale Edge, Swindale Crag and Swindale Brow.
The valley was either cut by the waters of the beck, or it was part of a glacial head feature that has since been modified by erosion. There are many shake holes in and around the valley (see the full-sized Ordnance Survey map), showing that the bedrock is very porous - this may explain the nature of the valley itself, perhaps formed from regular collapses of underground watercourses, whilst the beck may disappear underground in drought conditions.
A bridleway climbs parallel to the beck from an unfenced, unmettled road alongside the Hilton Beck onto the high moorland of Warcop Fell, and eventually leading to the head of the nearby Swindale Beck above Brough, with a footpath branching off into Brough itself via the hamlet of Helbeck.
There is no trace of any human habitation associated with this Swindale Beck, though there are abandoned mine workings in nearby Scordale and a single abandoned shaft at the head of the valley, and sheep enclosures are found on the moorland above.
| Swindale Beck near Knock |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Swindale Beck near Knock |
|Click map to enlarge |
This Swindale Beck lies about 5 miles (8 Km) due north of Appleby-in-Westmorland. For most of its length the geology is such that it is little more than a stony ril, and can be crossed by stepping from rock to rock without getting your feet wet.
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|© Alan Swindale [2] Swindale Beck |
|Click photo to see more |
Its source at Swindale Head is at an altitude of 2,300 feet (700 metres) between High Scald Fell and Green Fell, an area of bog and shake holes. From there it cuts a deep, rocky gill through the escarpment overlooking Edendale, through another extensive area of shake holes, before passing beneath the Pennine Way footbridge in the illustration below. It then tumbles more gently towards the south west through the boggy Howe Cauldron at the foot of Knock Pike to meet the Great Rundale Beck at Knock Gill just north east of the small village of Knock, a total fall of some 1,600 feet (500 metres) in 3 miles (5 Km).
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|© George Tod [25] |
|View towards the Lakeland Mountains |
|from Swindale Beck |
|Click photo to see more |
The beck and its source at Swindale Head are the only geographical features on the OS map that carry the name Swindale.
There is no trace of any human habitation associated with the beck, its only claim to modern fame being the Pennine Way that follows it on its way over Great Dun Fell to Cross Fell.
| Great Swindale and Little Swindale off Weasdale in Lunedale |
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|[pic] |
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|© Alan Swindale |
|Great Swindale near Weasdale |
|[pic] |
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|© Alan Swindale |
|Little Swindale near Weasdale |
|[pic] |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Click on the map to zoom in |
These Swindales are some 10 miles (16 Km) south east of Shap and a similar distance south west of Brough. They both lie on the east side of Weasdale, and carry tributaries of the Weasdale Beck, which drains northwards off of Howgill Fell and Ravenstonedale Common into the River Lune in Lunedale.
Weasdale, Great Swindale and Little Swindale all share the same soil and grassy, heathland habitat.
Great Swindale has the characteristics of a glacial dale, as does Weasdale itself, whilst Little Swindale is shallower and less well defined, and is dominated by the gill carved by the Little Swindale Beck.
The sandstone and siltstone geology of the area is very different from that of the Yorkshire Pennines to the north and east, and the igneous rock of the Lakeland mountains to the west. Here there are no shake holes, crags or rocky, precipitous gills, rather the area is characterised by rounded, open hills most typical of the title fell.
Great and Little Swindale are very isolated, lying to the north of Howgill Fells, and bypassed by tracks which generally follow the highest ridges, taking in the spectacular views.
The watercourses in both these dales are insubstantial, and can be scrabbled over fairly easily without getting your boots wet.
There is no trace of human habitation in the Swindales or along the Weasdale Beck before the village of Weasdale itself, though there are a couple of large sheep enclosures.
| Swindale near Moorsholm, North Riding [2] |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Click map to see detail |
Some 60 miles (100 Km) due east of Brough, below the foothills of the North York Moors, 12 miles (20 Km) east by south east of Middlesborough, 6 miles (10 Km) west by south west of Staithes and 4 miles (7 Km) south by south east from Saltburn inland from the North Sea coast, 4 miles (7 Km) east of Guisborough, 3 miles (5 Km) south east of the village of Skelton, and half a mile (1 Km) west of the village of Moorsholm in the ancient North Riding of Yorkshire, lies a roughly rectangular area of undulating countryside less than half a mile square (less than 1 square Km) named Swindale.
|[pic] |
|© Alan Swindale - Swindale Farm |
|Click photo to see more |
Swindale Farm, recorded in the 17th century as Swindale House, lies near the centre of the area beside the Caukerdale Beck, which bisects the the area marked on the map as Swindale and was probably the house's original water source.
The area is skirted on the south by Swindale Lane which runs westwards out of the village of Moorsholm, on the west by an ancient land boundary, on the north by the Dale Beck, and on the east by the Swindale Beck.
The Swindale Beck is some 4 furlongs (800 metres) in length, meandering through a scrubbily wooded valley, and is just one short section of a watercourse with several names along its length relating to local landmarks and land holdings, following the custom of the region (The Dale Beck is also just one section of a beck that has many names along its length). With care the narrow beck can be leapt without getting your boots too muddy.
A feature called Swindale Nook is marked about the middle of Swindale Lane.
|An area of grouse moor some half a mile (1 Km) to the south west of the end of Swindale Lane is called Spindle Bogs, |
|draining eventually into the Dale Beck. If this is an ancient name then it is surmised that it could be related to |
|Swindle, and eventually Swindale. |
|N.B. This is pure surmise, and no attempt is made to look into it further. |
The following entry is taken from "A Dictionary of English Surnames" [11]:-
Swindell, Swindells: James Swindell 1621 SRY; Humphrey Swindells 1647 PN Ch i 147. From Swindale House in Skelton (NRY).
|Swindale |
|Swindell |
|Swindells |
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"As I interpret this it means that the name James Swindell was found in the Subsidy Rolls for Yorkshire in 1621, and the name Humphrey Swindells in a reference from 1647 in 'The Place Names of Cheshire' from the English Place Names Society, Vol i, page 147. The surname is believed to have derived from Swindale House in Skelton in the North Riding of Yorkshire". Alan Swindale [2]
The regular nature of the field boundaries shown in the First Series Ordnance Survey map, coupled with the reference above, suggests that this Swindale Farm was founded during the enclosure movements in the 16th and 17th centuries, when the farm was created from open common moorland. If this is the case then the absence of any major geographical feature bearing the name Swindale, and the naming of only a short section of the beck to the east as Swindale Beck, suggest that the farm was named after the family that founded it, or they gave it the name themselves, rather than the name being ancient in the landscape.
| Swine Dale on the island of Westray, Orkney [2] |
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|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Swine Dale, Westray, Orkneys |
|Click map to enlarge |
Westray is one of the northernmost inhabited islands of the Orkney archipelago, twenty miles (30 Km) off the northern tip of Scotland.
Historically the Orkneys were ruled by Norway after Vikings settled there in the 9th century. The Vikings displaced the Celtic or Pictish population, and for centuries the language spoken there was Norn, a dialect of Old Norse similar to Faeroese and Icelandic.
In the middle ages the population began to come under the influence of their nearest trading partner, Scotland, and Norn gradually gave way to Scots. The Orkneys were finally annexed by Scotland in 1468, and Norn finally died out in the late 18th century. Most placenames in Orkney today are of Norse origin.
CLICK HERE to see more about Norn and Scots.
The geographical feature marked as Swine Dale on Westray in the Orkneys is a shallow valley, some 540 yards (500 metres) long running down the middle of a spur or ridge. There is no suggestion of a stream on the Ordnance Survey map of the area, though it may have been obscured by peat growth over the last couple of thousand years. Or the feature may represent a fault or some other geological phenomenon.
Swine Dale runs steeply down towards cliffs some 225 feet (70 metres) high just south of the point of Red Nev on the exposed western coast of the island, with nothing to protect it from whatever the Atlantic might throw at it.
