Walter Reynell, MP, of Malston & Badlingham merged with his "father"

Posting a few more profiles to associate with this discussion.

Father: John Reynell, MP, of Trumpington
Mother: Maud de Fulborne
Profile: Walter Reynell, MP of Malston & Badlingham
1st wife: Agnes Reynell
2nd wife: Margaret Reynell
3rd wife: Joan Reynell
Son & heir: Sir Walter Reynell, MP, of East Ogwell

This seems odd, because if this Walter was the son of John Reynell, then it would mean John was 82 years old when his son Walter was born, and Maud de Fulborne, had been dead for 17 years. It makes a lot more since to me that there was another Walter in between this one and John Reynell as other websites say.

Dear Charles (if I may),

One of the problems of Geni is that people assign arbitrary birth-dates to fit the tree, rather than the other way round. There are of course very old men who (allegedly) father children. Senator Strom Thurmond apparently had a child in his nineties. But it is extremely rare to find a real birth-date at this time, unless you are dealing with Kings and Things. There are of course exceptions. One of the joys of using the history of parliament as a source is the understated humour of some of the entries. A Nothern MP at about this time married for a third time in his seventies, to try finally to get an heir, got him, had a riotously drunk christening party, and 16 of the drunk guests killed each other. So as a result you have a precise date for the christening.

My latest joy is a seventeenth century MP. Robert Harley, 1st Earl of Oxford, who was managing the House of Commons on behalf of the King, gets a neighbour to keep him voting the right way. First dinner goes swimmingly. At the return dinner, the "keeper" is too flattering to the wavering MP. "Keeper"'s wife makes an appalling scene; with the result that "keeper" and the MP's wife run off together (though they are promptly caught). Presumably Robert Harley loses the automatic vote on which he had been counting.

Mark

Mark, thank you for your reply. There sure are a lot of "interesting" characters who have held high positions. It's too bad so many others have confused this branch of the Reynell tree. It definatley gets very confusing when numerous people share the same name. Charles.

It looks as if the Walter Reynell who married Margaret Stighull and Joan Bassingbourne has been divided into two separate people again. Also, farther down the line, a @Robert Reynolds, III (b. 1505) who had previously been listed as being the father of several children including a Christopher Reynolds, now is shown to have no children. Are there reasons for these changes?