Twins born in different years! Family history gems with Family Tree's Dear Tom columnist

Family historians always enjoy a genealogical mystery and in Family Tree we love to share our readers’ stories of family history wonders, gems and funnies. You'll find such snippets collected from all over the world by stalwart family historian Tom Wood in his hugely popular Dear Tom column.

Many of our readers send us family history stories gleaned from their genealogical searches, such as Raymond Blight, who wrote into Tom recently with news of a fascinating discovery in his wife’s family tree of a pair of twins who were not only born on different days, but different years!

How is this possible, you may ask?

Well, it seems that Raymond’s wife’s grandfather, James Townsend, was born on 1 January 1891 – but his older twin brother Robert had arrived a few hours earlier, on 31 December 1890! The boys were the sixth and seventh children of Charles Townsend and his wife Susan East, who lived in Dover Road, Upper Norwood, London, and they were baptised together on 5 April 1895 at All Saints Church in the parish.

Tom wonders if they did celebrate their birthdays on different days. Does anyone else have similar stories in their trees?

Don't miss these other family history funnies from Dear Tom:

Twin trouble! More family history fun with Dear Tom

A house of Maxwells: Family history fun with Family Tree's Dear Tom columnist

A friendly chap?

Now, from twins to unusual birth names. What about this? Margaret Armstrong, from New Zealand, dropped Tom a line about a gentleman called Reconcile Loasby, who she came across while doing some research for a friend. Reconcile was born on 10 May 1754 in Kettering, Northamptonshire, England, and died on 11 October 1840. Margaret has also found his name occasionally spelled Reckencile and Rickincile on records, ‘but primarily Reconcile’.

What a splendid moniker, we wonder what the story was behind it?

Read the full version this Dear Tom column in the September 2018 issue of Family Tree on sale from 31 July 2018 in our online store and in all good newsagents.

• Have you got a genealogical gem for Dear Tom, or can you help a fellow family historian with a query? Email us or comment on our Facebook or Twitter pages and we'll pass your snippets on for Tom's consideration.