There are no traces of human habitations in the area, most dwellings being on the eastern side of the island, in the lee of the few, but high, hills.
| Other possibilities |
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| Uckington in Shropshire [2] |
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The following deed from 1756 names the constituent parts of an estate in Shawbury and Moreton Corbet, Shropshire. One of these parts is called Swindle and is underlined below.
|[29] [from Scope and Content] Confirmation of an assignment of 15 August 1755 Walter Smythe, Thomas Ottley and John |
|Windsor TO the same trustees, of £5000 secured on the manor of Acton Reynold, capital messuage and land (tenant late John |
|Dickin), property in Shrewsbury and Moreton Corbett (tenants late John Dickin, Robert Beech and Elizabeth Burrey widow), a |
|messuage and land (reserving Duncott meadow, Little Duncott and Mill Leasow), with the Upper New Leasow, Lower New Leasow, |
|Bradmore croft near Fern Hill, Further Fern Hill, Nearer Long Breach, Further Long Breach, Old Hill, Old Hill meadow, Over |
|Field, New Piece, Clover Leasow, Chappel Yard, and Sheeps Yard, all in Uckington in the parish of Atcham (tenant William |
|Jones); another messuage and land called Broad Yard, Long Croft, Turners Hedge Buttfurlong, Marsh Furlong, Tilmoor furlong,|
|Gorsty Piece, Seech Leasow, Brice Furlong, Bolas Hill, Springswell Bines, and Swindle, in Uckington (tenant Robert Bolas), |
|Meadow Brook Leasow, Bradmoor croft, Tilmoor New Leasow, the Patch, the Croft Wall Hill, and Bine Wickett in Uckington |
|(tenant Joseph Bennett); a messuage and Meadow Marsh Furlong, and Marsh meadow in Uckington (tenant Edward Blockshead); a |
|messuage and Crossfeild, Wettreans, Butlers Yard, Wheat Hill, Lower Whiteway, Middle Whiteway, Upper Whiteway, Charlton |
|Field side, piece by Grices, the Yard, New Leasow, Overfield, Marsh Meadow, and Further Field in Uckington (tenant |
|Nathaniel Jones at £113 10 rent); a messuage (tenant Joseph Battley) at £3 10. 0d. rent; a third share in the Shrewsbury |
|waterworks and of an island in the Severn belonging to the waterworks; all for the remainder of a term of 1000 years |
|(created by a mortgage of 30 October 1752 John Corbet TO John Windsor). |
The deed lists packages of land, most of which appear to be specific fields, but some may be larger packages constituting farms or smallholdings.
The compiler will investigate this further.
| Syndale in Kent [28] |
| |
| |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|CLICK to see more |
This was identified by a correspondent whose ancestors include a Joseph Alexander Swindale, a farmer living near Lenham in Kent, who is mentioned in Bagshaw's 1847 Directory [28]
Syndale is a dry valley through the chalk downs of north Kent, climbing gently south westwards from near Faversham.
A large house now called Syndale Park Motel appears to have been the centre of an old estate, and buildings called Syndale Farm and Syndale Farm Cottages are found in the vicinity.
Five miles (8 Km) further up the valley, near the village of Wichling, is a house called Syndale Bottom.
| Distribution of Swindale placenames |
| |
Six of the eight Swindale and Swindale Beck placenames are found within 20 miles (30 Km) of each other in Westmorland.
The placename Grizedale also means Swine Dale (from Old Norse), and it is found in the same area as the knot of Swindales in Westmorland. These Grizedale locations are greater in number than the Swindales and they spread more widely, extending southwards into north Lancashire.
The concentration of Swindale/Grizedale place names in this one small area is a curiosity that fascinates the compiler, but for reasons you will see below it probably has no relevance to the origins of the surname Swindell/Swindale etc, so the question is not pursued here.
However if you are interested, CLICK HERE to see thoughts on this clustering.
| So did the surname come from a place called Swindale? |
| |
On the assumption that any Swindell/Swindale family members who had lived in an area in antiquity would have left some trace in the records, the WWW was interrogated for other genealogical studies, published citations, Hearth tax, Window tax, Census records, births, deaths, marriages etc for Westmorland [5], Yorkshire [6] and Orkney (NB. Surnames became established in Orkney centuries later than on the Scottish mainland and in England). The Westmorland Protestation Returns for 1641/2 [30] were also inspected - these cover all the parishes where Swindales and Swindale Becks are found in Westmorland.
To the compiler's surprise, no surnames whatsoever that would approximate to Swindell/Swindale etc were found in any official records relating to the parish of Shap, nor in Edendale or Lunedale.
A few Swindale marriages appear in the 17th to 19th centuries in towns close to Shap in Westmorland, such as Penrith and Alston, and the surname is still found in Cumbria today. However, similar numbers of Swindell/Swindale records are found in other counties of England in the same period, so it cannot be concluded with certainty that those found today in Cumbria represent a significant concentration of long-standing native residents rather than more recent immigration (more about these later).
Swindale House in the old North Riding of Yorkshire is recorded as having been associated with a James Swindell in 1621, and a Humphrey Swindells from a Cheshire reference dated in 1647, but searches of the WWW revealed no other Swindells/Swindales in the area in antiquity, nor in more recent times.
No record of any surname similar to Swindale was found in Orkney, nor in the vicinity of Uckington in Shropshire.
Only one Swindell/dale family was found on the WWW in the area of Syndale in Kent, in a blog reporting on the 1881 census - they lived near Faversham and were involved in stone masonry, and they were all born in Matlock in Derbyshire. Joseph Alexander Swindale, the ancestor of the correspondent who brought him to the compiler's attention, was not found in the search - this was because Bagshaw's Directory is presented on the WWW in image form only, not as text (Note that only the actual text of a web site can be automatically incorporated in indexes generated for search engines, not the contents of a picture, photograph or other image).
| The answer? |
| |
The only Swindale etc locations found to be associated with the surname Swindell/Swindale etc were those near Moorsholm in the North Riding in the 17th century, and Syndale and Faversham in Kent in the 19th century. It seems probable that a Swindell(s) family from Cheshire founded Swindale farm near Moorsholm in the late 16th or early 17th century, and left it after a generation or two with no descendants remaining in the area. The only family found near Syndale in Kent hailed from Derbyshire, and no other trace was found of the family of Joseph Alexander Swindale.
The earliest records transcribed onto the WWW for the Shap, Edendale and Lunedale areas show no Swindell/Swindale etc surnames, and there is no trace of the name there today. This strongly suggests that these areas did not contain Swindales etc at the time records began.
The placename Grizedale has the same meaning as that generally ascribed to Swinedale, and it is found in the same area as the knot of Swinedales in Westmorland. Unlike Swindell/dale, Grizedale is also a well known, long standing surname in the area today - in the Westmorland Protestation Returns of 1641/2 [30] it is seen as Grosdall and Grysedall.
It is the compiler's conclusion that none of the locations examined here was the original home of the Swindell/Swindale/Swindle etc surname. CLICK HERE to see the reasoning behind this conclusion.
| |
| |
|This calls into question those "authoritative" sources which place the origin of the surname in a place called |
|Swindale, and specifically that Swindale near Shap. |
| |
| |
| |
|It would appear that they do so on no firm evidence, but simply on :- |
| |
|• |
|a cursory analysis of the modern spelling of the surname |
| |
|• |
|the assumption that the surname is derived from a place called Swindale |
| |
|and • |
|the belief that that Swindale is near Shap in Cumbria. |
| |
| |
| |
|These analyses, assumptions and beliefs are not supported by the evidence presented in this study. |
| |
| |
| |
|If you can refute any part of this assertion with documented evidence I will be more than pleased to incorporate your|
|comments in this web page and modify its conclusions. But please do not simply quote "authoritative" sources or |
|family lore without firm, documented evidence - even the "authorities" get it wrong sometimes. |
| |
| Where do the oldest records say the Swindales/Swindells used to live? |
| |
No records of Swindale etc surnames were found associated with any of the Swindales in Cumbria, nor in Orkney. The Swindale name associated with Moorsholm is believed to be transient, and references to the name at the other possible locations are extremely sparse or non-existent.
