Have you stayed put?

I live 8 miles from where I was born!
I grew up in the road DM had lived in as a child, but in the house next door but one.
DF was born 1.6 miles from where I live now.
We're lucky enough to live on a beautiful bit of the coast, in fact the house I live in now is literally on the promenade!
DS had to work away for the first few years of his career, but came back here as soon as he could, he doesn't want to live anywhere but where he grew up.
DDiL is from inland, but jumped at the chance to live near to us on the coast. They live diagonally behind our house, one road back from the prom.
I may consider moving slightly inland if we downsize as all the houses on the prom are big, family homes, and ours is really a bit too big for just the two of us.
However, when I say inland, I mean within two hundred metres of the prom, I couldn't live without smelling the sea every day!
DS has already informed us that if we move, he'll be buying our house, he wants DGS to grow up in the same house as he did, with the prom and beach right outside the front door!
It takes less than 1.5 minutes to walk from our front door to stepping on to sand, I'm not giving that up in any sort of a hurry

Also, my dad's ancestors were farmers from Lancashire but must have moved down South at some point.

Born and lived in South London till I was 7, then family immigrated to New Zealand in 1963. Saw many beautiful places as we had to go and return by passenger ship... so grateful for that. Came back to South London in 1968. Moved from there to Eastbourne in 2001. Could not imagine living back where I was born, the place has changed so much and now I appreciate living in the country near the sea.

I was born in Southport and with my stepdad being an engineer we went on to live in Macclesfield, Hove, the birthplace of anthracite wherever that was, followed by Texaco in Trinidad and the CAT company in Kuwait.

Born in Lancashire, then Uganda, school in Wales, then berkshire, Hampshire and back to Lancashire. Short time in London, then Leicestershire, Yorkshire, Gloucestershire, 15 years in Spain and now finally, I hope, Oxfordshire.

When I look at my family's history, converging on S London in second half of the 18th century, we have ancestors from Herefordshire, Suffolk, Somerset, Leicestershire, Hertfordshire, Sussex, Pembrokeshire, Essex, Lincolnshire and Surrey. Almost came from agricultural backgrounds, but left there to work in some kind of service industry, some time after the Industrial Revolution.

Still live in the town I was born in. I/we tried moving away to Wales (70 miles away) - sold our house, bought one in Wales but couldn’t go through with it. Roots were too deep, friends too far away to have a coffee with. In a way I regret not carrying the move out but felt it was too late in life to up sticks also.

I live 20 miles from where I was born and grew up , where I grew up was where my paternal grandmother and ancestors lived, now I live where my maternal grandmother and ancestors lived .

At 65, I now live 10 miles from where I was born and my childhood home, for the first 8 years of my life. In the interim, I have lived all over the UK, in Holland and in Sweden. My kids are well travelled and very confident, which I know is related to us living abroad, so I'm so pleased we did that. The situation of caring for my mother brought us back to the area, and I am loving it - back to my roots in northern England. I won't be going anywhere else! I look around at some families though, and some work colleagues who would not entertain moving away from their familiar childhood home, and I always feel they are missing so much! Just my opinion of course....

Reminds me of a conversation I had with an old lady shortly after we moved to our present house 8 years ago. She lived in a house on the road behind ours, so our gardens backed on to each other. She was telling me how, as a little girl, she used to play on the fields where our house now is. She then said “I haven’t always lived here. I used to live next door.”

I was born in London, moved to Hertfordshire as a child. Married and moved to Bedfordshire, then Cambridgeshire, back to Hertfordshire, then onto Scotland for 20 years. Now living in Staffordshire.
So, Yes moved a lot over the years. None of my family live close by or live where they were born. All have moved several times over the years.

I am always surprised by people that still live in the same place they were born and have never thought of moving away, and their families also live close by.

Luckylegs I too was surprised at the number of posts from the North and particularly Lancashire, whether they left or stayed.

grammargran A whole new thread could be started on accents! I have had Cumbrian, Geordie, Northern Irish, Scottish, Welsh (North) and Lancastrian influences on my accent and usually can only be defined as 'Northern'.

My 2 siblings & I are all within 6 miles of our 1st home.Though my eldest sibling has lived abroad . EllenT...least we come from beautiful county. Lancashire . Interested in your freecen. Would love to know more. A.

