My eight times great grandfather, Elnathan Botsford (1641-1690) appears to have believed in the KISS principal, Keep It Simple, Sir! On this date, 12 December, in 1665, he married Elizabeth Fletcher, the daughter of John Fletcher. They had one daughter, Elizabeth (1665). Elizabeth Fletcher must have died because on this same date in 1667, he married my eight times great grandmother, Hannah Baldwin, the daughter of Timothy and Mary Welles Baldwin. Both times, the marriage took place in Milford, Connecticut.

With Hannah, there were eleven additional children brought into the world: Esther (1668), Samuel (1670) [my seven times great grandfather], Mary (1671), Hannah (1674) [my seven times great grandmother], Joanna (1674), Henry (1676), Timothy (1678), John (1680), Sarah (1683), Ruth (1686), and Joseph (1688).

For any paying attention, you realized my seventh great grandfather and seventh great grandmother were siblings. They married other people, but their descendants seemed to have found each other and married. Hannah married John Prindle. Their daughter, Hannah, married Samuel Botsford, Jr. , the son of Samuel and Hannah Camp Botsford. One of the ways I have become my own cousin. And one of the reasons I use for buying myself gifts — “I got this for you, cousin!”