Cladish family

The first link I have to the Cladish family is Ann Elizabeth Cladish. She was born in Margate in 1818. At first I was somewhat bemused by finding, that according to one record, she was born in Buenos Aires. I spent some time trying to figure out how she had arrived at Margate in Kent from South America. This mystery was eventually solved when I found out that a small area of Margate on the seafront, close to the present-day station, is named Buenos Aries. So my somewhat fanciful idea of relations from foreign parts was dashed.

Ann married Thomas Wells in Kent in 1838. Her parents were John Cladish and Rebecca Christian. The name of Cladish is probably one of the rarest surnames in the UK and may be virtually extinct. It took me some time to trace John and Rebecca's marriage. In the meantime I used sources such as the IGI to record as many of the family members as possible. It is very likely that this family emanates from one source, that is somewhere in Kent. The earliest record to date being in Stone, Isle of Oxney around 1595 when William the son of Henry Cladish was baptised. I have not been able to trace links to this person but I am fairly certain that the links via Thomas Cladish through to John born before 1700 are correct. The records for Chislett show a John and a Thomas Cloddesse sons of Joseph and Thomasine Cloddesse being born in 1679 and 1680. Allowing for pronunciation of the name it is very probable that these are the Thomas and John we find later using the surname Cladish.

I have documented all of the Cladish names that I have been able to find to date and it is clear to me that they will all link up. A Stephen Cladish circa 1750 begins a major branch and his baptism, currently missing, if found should link all of the family to the one source, hopefully this baptism will eventually turn up.