If the absence of records can be taken as indicating that they didn't come from a place, then where did they come from?
Or if they did come from a Swindale but the line died out in their native place before records began, where did the unrecorded ancestors(s) migrate to in order to establish the dynasties we see today?
The studies below look at Swindell/Swindale etc communities in Cheshire, Cumbria, Derbyshire, Kent, Manchester, and in Hexham and Alston in Northumberland.
|Click on one of the key paragraphs on the | | Research into the Origins of the Swindale Surname |
|right, or page down and read on | | |
| | | |
| | | Documents surviving in the compiler's family |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | Analysis of records available on the WWW |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | Surname SWINDEL in Stoney Middleton and Eyam, Derbyshire |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | The Wirksworth Churchwardens Accounts |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | Manchester Swindells |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | Cheshire Swindells/dales etc |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | Independent study "Surnames as a quantitative resource" |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
|Or if you've had enough, go straight to:- |
| |Summary and conclusions. |
| | |
| Research into the Origins of the Swindale Surname [2] |
| |
The author of this reference is a Swindale whose family was resident in Cumberland (north west Cumbria) throughout the 20th century. The starting point was the assumption that the family had its roots in Swindale near Shap, but the conclusions were a surprise.
| |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Click map to locate Hexham |
The earliest traceable surnames in the area are found in Northumberland, where John Swindale or Swindall and Richard Swindel, possibly John's brother or son, are mentioned in various records between 1653 and 1667.
| |Richard Swindel lived at Mollersteads, 4 miles (6 Km) south of Hexham, a quarter mile from a contemporary lead smelter, |
| |and he and his son (also Richard) are described as 'piper/pyper's, ie plumbers or lead workers. Another son, Christopher, |
| |later moved to work in the smelt mill at Whitfield 10 miles (16 Km) south west of Hexham, on the road to Alston. John |
| |Swindale lived in Warden 2 miles (3 Km) north west of Hexham, but considerably further by road, in the crook of the North |
| |and South Tyne rivers, and had no known connection with the lead industry, but there were early lead workings just to the |
| |north. [2] |
There is strong reason to believe that many, if not all, of the Swindales later recorded in the Hexham area, Alston, Allenheads, west Cumbria and County Durham are descendants of these.
|Swindale |
|Swindall |
|Swindel |
|Swindle |
| |
In Northumberland the surname was first recorded as Swindale, but was most commonly spelled Swindle, Swindel or Swindall. Marriages in the lead mining areas around Alston, Allenheads and in the Lake District over the following two centuries can be traced to these lines. Later generations reverted to the Swindale spelling.
|Lead smelting Mendips |
|Derbyshire |
|Northumberland |
|Westmorland Cumberland|
|Cumbria |
| |
The author suspects that these early Swindales moved to Hexham from the Derbyshire area with the lead smelting industry in the early 1600s. No positive evidence is presented to justify this, but CLICK HERE to see arguments in support.
One Swindle family living in Nenthead near Alston throughout the 20th century maintains the family lore that they came originally from Derbyshire, this lore dating from before 1916. Family lore must always be treated carefully, but cannot necessarily be discounted. In this case the Derbyshire connection is so surprising that it may have a much stronger source than mere supposition, since Swindale near Shap is very close by. Also the Swindale families in Hexham to the north, who are known to have been there since at least the 17th century, are known to have spread to Alston and the surrounding lead mining communities before moving further west to the Cumbrian coast. So this Derbyshire connection, possibly dating back as far as eight generations, may be quite credible despite the lack of documentary evidence. However, it might also be that these Swindles are unrelated to the Hexham Swindales, and moved to Nenthead from Derbyshire far more recently.
IGI records show one Swindale family to be in Leicestershire (adjacent to Derbyshire) in 1692, and others in Lincolnshire (adjacent to Leicestershire), with a marriage as far south as Woodbridge, Suffolk, and a record in Thirsk, Yorkshire, in 1605.
| Documents surviving in the compiler's family [1] |
| |
Letter written after 1862
Edited with punctuation and capitalisation inserted in blue
|Dear Son |[pic] |
|I saw Wm Faulkner this Evening and he tells me you wanted to see me about | |
|the Derbyshire property, but I have nothing to show about it. I can give a |© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|little information of Ancestors. Francis Swindell, my great Grandfather, |This letter was written from Lessness Heath, North|
|was from Derbyshire, he left his native place and entered for a Soldier, I |Kent. Many Swindell families still live in the |
|think in the 32nd foot but I am not certain that was the Regiment, but I |area. |
|think it was for I saw his Discharge at Mr Langham's about twelve years | |
|ago, I think it was dated about 1790 but I am not sure. I have heard my | |
|Father say that after my Greatgrandfather was Married his Regiment was | |
|ordered to America and he left my Greatgrandmother with two Children, my | |
|Grandfather and a Daughter. My Grandfather was Christened Thomas I think. I| |
|am not certain where he was christened, at Orpington or at Farnborough or | |
|where else I do not know. My Greatgrandfather Died about the 1794 or 5 and | |
|buried at Orpington for I have heard my Father say he was at the Funeral. | |
|My Grandfather Thomas Swindell Died in 1823 and was buried at Farnborough, | |
|I was at his Funeral. My Father was the second Son of Thomas. The eldest | |
|Son was Thomas but he Died before his Father and left two Sons who I | |
|believe are living; their Father's name was Thomas. My Father was the | |
|second Son and was Christened Francis after his Grandfather. He was born in| |
|1783 and Died in 1863. I have heard that shortly after the Death of my | |
|Greatgrandfather that two Gentlemen came from Derbyshire into Kent in | |
|search of Francis Swindell and found his Widow at Orpington and they told | |
|her there was property left to her Husband and told her that her Son had | |
|better see into it, but he a poor easy man never troubled him self about | |
|it. I have heard they made her a very handsome present before they left | |
|her. Dear Son you can take this to them that has spoken about it and if I | |
|am wanted send me word and I will come If Please God and nothing happens I | |
|will come [up on] Sunday Next to see you all Hoping all is well I remain | |
|your ever | |
|Affectionate | |
|Father | |
|F Swindell | |
|Beadon Well | |
|Lessness Heath | |
|Kent | |
| |
|Derbyshire |
From this letter and other sources, Francis Swindell (the compiler's great great great great great grandfather) was born about 1735 and left his native place around the middle of the 1700s to settle in North Kent. It is presumed that the last of Francis' family remaining in Derbyshire died out, with no further issue, some time after Francis' death in Kent in 1794/5, hence the visit by two gentlemen ... from Derbyshire looking for his widow to arrange distribution of property from the estate.
It was always a matter of family lore that two brothers came down to Kent from Derbyshire, and the name Jasper appears in the family archive relating to the legacy. No property came to the compiler's family, but some appears to have gone to the descendants of Jasper's daughter, Elizabeth, so Jasper may have been Francis' older brother, or his uncle.
There is reason to believe that the concentration of Swindell families still to be found in North Kent originated from Francis and Jasper Swindell.
| Analysis of records available on the WWW |
| |
The compiler knew that his family line started in Derbyshire, and family lore equated the name with swine dale. So it was a great surprise to find there was no locality named anything like Swinedale in the county.
After identifying the Swindales in Westmorland, the North Riding and Orkney, it was a further surprise to find no significant presence of the surname in any of those localities. However, searching the WWW for versions of the surname in Derbyshire gave a very significant return.
Selectively searching only on Derbyshire, Westmorland, the North Riding and Orkney is unsatisfactory, because it ignores the possibility of significant communities elsewhere in Britain. So WWW searches were made for the presence of various versions of the surname in each county of England. (CLICK HERE to see the methods used when searching the WWW.)
This was a tedious and time-consuming process, and no statistics were preserved to present here.
Only Derbyshire produced more than just a few responses, and many English counties produced no returns at all.
The few responses from present-day Cumbria centred on some of the towns and communities identified in Reference [2], most of which were involved in lead mining. No responses came from Shap or any of the other settlements close to the Swindales and Swindale Becks surrounding Upper Edendale.
