Please note: this part of the family tree is conjectural.Ancell Clark lived in Leonard Stanley, a little Cotswold village near Stonehouse on the road leading to Stroud, Gloucestershire.  Centred around the ancient parish church, the village includes a couple of public houses, a vicarage, post office, general store, a manor house and a variety of houses, large and small, ancient and modern.

 

In the book Men & Armour for Gloucestershire in 1608,  Ancell Clark (or Anselme Clarke), a broadweaver, was categorised as II M, that is a middle aged man suitable to be a musketeer for military purposes.  Little is known about him except that he had two sons: Augustine baptised on 4th April 1615 and William baptised on 3rd January 1617/18.

On the 26th January 1682, William Clark had a son Moses, who was  christened at the same parish church. According to Philimore’s Marriages” of 1897 Vol. II, William Clark and Elizabeth Allin were married at Leonard Stanley on 27th April 1682.

The record of Gloucestershire churches show that on the 24th August 1729, Moses Clark and Ann Williams, both of the same church were married at St. Michael’s Church, Gloucester.  It is assumed that Moses moved there from Leonard Stanley.

There are a number of references to Clarks or Clarkes of Leonard Stanley.  A gravestone on the right hand side of the path to the church is to the memory of “our dear mother Harriet Clarke, who departed this life  Feby 2nd 1898, aged 75 years”  A list in the church of Chaplains, Ministers, Curates and Vicars includes Samuel Clarke 1628.

A wooden board in the north chapel, listing benefactions to the church includesMiss Sophia Clarke who left £38-11-3 three per cent Consols, the yearly interest thereof to be given to the poor of the Parish.

A war memorial to those who served in the first world war shows the names of W.A.Clark, Somerset Regt. and J. Clark, Royal Garrison Artillery.

On another note, a list of transportees from Gloucestershire between 1783 and 1842 includes: Clarke, Susanna, aged 20, dressmaker of Leonard Stanley, sentenced to 7 years transportation, and conveyed on the ship Grenada (NSW). The source of this information is Gloucestershire Record Series Volume I:

‘Transportees from Gloucestershire to Australia 1783-1842’, edited by Wyatt, 1988.

A local inhabitant of the village remembers the only Clark in the village as an elderly lady who kept a general store, which has since been replaced by another building.