This thread is so reassuring to me in that so many members are in or from Lancashire or the NW, and I include Liverpool, the Wirral and North Yorkshire as that’s all local to me. I had no idea as I assumed (for some reason) most members were from the Home Counties!

I’m born and bred in Lancashire, have lived as far away as Manchester but moved 8 times in and around Lancashire due to my husbands job. My mum was from Yorkshire so I think I’m not far from my birthplace.

My great aunt traced my mother’s paternal family back to France in the 1100s .They later escaped to England with the Huguenots. Part of the family stayed in the Southampton area,part in London and part in Yorkshire.,My parents grew up in Rotherham and then moved to Barnsley,where I was born. I was there until going to college in London. Had 3 years at college and then 3 years teaching in North London.
On getting married I moved to Nottingham and have been here ever since. My heart is still in Yorkshire but ,widowed for 10 years now, I can’t see myself returning. I have my DD,SIL,DGS and DGD here and the rest of my family are in Pembrokeshire -300 miles away ,sadly.

EllenT. I also did a lot of transcribing of the census for FreeCen. My areas were the east end of London and opposite to your experience so many of the families came from Poland/Russia or Germany, possibly following pogroms and persecution. And in many cases they arrived with children born in their home countries, then had one or two here, then the next one or two were born in U.S.A, or Canada, followed by another one or two born here. Can you imagine the hardships of taking a voyage across the Atlantic with several small children in those days. Then coming back!! Some also seemed to move around within England before returning to the east end.
In my own family apart from a g g grandmother from Ireland my ancestors seem to have moved between Cornwall and London, and Worcestershire.

My ancestors are all from Yorkshire apart from one arm that moved up from Lincolnshire many generations ago and one great grandfather who was from Devon. I was born outside the county (but in the north!) and when I was 3 my parents and I moved back to Yorkshire followed a few years later by my maternal grandparents. So we were all back where our roots were. The paternal grandparents never left Yorkshire.

I have lived in two different counties in my life. Neither of my parents were born in those counties and generations before that were from Eastern Europe.

Born in Gloucestershire and never moved out of the county. Happily all the family are around, too - well, it is a beautiful part of England! However, I can trace ancestors on my mother’s side back to the Isle of Man, and I would love to know what brought them so far south. However, a question for all of you who’ve scattered far from your birthplace, have you kept your accents or have you adapted your speech to where you live now? Do people try to guess your origin?

I moved because of marriage, fifty years ago to Sweden, would give anything to move back to the UK!
My parents always lived near to where they were born, until they died, their parents moved from Ireland and Yorkshire, my Mum and Dads generation didnt seem to move about much, they loved where they lived and where I grew up.

Originally from Wiltshire, I never really went back to live once I went to college. I worked in London and Singapore (where I met DH), and we settled in Northants where his job was based. Been here since 1972, with tours of duty in Cyprus and Australia.
DM was from Sheffield and was posted to Wiltshire with the Land Army where she met my father. She never moved away.
I am the eldest of five and we are all scattered far and wide.

Born in Hampshire - but due to county boundary changes, found myself living in Dorset. Actually moved back to the same village I was born last year as we love the area, despite the changes time has brought.

Nannyxthree agree with you there! My paternal grandfather ended up overseas at the end of WW1 and stayed! My mother and her family had stayed within 20 miles of the bigger town though, due to WW2 jobs and postings one aunt who was a WAF married a man all the way from Alnwick ( to Darlington) and my other maternal aunt went to work in Jamaica to avoid the scandal of baby born to her as an unwed woman. So yes wars do move people about as does lack of work, famine etc. Sadly still happens now!

It must have been a wrench leaving Herefordshire, though, but they never went back there.

Yes Jalima - that's another good point too about shifting populations. In the 19th Century the 'push pull factor' accounted for so many people coming into cities to find work - and build the railways, so a big thanks to your ancestors! The mechanisation of farming pushed my ancestors out of a rural life and the pull of the cities where they could find labouring work or go into the new factories and workshops accounted for my not being born in the countryside. So interesting to see how life has changed and evolved for the working man and woman.