Searches on Cheshire found no more instances of the surname than most other counties, and certainly far fewer than Derbyshire, leading to the initial conclusion that it was not an ancient home for the family name. This was re-examined in the light of correspondence received after this web site was published, and the conclusion tentatively revised (see below).
Kent was the first home for the compiler's branch of the family after Francis, and perhaps Jasper, Swindell left Derbyshire in the 18th century. A growing population of Swindells families lived there throughout the 19th century, and many are still there today, but the searches of Kent did not give a return worth remarking upon.
The returns from both Cumbria and Kent were considerably less than those from Derbyshire, and other counties gave similar or greater responses, though still notably less that that from Derbyshire.
It was concluded that Derbyshire was probably the home of the largest number of Swindale/dell families in antiquity.
The observations and conclusion presented above are substantially supported by the study "Surnames as a quantitative resource" to be presented below.
| Surname SWINDEL in Stoney Middleton and Eyam, Derbyshire [3] |
| |
|Swind Swindale Swindal Swindall |
|Swindel Swindell Swindells |
|Swindels Swindil Swindill |
|Swindles Swindolls Swinhill |
| |
| |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Derbyshire |
|Click map to see Stoney |
|Middleton and Eyam |
Some 170 occurances of related surnames appear between 1663/4 and 1860 in the parish records of the Stoney Middleton and Eyam area of Derbyshire. These are variously spelled as Swind, Swindale, Swindal, Swindall, Swindel, Swindell, Swindells, Swindels, Swindil, Swindill, Swindles, Swindolls, Swinhill.
The variety of spellings in this study is worth noting, as more limited studies by their very nature represent a sample, where this is a full account for the period, including some questionable spellings.
CLICK HERE for an analysis of Swindel spellings in Stoney Middleton and Eyam over time.
CLICK HERE for information and views of Eyam [17].
CLICK HERE for information and views of Stoney Middleton [18].
| The Wirksworth Churchwardens Accounts [4] |
| |
| |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Derbyshire |
|Click map to see Wirksworth |
|Swindale |
|Swindall |
|Swindell |
|Swindill Swindle|
| |
| |
This study complements the previous one [3], giving information on genealogy and local history of the Wirksworth area of Derbyshire from 1600 to 1900, listing some 350,000 original records.
Fourteen occurances of the surname are recorded in the archive during the 46 years between 1668 and 1714, variously spelled as Swindale, Swindall, Swindell, Swindill and Swindle.
Note that the Stoney Middleton and Eyam occurrances average out to some 0.85 references per year, where at Wirksworth this figure is 0.31. The Wirksworth figures, however, fall in the period before the explosion in population of the mid 1700s.
Fourteen examples over 46 years is too small a sample to examine the occurrance of the surname over time as with Stoney Middleton and Eyam above.
Targeted searches on the WWW for Swindale/dell/etc in Wirksworth found a few Swindale etc births and marriages in the 17th to 19th centuries, and also showed that the surname is still in the area today, but again, information on the WWW cannot be considered fully representative or complete. The compiler has since spoken to people from Wirksworth, who recognise Swindell as a common surname in the area.
No Swingle or Swingler records are recorded in the archive.
CLICK HERE for information and views of Wirksworth [19].
| Manchester Swindells |
| |
In verbal statements given to the compiler in 1972 and 1987, members of separate Swindell and Swindells families from Manchester acknowledge Derbyshire as their ancestral homes [1], and demographic analysis by the compiler suggests this could be true (but see also Cheshire below).
The dates their ancestors moved there are not known, and this information is so far only anecdotal, but the proximity of Derbyshire to Manchester, which grew rapidly in the 19th century, suggests that a number of different ancestors could be involved.
NB. The centre of Manchester lies some 24 miles (38 Km) from Buxton, the northernmost major town in Derbyshire, and the suburbs of Greater Manchester come within 12 miles (19 Km) of Buxton.
|[pic] |
|Swindell's Fold, Godley |
The postcard on the right shows a house or farmstead called Swindell's Fold at Godley near Manchester about 1910. Godley lies east of Manchester, and about 7.5 miles (12 Km) north east of Cheadle in Cheshire, of which more below. The name of this house suggests that a moderately wealthy Swindell family was established in the area at some time in the past.
The compiler looks forward to hearing from Swindells etc genealogists in Manchester to add positive substance to the history of their name in Manchester.
| Cheshire Swindells/dales etc |
| |
|[pic] |
|Cheshire |
Cheshire is the county adjacent to north Derbyshire to the west.
When carrying out searches on the WWW to identify knots of Swindale/dells in various counties of England, Cheshire produced no more returns than any other county, and considerably fewer than Derbyshire.
However, the information available on the WWW depends on genealogists in the various counties publishing their results in web sites. If nobody does this, even though a particular surname is well represented in their county, then that information is not available for interrogation and search results will not represent that region correctly. This may be the case in Cheshire, where long before the advent of the WWW they had a well-established genealogical network in the Family History Society of Cheshire.
After reading this web site a number of people contacted the compiler, and the following remarks have been added:-
| |Swindell Coat of Arms |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |[pic] |
| | |
| |Commercial organisations that offer coats of arms and family histories place the Swindell surname in Cheshire. |
| | |
| |Macclesfield |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |© Ordnance Survey [20] |
| |Macclesfield |
| |Click map to enlarge |
| | |
| |American Genealogists have traced Swindell/Swindle/Swandal records in Macclesfield, Cheshire in the 1500s. |
| |Swindell Swindle Swandal |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |Macclesfield is about 10 miles (15 Km) west of Buxton in north Derbyshire, though communications between them were always |
| |perilous, most notably over the Cat and Fiddle Pass. Note that a significant knot of Swindell/dale surnames from the 17th |
| |and 18th centuries is documented on the WWW at Stoney Middleton and Eyam [3] about 10 miles (15 Km) east of Buxton. |
| |Square Dealinge |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |After the execution of king Charles I in 1649 monetary tokens were issued from many independant sources. This was illegal,|
| |but in the turmoil and disorganisation of the civil wars and the Commonwealth they fulfilled a need that the fragmented |
| |government could not. The monarchy was restored in 1660, but tokens continued to be issued till their eventual withdrawal |
| |in 1672, amongst which was the square, 1/2d token issued by a Francis Swindell of Macclesfield in 1669, marked SQUARE |
| |DEALINGE IS BEST. The fact that it was issued suggests that he was at least wealthy, and had influence and standing in the|
| |region, perhaps reflecting a long association with the area - alternatively he could have been a criminal profiting by |
| |debasing the coinage [27]. However, the fact that a Swindell family was given a coat of arms in Cheshire suggests that at |
| |least one branch in the county was respectable at some time in their past history. |
| |Congleton |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |An English Swindells family trace their origins firmly back to at least 1760 in Congleton, 6 miles (10 Km) SSW of |
| |Macclesfield, where the family is still thriving at the beginning of the 21st century. |
| |Swindelves |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |[pic] |
| | |
| |© Ordnance Survey [20] |
| |Handforth cum Bosden |
| |Click map to see more |
| | |
| |The author of A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, published in 1901 ([26]), traces his Swindells ancestors back to|
| |at least the early 1600s in the vicinity of Cheadle, some 8 to 10 miles (12 to 16 Km) north of Macclesfield. He also |
| |points to the existence of a small estate called Swindelves in the ancient township of Handforth cum Bosden, south of |
| |Cheadle, with the implication that his family surnames and the placename Swindelves could be connected. |
| |[pic] |
| | |
| |© Ordnance Survey [20] |
| |Upper Swineseye Farm |
| |Click map to see more |
| | |
| |No placename like Swindelves is found today in the Ordnance Survey Gazetteer, but there were three locations called |
| |Swineseye, Lower Swineseye and Upper Swineseye, which were near the south east edge of the ancient township. |
| |There are Swindell(s) families in the area today (2006). |
| | |
| | |
| |CLICK HERE to see more about Swindelves in Handforth cum Bosden. |
| |CLICK HERE to see more about Swineseye in Handforth cum Bosden. |
| | |
| | |
