Rowney Family Tree

George was born around 1731 in the village of Dunton, in Bedfordshire, England. His only sibling, an older half-brother named John, died in 1736, when George was around 5 years old. His father passed away just two years later, in 1738, when George was 7 years of age. It is believed that his mother remarried shortly after his father's death, to a man named Thomas WATTS. The movements of George and his mother after his father's death are not known for certain, but it seems likely that they made their way from Dunton to the nearby town of Gamlingay, in Cambridgeshire, sometime in the following years.

George was married to Anne LARKINS in Gamlingay, in 1753. He would have been around 22 years of age at that time. Anne was a 19 year old native of Gamlingay.

After their marriage, George and Anne settled in Gamlingay and began raising their family there. Their first child, Mercy, was christened there in 1753. She was followed by a son, William, who was christened in 1754.

Anne seems to have died shortly after the birth of William, although the exact date of her death is not known. She possibly died from complications in childbirth. She would have been only 20 years of age at that time. It is not known whether William survived, and in fact no traces of either of George's first two children have been noted in connection with his family in later years. Perhaps they were raised by relatives or friends in the area, or perhaps they both died in infancy. Both Mercy and William would have been little more than babies when their mother died. George was remarried relatively soon after Anne's death, so it is also possible that he continued to care for his own children, perhaps with the assistance of a housekeeper.

This theory is supported by the circumstances of George's second marriage, to Elizabeth CULLIP. It appears that he had two children with Elizabeth before they were formally married, so Elizabeth may have lived with him and helped him with his children after Anne's death, and their relationship might have developed from there. Elizabeth would have been around 23 years old when Anne died. George and Elizabeth's first child, Thomas, was born around 1755. His place of birth is not known, but he was probably born around Gamlingay, where the family seems to have continued living. It seems that most of George and Elizabeth's children were not christened until later in life, so information on their family's movements over the years is scanty. Their next child, named George, was believed to have been born around 1756.

George and Elizabeth had also formalised their relationship by that time. They were married in 1757 in Gamlingay. George was around 26 years of age and Elizabeth was 25 years old at that time. They possibly had several children. Assuming they were all still living, they might have included; Mercy (aged 4), William (aged 3), Thomas (aged 2) and George (aged 1). Their youngest son, George, was christened in Gamlingay the following year, in 1758, when he would have been around 2 years old.

In 1764, another daughter, Mary Ann, was born. Her place of birth is not known, and the movements of the family over the subsequent two decades are equally unclear. Their probable son, James, followed around 1766, however his association with this family has not been confirmed, and no place of birth has been identified. The last of George and Elizabeth's known children, Hannah, was born in 1770, but once again her place of birth is a mystery.

In 1777, their son Thomas died when he was around 22 years of age. His place of death is not known.

In the May of 1784, their daughter, Mary Ann, was christened at the age of 19. She was christened in the town of Kempston, just a short distance from the city of Bedford, in Bedfordshire, where George and Elizabeth's family had by this time settled. Mary Ann had perhaps a reason for making her peace with God at that time, as she died just four months later, a week before her twentieth birthday, in October 1784.

Their son George was married to Hannah HALL in 1786, in the small village of Goldington, on the outskirts of Bedford, in Bedfordshire. George and Hannah subsequently settled and raised their own family in the city of Bedford.

Their next son, James, was married in 1788. James was married to Mary SMITH in Kempston, and his younger sister, Hannah, was also christened there on the same day at the age of 17. James and Mary settled in the village of Cardington, just across the river from Goldington, near Bedford.

Elizabeth died in Kempston in 1800 at the age of 64.

George died in Kempston the following year, in 1801, when he was around 70 years of age.