I hope I am not considered presumptuous in suddenly sending so much, but this is typical of me; I'm the one who sits there quietly for a few weeks or months, listening, and then suddenly becomes voluble.

Reading through Donald Sydney-Fryer's biographical sketch I was fascinated to see that CAS's maternal ancestors spent time in Devon, which is where I am. According to him the Gaylords have a published genealogy, which presumably says where in Devon (and Somerset) they were. My first assumption is Exeter, the major city for SW England, where a lot of Huguenot families settled, including the ancestors of Thomas D'Urfey, the playwright and publisher. Through my contacts at the Devon Records Office I could try to find out more about the family, if this is of interest and hasn't already been done. I'm currently putting together a book on Devon's literary associations, and it will be great to get CAS into it, if only indirectly, as a person whose ancestry spent time in England's loveliest county (there's also meant to be a connection with James Branch Cabell, but this is becoming more dubious on examination).

I must admit to being a bit worried about the confident statement (repeated uncritically in Stephen Jones's piece in the Emperor of Dreams collection) that one of CAS's paternal ancestors was beheaded for his involvement in the Gunpowder Plot. As far as I am aware, no one was beheaded for implication in the Gunpowder Plot. The punishment for treason was to be hanged, drawn and quartered (I could give a graphic description, but am sure that such erudite readers as are in the Eldritch Dark will not need me to). For royalty, or the higher echelons of the nobility, the sentence was usually commuted to beheading, but a baronet in Lancashire wouldn't have counted as either. The fact is that no history of the Plot that I have read mentions anyone called Ashton. This is not to say that the family weren't sympathetic to the plotters, and did not suffer for their catholicism (Lancashire was a hotbed of it). But they weren't major players, and unless someone has more specific information, I would suggest that this is a bit of family myth-making rather than historical fact.

Best wishes
Bob

I tend to agree with you regarding CAS' ancestors and the Gunpowder Plot, and I am also quite familiar with the process involved in British executions for high treason, having read a biography of William Wallace, among other things. Roger Dobson was doing some work in this area before he was sidetracked by the Mad Cow disease panic, but I've lost contact with him. However, I'm asking a couple of mutual friends to place us back into contact, and perhaps you and he might care to do some delving. Getting back to gunpowder treason and plots, I might point out that it really doesn't matter whether CAS had one of his ancestors spoon fed his own mountain oysters or not, just so long as he believed he had! This legend would certainly have reinforced his self-image as a rebel and as an outsider, not to mention as to one persecuted for his beliefs. We all have our family legends, mine is that Joseph Connelly of the Easter Rebellion martyrs was my granddad's cousin (and we do have cousins by the name here in the States). I'll try to dig up some geneological information I have on CAS; contact me offlist. Best, Scott

Bob, It would be great to see some research in to cas's background. I did a little look at the 1901 Census for England and Wales but lacked enough information to really find anything. Let us know how you get on. If it goes well we can have CAS's family tree up on the site - perhaps next to his one of the Gods.

B.:-))

I absolutely agree that it is what CAS thought about his family that matters to his life and work, rather than the historical truth, but the pedantic historian in me likes things to be within the bounds of what is verifiable! 'He believed that one of his ancestors was beheaded etc etc' makes me happier than 'One of his ancestors was...etc'. I know we're only talking footnotes here, but I love footnotes. And the Devon connection does intrigue me. Talk soon...
Bob