| |Manchester anecdotes |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |Note also the anecdotal comments from Swindells families in Manchester [1], that they believed their ancestors came from |
| |Derbyshire. The parish of Cheadle is today a suburb in the south of Greater Manchester, so it could be that they are |
| |mistaken about their Derbyshire origins and may in fact have come from East Cheshire. It may be that they know about the |
| |the high incidence of Swindell/dale/etc surnames in Derbyshire and presumed they originated there. |
| |Cheshire Swindleys |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |A Canadian correspondent [15] studying the occurance of Swindley in Cheshire noted the Swindell/dales in East Cheshire |
| |around Macclesfield, and showed that Swindley and related similar spellings appear more in West Cheshire, and in Chester, |
| |where Swindell/dale occurs less. |
| |Swindale Swindel Swindilah Swindily Swindlah Swindleah Swindley Swinley |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |They also showed that with changes in spelling over time, the Swindley pronunciation has persisted. The first ancestor |
| |traced in their family was a Swindel who married in Churton Heath, West Cheshire, in 1754, and written records of the |
| |family name varied through Swindilah, Swindale, Swindily, Swindley, Swindlah, Swindley, Swindleah, Swindley, Swindlah, |
| |Swinley, until it finally settled on Swindley and stayed that way. |
| |This study is notable for following a single, genetic family line, in which the vast majority of representations of the |
| |family name reflect a similar pronunciation, with only occasional variations towards Swindale/dle and two variations, |
| |Swindlah and Swindilah which when pronounced in the local dialect but heard by a clerk from a different region might also |
| |have been written Swindler. |
| |By contrast, the compiler's analysis of Swindel etc names over time in Stoney Middleton and Eyam in Derbyshire, to the |
| |east, makes no attempt to follow family lines, just taking what the local clerks wrote in the record. But nevertheless the|
| |variety of spellings was similar to that for Swindley for the correspondent's single family line. |
| |This suggests to the compiler that the family was not literate for much of the early period covered by the data, otherwise|
| |they would have insisted on a more consistent spelling from an early date. |
| |It also suggests that there was an aspect of the local dialect or culture influencing the clerks in the region, |
| |predisposing them to hear the name as Swindley rather than Swindler, Swindale etc. (NB. As a student in Leeds in the |
| |1960s, my friends from Manchester and Cheshire habitually called me Swindley rather than Swindle or Swindell - this may |
| |have been partly due to a character in a popular television soap opera at the time Compiler) |
The Family History Society of Cheshire continues to serve and preserve the interests of Cheshire genealogists and researchers. However, almost all the surnames for which people declare an interest in the CHESHIRE SURNAMES DIRECTORY [8] of the Family History Society of Cheshire are spelled Swindell(s), with none of the variations examined in other studies, and also requests date from no earlier than 1700.
Note also the earlier reference to Humphrey Swindells, in 1647, from the English Place Names Society, Vol i, page 147 quoted in [2], which suggests a link between Swindells in Cheshire and Swindale Farm near Moorsholm in the North Riding.
It appears that the county boundary and hilly terrain between Cheshire and Derbyshire was never an obstacle to the movement of the Swindell/s name and families. Or perhaps there is a characteristic of the language, local terrain or traditional, agricultural practice around the Pennine hills in this area that has predisposed the surname to appear there in more than one locality.
|The greater occurance of the name in north Derbyshire may simply be a result of a few diligent Derbyshire |
|genealogists setting up web sites, whilst Cheshire family historians have not yet done this, relying rather on the |
|excellent CHESHIRE SURNAMES DIRECTORY [8] of the Family History Society of Cheshire. The several web sites in |
|Derbyshire are more likely to give multiple hits on a WWW search than the single Family History site for Cheshire. |
The compiler will repeat the WWW searches and the analysis of the resulting returns from time to time. As more people post their genealogical information on web sites it is hoped that the boundaries of the geographical distribution of the name in antiquity will become clearer.
| Surnames as a quantitative resource [16] |
| |
|[pic] |
|© Surname Profiler [16] |
"A recent research project based at University College London (UCL) has investigated the distribution of surnames in Great Britain, both current and historic, in order to understand patterns of regional economic development, population movement and cultural identity. This website allows users to search the databases that we have created, and to trace the geography and history of their family names." ([16])
This study, which was released onto the WWW in 2006 as the Surname Profiler, allows you to examine the distribution of surnames in Britain in 1881 and 1998. The statistics for 1881 are, of course, taken from the national census in that year.
Examination of the Surname Profiler confirms the conclusions of this study, that that the surname Swindell/dale and other closely related names probably originated around Derbyshire.
CLICK HERE to see the compiler's comments on the Surname Profiler database.
| So did they all come from there? |
| |
It looks as if centuries ago significant groups of people sharing the Swindells/Swindales etc surname lived in Derbyshire and East Cheshire, but did all of today's Swindells/Swindales etc come from this area?
| |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
|Swindell/Swindale family moves |
|17th to 19th centuries |
|Click to enlarge |
|Swandal Swendalls Swind Swindale|
|Swindal Swindall Swindel |
|Swindell Swindells Swindels |
|Swindil Swindill Swindle |
|Swindles Swindolls Swinhill |
|Swyndels |
| |
The variety of spellings of the Swindell/Swindale etc surname in the records in Derbyshire and East Cheshire, and their relative or complete absence in other counties, coupled with the certain knowledge that significant Swindell etc communities elsewhere in England can show their ancestors came from Derbyshire, suggests that in antiquity the region was the home of a great many Swindell/Swindale etc families. (For the reasoning behind this assertion CLICK HERE)
Another conclusion might be that it is the earliest home for them that can be traced through the records. It might still be suggested that the original ancestor(s) moved to this area from nearby Leicestershire or Lincolnshire, or one of the Swindales in Westmorland or the North Riding, or from Northumberland, Orkney, or even the Mendips, but no records were found that could support this.
| Did they come from somewhere there called Swindale? |
| |
It looks like a very significant proportion of Swindells/Swindales etc lived in Derbyshire and East Cheshire in antiquity, so did they come from somewhere there called Swindale?
No, because there isn't one!
Despite the county being rich in ruggedly beautiful dales, and the home of the largest recorded number of Swindell/Swindale etc families in antiquity, there is no present-day placename that approximates to Swindale, and none that might be construed as having looked like Swine Dale in antiquity.
There was, however, in antiquity a place whose name comes down to us today through 14th century documents as Swindelves in the present-day district of Hazel Grove, Stockport, where one source places his Swindells ancestors over a long period. And in the same area today there are remnants of three farms called Swineseye, Upper Swineseye and Lower Swineseye.
|Once again this calls into question the notion that the surname derives from a place called Swindale. |
To counter this you might surmise that the Swindale ancestor did indeed come from one of the Swindales further north, but that all traces of the line in their native place died out completely before records began. By its very nature, it is impossible to test this hypothesis further.
| Where else might the name have come from? |
| |
The following paragraphs discuss other possible origins for the surname. Some of this is based on fact, and some is as speculative as the traditional assumption that it comes from a place called Swindale.
|Click on one of the key paragraphs on | | The swingle connection |
|the right, or page down and read on | | |
| | | |
| | | Surnames and placenames outside Britain |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | What does Swindale mean? |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
| |
|But if this doesn't interest you go straight to:- |
| |Summary and conclusions. |
| | |
| The swingle connection |
| |
|Swingle |
| |
| |
|?? |
| |
|Swindle |
| |
Some genealogical literature suggests that the word swingle or swingler could be an origin. A swingler was a person who used a swingle, an implement used in flax production, and a swingle tree was part of the couplings of a horse-drawn cart. The suggestion is that the trade name Swingler could have changed to Swindler or Swindle.
