The Spurgeon family Bible
Conversation with Charles, Roy, Joan, Graham, Paul, Gladys Spurgeon, Sacremento, California, March 1968.Graham: What other brothers did you have besides those two.
Charles: Well, I had Uncle Cecil, Uncle Sid, and Uncle Walter, and there was Uncle Charles next, and then there's Harold, Arthur, and George, that's seven boys, and three girls.
Graham: Who were the girls?
Charles: Ethel, Winifred, and Hilda.
Joan: There was a lot, big family.
Charles: Seven boys and three girls, yes.
Gladys: And two died, too.
Charles: Yes. We have the family bible here somewhere.
Roy: Have you really?
Charles: There's definitely just too much history there.
Graham: (unclear)
Joan: Like Uncle Charles. It's Uncle Harold, Uncle Arthur, Uncle George, and your grandpa.
Graham: And who did you descend from, your family?
Joan: That's what we've been talking about. Where've you been? (laughs) Poor Graham he gets confused with uncles and grandpa's.
Charles: Do you have any relatives on your side?
Joan: My own family?
Charles: Yes.
Joan: Yes I have a brother, just one brother. That's all.
Roy: And I don't have any.
Joan: We are going to make a family tree, aren't we Graham, and you can take it home and look at it.
Charles: Here's the bible. It's very old, it will fall apart.
Joan: Put that glass over there. Can't you see dear?
Graham: There's Cecil Robert Spurgeon born on the 31st March 1879, and Ethel May Spurgeon born December 1st 1880, then Sidney Francis Spurgeon July 26th 1882, then Catherine Edith Spurgeon (Charles: she died) born March 9th 1884, and she died, then there's Henry George Spurgeon born July 12th 1885, and Albert Edward Spurgeon (Charles: he died too, in childbirth) born 17th January 1889, there's Walter James Henry Spurgeon (Charles: that's your father) born 11th December 1898 (loud remark), Frederick Spurgeon (Charles: who?) Arthur Frederick Spurgeon born 31st December 1895, then Herbert Harold Spurgeon born 14th October 1896, and Hilda Charlotte Ellen Harriet Spurgeon born 3rd March 1899, there's Charles Ernest Spurgeon (Charles: that's me) born 11th November 1891 or 2 - it's a squiggle (Charles: 1892, mother made a mistake there), Winifred Evelyn Eugene Spurgeon born January 3rd 1902.
Roy: And that's the whole lot.
Graham: It's the family bible, is it?
Charles: This bible will fall apart.
Graham: It belongs to Sarah Spurgeon.
Charles (to Roy & Joan): Yes, that's your grandmother.
Joan (to Graham): That's your great-grandmother.
Graham: From his (Joan: her) loving sister, Edie Fisher
Charles: That's Charlotte, aunt Charlotte
Graham: Charlotte's sister, In 1896, August 1896.
Gladys: What does it tell us, on the front page, where they were married or something. Up at the top.
Graham: Family of Robert and Sarah Spurgeon, married at Ormesby, I think, Attleborough.
Joan: Show it to daddy, you can't...
Roy: Attleborough
Charles: Attleborough, that's right, I was telling you a little while ago.
Graham: Thursday February 1878
Charles: 1878?
Roy: You see they can't be far removed from err, from err
Paul: There's not enough to get 46 cousins in here.
Roy: Charles Haddon, because he was born on the 19th June 34, 1834, and his sons were born...
Charles: When were they married? What year?
Graham: 1878.
Roy: ...the sons were born in 1856, you see, so they can't be far removed.
Charles: No, no.
Roy: It's a sort of horizontal, not a, it's not down here, it's somewhere down here.
Joan: Well they had lots of family, lots of children in those days.
Roy: Yes, exactly. That makes it more difficult.