This derivation is also suggested in the following documents from the compiler's family archive:-
Letter sent to the parish clerks of 37 parishes in London, Surrey and Kent in 1857 [1]
|Post Office |
|15 Royal Hill |
|Greenwich Kent |
|1 July 1857 |
| |
|Sir, |
|Will you refer to your Books for the Marriage Certificates of Jasper Swindall or Swingle and Mary - from 1706 to 1720 |
|also the Certificate of Jasper Swindall or Swingle and Catherine Hutchins from 1738 to 1750. One pound is offered if |
|either of the Certificates are found and Twenty Five Pounds when the property is obtained. |
|I am sir |
|Yours respectfully |
|G Howard |
| |
Advertisement in the Times Monday December 26 1859, edition 23,499 [1]
|TO PARISH CLERKS and others. - WANTED, the MARRIAGE|
|CERTIFICATES of JASPER SWINGLE or SWINDELL, and |
|MARY, from 1708 to 1720; also the Certificate of |
|Jasper Swindell and Catharine Hutchings, from 1738 |
|to 1750, supposed to have been married in London, |
|or in the counties of Kent or Surrey; also, the |
|Baptism of Jasper Swindell, or Swingle, from 1680 |
|to 1690. TWO POUNDS REWARD is offered for each |
|certificate if found. Information to be sent to G. |
|Howard, chymist, head post-office, Royalhill, |
|Greenwich. |
| |
It isn't known whether the Swindell/Swingle synonym in the above documents was introduced by the solicitor or by his client, the compiler's great grandfather, but it did not come down through family lore to the present day despite these documents being known to successive generations [1].
|Swindall |
|Swindell Swingle|
| |
| |
Note also the three versions of the surname in these documents, Swindall, Swingle and Swindell, all from the same solicitor (he styles himself a "chymist", or chemist, but other letters in the same hand show that he also carried out legal work).
| From Swingle to Swindle in Derbyshire |
| |
|Swindale |
|Swindall |
|Swindell |
|Swindill Swindle|
| |
| |
Considering the variety of spellings of Swindle/Swindale etc existing around the same time in the Wirksworth Churchwardens Accounts [4], it is reasonable to suppose that if they all derived from the same source, Swingle, then all the surnames, Swindale, Swindall, Swindell, Swindill, Swindle and Swingle, could have existed there at the same time.
But the Wirksworth archive [4] doesn't show any Swingle or Swingler surnames.
| |NB. The Stoney Middleton and Eyam study specifically examined Swind- spellings, so no comment can be made on the presence |
| |of Swingles there. |
Furthermore no Swingles, neither ancient nor modern, appear in a web search of Derbyshire.
However, Swingler appears in the early 1800s, and continues to the present day.
NB. Targeted searches on the WWW cannot be considered fully representative or complete [1].
| From Swindle to Swingle |
| |
|Swindle |
| |
| |
|\\ |
| |
|Swingle |
| |
It might be assumed that, where it happened, the switch from Swingle to Swindle happened long ago, but during his research the compiler found one family in Australia which consciously decided to change in the opposite direction, from Swindle to Swingle, in the late 20th century.
| Swindler/Swingler |
| |
| |North |Britain |
| |America | |
|Swindler |1,082 |84 |
|Swingler |67 |2,238 |
A Canadian correspondent researching Swindleys in Cheshire [15] also investigated similar names, in particular Swindler and Swingler. They noticed that the proportions of Swindler to Swingler surnames seen in the IGI for North America and Britain are to all intents and purposes reversed, as seen in the table on the right.
The significance of this is not immediately clear, however it must be stressed that the IGI, from which the data in the table were extracted, is not the definitive source, though like the telephone book it gives a feel for population numbers. The IGI reflects church records from the 1500s in Britain, covering about 350 years, whilst the figures from North America, likewise church records, only cover about 150 years from the late 1700s, whilst the social history of population movements with regard to the two regions is very different.
|The compiler found no connection between the surname and swingle or swingler as an agricultural tool or occupation. |
|This calls into question those "authorities" who suggest that this was an origin. |
| Surnames and placenames outside Britain |
| |
| Norse and Scandinavian names and places |
| |
The English placename Swindale is only found in areas of Britain that were Norse speaking, and similar names survive throughout the Norse and Scandinavian world.
The Norse tradition has two ways of forming a surname. In the first the daughter of Sigurd can choose the surname Sigurdsdottir, whilst her brother might take the surname Sigurdsson.
The alternative tradition is to take one’s surname from a place, most typically the place of origin.
The surnames Svinadalur, Svinadal, Svinndal and Svindal are found in Iceland, Norway and Sweden. These are taken from placenames that are generally presumed to mean Pig Valley.
Svinedal, Svendal and Svennedal are placenames and surnames found in Denmark, and the surname Svandal is also found in Iceland and Scandinavia.
CLICK HERE to see more about Norse and the other Germanic languages of Britain.
| Swindells in the United States |
| |
A search for Swindell finds a great many in the United States, where most of the family genealogy sites seen followed family lore in suggesting the surname derived from Swindale, or Pig Valley, locating it near Shap in Westmorland, modern Cumbria, England.
Many of these certainly came from England, but in many other cases the name had a quite different root :-
| |Svinadalur |
| | |
| | |
| |\\ |
| | |
| |Swindal |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |One American Swindal family traces their surname directly to an Icelandic ancestor who adopted the surname Svinadalur, |
| |from his native place, before emigrating to the United States in the late 19th century, where it was anglicised to its |
| |present form. This was a time of massive emigration from Iceland to Canada and the United States, after the ash fall-out |
| |from a volcanic eruption devastated Iceland's farm land. Svinadalur is taken to mean Swine Dale by all sources seen. |
| | |
| |Schwindel |
| | |
| |Schwindler |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |These German surnames are words that can convey either dizziness or swindling/cheating. Apart from their perfectly |
| |legitimate occurrence as names, they were often given, scurrilously, to refugees fleeing from persecution in the east as |
| |they entered the Austro-Hungarian Empire or Prussia, irrespective of the name they gave to the border official at the |
| |time, which the official may have found impossible to pronounce or spell. This was written into official papers given to |
| |the refugee, and later taken through Ellis Island into the United States, where the name may have been anglicised to |
| |Swindle or Swindler etc. In many such cases the refugee's original name may have been lost altogether. |
| | |
| |Schwingel |
| | |
| |Schwingler |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |A documented origin of Swingle and Swingler in the United States of America is the anglicisation of the German names |
| |Schwingel and Schwingler, which may also have been anglicised to a name similar to Swindle. The German name may be taken |
| |as meaning Shakespear. |
| | |
| |Zwingler |
| | |
| | |
| |\\ |
| | |
| |Swingler |
| | |
| | |
| | |
| |The name Zwingler is a Jewish and east European surname that has been shown to have been treated by immigration officials |
| |in much the same way as Schwingler, and anglicised to Swingler or Swingle, or by less kindly officials as Swindler or |
| |Swindle. |
So, although many American Swindell/dale families can be shown to have originated in Britain, care must be taken in assuming a link in all cases.
The link may not, however, be completely impossible:-
|• |European families have settled in Britain at various times in antiquity and the recent historical past. |
| | |
|• |On the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660 Charles II brought Dutch and German artisans back with him. |
|• |During the Commonwealth (1649-1660) Jews were officially allowed back into England after their expulsion in 1290 during |
| |the reign of Edward I. |
| | |
|• |Mercenary troops or soldiers of fortune of all nationalities fought with the various armies during the Hundred Years war|
| |(1337-1453) and the Forty Years War (1618-1659), and many fighting for the English later settled in England. |
| | |
|• |Merchants established representatives in Britain during the middle ages, many of whom became accepted citizens and took |
| |an active part in society, trade and government. Notable among these are Flemmings who settled in East Anglia with the |
| |wool trade, and Italian wine merchants in Southampton. |
The compiler once met an architect from Cologne who was taken aback by the name Swindell, recognising it as German, Schwindel. [1]
The following section is the compiler's speculation on other meanings of the surname and placename, based on his knowledge of the way that surnames and placenames have changed over the centuries. If it doesn't interest you please skip straight to the Summary and conclusions.
| What does Swindale mean? |
| |
This study began with the assumption that the surname we write today as Swindell/dale/etc was taken centuries ago from a place called Swine Dale.
The study found no link in the records between today's Swindell/dale/etc surname and any of the Swindale locations in Britain. It would appear that the assumption that a name ending in -dale or -dell must necessarily have come from a valley does not always hold.
We have also seen that within a single genetic line, a family name that started off written as Swindel in 1754 varied through Swindilah, Swindale, Swindily, Swindley, Swindlah, Swindley, Swindleah, Swindley, Swindlah and Swinley, until it finally settled on Swindley.
This shows how the pronunciation of a name can vary within the same family over several generations, so how can we know what the family called itself before it first appeared in the records as Swindel? And what was so special and inevitable about the Swindley pronunciation? Couldn't it just as easily have ended up as Swindale or Swindell?
The following is the compiler's thoughts and flights of fancy on how the name might have developed from something that might have had nothing much to do with pigs and dales. This is, of course, pure speculation, but is it any less valid than the the un-proved notion that Swindale/Swindell means pig valley?
| Placenames |
| |
|Salisbury |
| Searobyrg |
| |
|Shrewesbury |
| Scrobbesbyrig |
| |
|York |
| Jorvik |
| |
|Pendle Hill |
| Pennal |
| |
|Newcastle on Tyne |
| Monkchester |
| |
|Blackwater, Surrey |
| Bredeford |
| |
|Bradford-on-Avon |
| Wirtgernesburg |
| |
|Simonburn |
| Simonsbyrgan |
| |
The table on the right shows just a few placenames you will come across today, with the names they were known by at some time in the last thousand years, the period during which surnames emerged. Some of them have changed subtly, some have been replaced, and at least one has changed its meaning significantly.
For instance Simonburn, a small village in Northumberland, looks like it is called after a stream or burn, but its ancient name, Simonsbyrgan, shows it was a fortified place or byrg, and sure enough the ancient ruins of a substantial fortified house sit on a hill in the village.
So we can't be sure that a placename we see today is anything like it was centuries ago. Consequently we cannot claim that a surname which today looks like a particular, modern placename must have come from there, because we don't know what the placename was in antiquity, in the age when surnames were beginning to emerge.
| Surnames |
| |
Similarly with surnames.
When a young man ran away to be a soldier he might have named himself after the place where he grew up, and on his discharge he might have settled just a few miles or many counties away from his native place.
As the generations went by the pronunciation of his surname would change with the dialect of his new adopted home. Coupled with that, changes in the English language would make elements of the surname that were once meaningful quite meaningless, or take on new meanings, whilst the placename suffers similar, quite independent, changes.
On top of this, the memory of his original native place will be lost within a generation or so. It might be passed down to his children, and possibly his grandchildren, but how many of us knew where our great grandparents lived before we started digging into the records, records that were much more difficult to find and consult in days gone by?
So any real family association between the surname and a location can be lost in a couple of generations, and the pronunciation of the name will then evolve quite independently of the pronunciation of the forgotten placename.
|Blanksby |
| Blingsby Gate |
| |
|Sapsford |
| Sawbridgeworth |
| |
|Stopford |
| Stockport |
| |
The table on the right shows just a few modern surnames, with the modern spellings of the places which it is known they originated from. The last two surnames in particular could lead you to assume that they refer to places beside fords in rivers, but this is obviously not the case. And a name that originally had nothing whatsoever to do with a dale or a dell could also evolve in just the same way to look, misleadingly, as if it did.
So claiming that a surname as we see it today must have originated from a placename that today looks somewhat similar is often quite false. This could then lead the genealogist in completely wrong directions in their researches, as indeed it initially did with the main contributors to this web site when we followed family lore to the Swindales in Westmorland.
Modern writers put less emphasis on placenames being the origin of surnames than was the case in the mid 20th century. For recent published accounts see:-
| • |
|Surnames and Family History [9] |
| |
| • |
|The relevance of surnames in genealogy [10] |
| |
In these writings it is noted that "locative" surnames, ones derived from placenames, tend to be concentrated close to the places the names were taken from, remaining there even if the original settlement disappeared long ago. It is further noted that many such surnames now look nothing like the original placenames, and only close etymological and historical examination has drawn out the connection.
You should not make assumptions about the origins of placenames or surnames from their modern spellings without looking more deeply into their etymology and histories.
| Nicknames |
| |
But a surname could equally, and perhaps more probably, have come from a descriptive nickname, trade name or occupation rather than a place.
An occupation, in particular, may be passed down from father to son, such as Thatcher, Archer, Shepherd etc, and after a few generations it could be fixed as the surname of everybody in the family.
You may feel that a surname like Swindale is unlikely to have come from an occupation or nickname, because the dale at the end has all the features of something that is seen in modern placenames. But the fact that dale in a surname looks like the word we use for a geographical feature, a valley, could be nothing more than an accident of time, dialect and spelling.
Who can say what a nickname in the Danish/Saxon dialect of the mid Pennines in the middle ages sounded like? We only have their modern spellings, not their ancient sounds, and these spellings have only been stable for a couple of centuries, a few generations.
It may well have sounded and meant nothing like the surname we see written today - the elements swin and dale could have grown from something quite different from the pigs and valleys we assume from today's speech and spelling.
| If it doesn't mean pig valley what does it mean? |
| |
From the absence of any Swindale placename in Derbyshire it looks as if the name may not be a locative name, so some descriptive name should be considered.
Amongst the contenders might be names ending in the Old English word dœll meaning a dalesman (OID). So Sweindœll could have been the name of someone called Swein living in a nearby dale - "Swein the Dalesman" (the Scandinavian languages do not use the definite article except before an adjective). Or in an age when Saxons were differentiated from more recent Nordic settlers, Sweondœll could have identified the Swedes or Vikings living in the dale.
Names structured in this way could have been applied to many people living in separate dales, which could explain the wide distribution of the name in the county.
This is, of course, speculation, but for more thoughts on how the surname could have evolved from ancient Saxon and Nordic words meaning something other than pigs and dales see :-
|What else could the name have meant? |
| |
But if you prefer to believe the surname comes from somewhere called Swindale, by all means go straight to the conclusions below.
| Summary and conclusions |
| |
| |
|© Ordnance Survey [20] |
Many Swindale/dell families, and many "authoritative" sources, put the origin of the Swindale/dell surname in a place called Swindale, and many of them place this near Shap in Cumbria. Many sources also suggest a link with the agricultural activity of the swingler
This study identifies several Swindale locations, all in the north of Britain, but finds no evidence to link the surname Swindell/Swindale etc with any of them. No correspondents have come forth since the publication of this web site with any evidence contradicting this.
|Swandal Swendalls Swind Swindal |
|Swindale Swindall Swindals |
|Swindel Swindell Swindells |
|Swindels Swindil Swindilah |
|Swindily Swindill Swindlah |
|Swindle Swindleah Swindles |
|Swindley Swindolls Swinhill |
|Swyndels |
| |
Large groups of many different spellings of the surname are recorded in Derbyshire in the earliest extant records. No other counties in England sampled on the WWW had such numbers. Correspondence with other genealogists also identifies many families in East Cheshire, adjacent to north Derbyshire.
|[pic] |
|© Surname Profiler [16] |
An independent study, analysing the 1881 census, shows the greatest concentration of Swindell/Swindells surnames in the Derbyshire area, with a significant population of Swindales.
This suggests that Derbyshire/East Cheshire is the earliest traceable home of the Swindell/Swindale etc surname.
No link was found between Swindell/dale etc and Swingle/Swingler in Derbyshire in antiquity.
|No Swindale or similar placename has been found in Derbyshire, today or in |
|antiquity, so either:- |
| |the Swindells/Swindales etc of Derbyshire and East Cheshire are |
| |descended from somebody who took their name from a place called Swindale|
| |whose location is no longer known, or which has evolved over the |
| |centuries and no longer looks anything like Swindale, or which never |
| |looked like Swindale in the first place |
|or | |
| |the surname is not derived from a place known today as Swindale, but |
| |from an ancient surname, nickname or descriptive phrase. |
The spellings of the endings of the many versions of the name found in Derbyshire in antiquity suggest that they may not bear any relation to the ancient, local dialect pronunciation of the word used to identify the geographical feature today known as a dale.
|It is the compiler's conclusion that :- |
| |the surname did not originate in any of the Swindales in Westmorland, but in the Derbyshire/East Cheshire area |
|and | |
| |it is unlikely that Swindale/dell/etc is a locative name. |
|If you know of an existing place or any other lost village in Derbyshire or East Cheshire that could be construed as Swindale I |
|will be more than pleased to incorporate your comments in this web page. |
| |
|If you can present documented proof of a firm, ancient link between the name Swindale, Swindell, Swindle etc and Swindale near |
|Shap, or in Edendale, or near Weasdale, or any locality elsewhere than the Derbyshire or East Cheshire area, I will be very |
|pleased to incorporate it in this account. |
| |
|The information available on the WWW is continually expanding. |
|The situation is reviewed from time to time and changes made when new information appears on the WWW. |
|If you know of a documented source of information that can add to what I have presented here, or demolish any of my flights of |
|fancy, please get in touch. |
|David Swindell |
|[pic] |
| |
| Contributors, references and acknowledgements |
| |
| Subsidiary discussions presented in the above text |
|Methods used when searching the WWW |
|Interpreting the information in the early records |
|Languages in Britain |
|The welsh connection |
|Thoughts on the clustering of Swindale placenames |
| List of Swin- placenames in Britain |
| List of Grize- and Grise- placenames in Britain |
| Boar- and Bor- placenames in Britain |
| Placenames beginning with or containing the element "hog" |
|Justification for saying they didn't come from Swindale in Cumbria |
|Did the Swindales go to Hexham from Derbyshire? |
|Analysis of Swindel spellings in Stoney Middleton and Eyam over time |
|Spellings of Somerset surnames in Toad Pool, Derbyshire, circa 1630 to 1870 |
|Swindelves in Handforth cum Bosden |
|Swineseye in Handforth cum Bosden |
|Analysis of the Surname Profiler database |
|What could Swindale/Swindell mean if it doesn't mean Pig Valley? |
| Other possible origins of the placename Swindale |
| Occupations and nicknames that might have evolved into the Swindell/dale surname |
| References to the following sources are given in square brackets in the text - eg [4] |
|[1] David Swindell - Compiler |
| |Documents surviving in the compiler's family |
| |[pic] |
|[2] Alan Swindale |
| |The Origins of the Swindale Surname |
| | |
| |And personal correspondence |
| |Swindale - Skelton Parish |
| |(skelton)/swindale_(skelton).htm |
| |Great and Little Swindale - Weasdale |
| |(weasdale)/swindales(weasdale).htm |
| |Swindale Beck - Brough |
| |(brough)/swindale_brough.htm |
| |History of Swindale Chapel in the parish of Shap |
| | |Transactions of the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian & Archeological Society |
| | |Vol 1 New Series 1901 |
| | |Pages 256 - 267 |
| | |ART. XX. - Swindale Chapel. |
| | | |By the Rev. J. WHITESIDE, M.A. |
| | | |Communicated at Carlisle, June20th, 1900. |
| |Swindale Beck - Knock |
| |(knock)/swindale_(knock).htm |
| | |Newspaper cutting concerned with the building of the Haweswater reservoir. |
| | | |Bound into a copy of "A Backwater in Lakeland", published in 1925. |
| |Further information is added to these references from correspondence between the author and the compiler |
|[3] Rosemary Lockie et al |
| |Surname SWINDEL in Stoney Middleton and Eyam, Derbyshire |
| | |
|[4] Cumbria/Cumberland/Westmorland Genealogy Links |
| | |
|[5] The Wirksworth Churchwardens Accounts |
| | |
|[6] Yorkshire genealological sources |
| | |
|[7] Rosemary Lockie et al |
| |Surname SUMMERS/SOMERSET/SOMERSALL in Toad Pool, Derbyshire |
| | |
|[8] Mr Alan Bennett |
| |Cheshire Surnames Directory |
| |The Family History Society of Cheshire |
| | |
|[9] David Hey |
| |Surnames and Family History |
| |History Today, Volume: 51 Issue:7 July 2001 pp38-40 |
| | |
|[10] Society of Genealogists Information Leaflet No. 7 |
| |The relevance of surnames in genealogy |
| | |
|[11] P. H. Reaney, R. M. Wilson |
| |A Dictionary of English Surnames: Revised third edition 1997 |
| |Oxford University Press |
|[12] History, Topography and Directory of Westmorland, 1851 |
| | |
|[13] Swindale |
| |Gateshead Civic Walking Club |
| | |
|[14] Nick Channer |
| |Take a walk round Brough |
| | |
|[15] J D'Annunzio |
| |Email correspondence on Swindley, Swingler and Swindler |
| |iosono@sympatico.ca |
|[16] Daryl Lloyd, Richard Webber and Paul Longley |
| |Surnames Profiler |
| |Surnames as a quantitative resource - 2006 et seq |
| | |
|[17] Cressbrook Multimedia 1997 |
| |Eyam |
| | |
|[18] Derbyshire UK |
| |Stoney Middleton |
| |Guide to Derbyshire and the lower Peak District |
| | |
|[19] Cressbrook Multimedia 1997 |
| |Wirksworth |
| | |
|[20] Ordnance Survey Maps |
| |All maps in these web pages marked © Ordnance Survey are produced from the Ordnance Survey Get-a-map service, and |
| |reproduced with kind permission of Ordnance Survey and Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland. |
| |Ordnance Survey's gazetteer of 250 000 placenames |
| | |
| |The Ordnance Survey ATLAS of Britain |
| |Ordnance Survey and Country Life Books 1982 |
|[21] Andrew Leaney |
| |Leaney's Lakeland Fells |
| | |
|[22] Sub 3000 - The Wee Hill Bashers Web Site |
| | |
|[23] Sub 3000 - The Wee Hill Bashers Web Site |
| |Mickle Fell |
| | |
|[24] //gtleisure.co.uk/walks/pw91/pwa107.htm |
| |//gtleisure.co.uk/walks/pw91/pwa107.htm |
|[25] George Tod |
| |Diaries of a Long distance Walker |
| | |
|[26] Charles Wareing Bardsley M.A., Worcester College Oxford, Late Vicar of Ulveston, Lancs. Revised for the press by his widow. |
| |A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, with special American Instances |
| |Henry Frowde, London, Oxford University Press, Amen Corner, 1901 |
|[27] East Anglian Magazine, July 1964 |
| |D.A. Sidell |
| |17th Century Tokens and their Origin |
|[28] Bagshaw's 1847 Directory - see page 7 in the following link :- |
| | |
|[29] Shropshire Archives: The Stobbs Collection |
| |Creator(s): Stobbs, M S, fl 1946, of Shrewsbury, Shropshire |
| |Deeds - ref. 163/1-100 |
| |Shawbury (Acton Reynold) and Moreton Corbet |
| |FILE [no title] - ref. 163/72 - date: 31 July 1756 |
| |(To find out more about these archives contact Shropshire Archives) |
|[30] The Westmorland Protestation Returns 1641/2 |
| |Edited by MA Faraday, M.A. |
| |KENDAL: Titus Wilson and Son Ltd, 28 Highgate, 1972 |
|Oxford English Dictionary |
| |Oxford University Press |
|The Complete Works of Geoffrey Chaucer |
| |edited from numerous Manuscripts - Skeat ed. 7 vols., Oxford, 1894-7 |
|Sweet's Anglo-Saxon reader |
| |ed. By C.T.Onions Oxford: Clarendon Press |
|Hall's Concise Anglo-Saxon dictionary |
| |ed. By Sean Crist |
| | |
|Zoëga's Old Icelandic Dictionary |
| | |
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