Lunch at the Manor with "Cousin Robert"

Even after 19 trips to the U.K. and nearly two months of extraordinary experiences on this visit alone, it was a "pinch-me" moment: Having lunch literally with the "lord of the manor" in his private living quarters in a stately home maintained by the National Trust -- a manor that dates back to the 1470s.

How, you ask, did that come about?

My cousin and traveling companion on this leg of the trip, Little Margaret, was a Floyd before her marriage. Our daddies were first cousins; there's a Hedrick woman tangled up in the family tree somewhere. Margaret, the historian, can quote chapter and verse how it is we're related. Anyway, her daddy was Marshall Floyd of Denton and Margaret, always known to me as Little Margaret, was an only child like myself. We've been close friends all our lives, both attending Guilford College and discovering a common love of travel that led to her joining me for the third time now abroad.

Last spring, while sorting out a possible itinerary for Little Margaret, our friend Susan and myself, I found Great Chalfield Manor, a National Trust property not too far from Highclere Castle, the "Downton Abbey" site we all three wanted to see. A visit to Great Chalfield in neighboring Wiltshire, if for no other reason than by virtue of its proximity, made sense.

Quite by accident I then discovered that the donor tenants of Great Chalfield are a couple named Floyd. Wonder whether there's any connection? I wondered. And being a bold American and former fundraiser ("if you don't ask, you don't get"), I wrote to Robert and Patsy Floyd to see whether it might be possible to meet them while we were on the premises.

Not only did they say yes, they invited the three of us to lunch! In her email response, Patsy even offered some tantalizing tidbits of Floyd family history -- a William Floyd of New York was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, a Julie Floyd married Sir Robert Peel who became Prime Minister, and a Sir John Floyd had a distinguished career as a professional soldier in India. It seemed likely that these Floyds and Margaret's ancestors may have intersected at some point.

Naturally, we couldn't accept the Floyds' gracious invitation fast enough!

Margaret got to work on the internet and with Denton relatives to dig into her genealogy further. By the time our lunch at Great Chalfield rolled around, she was armed with additional tempting Floyd facts -- including some bits about her earliest documented ancestor, a John Floyd, born in Wales in 1570. His sons, Nathaniel and Walter, were the first known Floyds to arrive in America -- in Jamestown, VA, in 1623.

Robert, our host, was obviously fascinated by the history Margaret had dug up, and offered some morsels of his own. He brought out photos of some of the Floyd men, one of which bore an eerie resemblance to Marshall Floyd, and a well-worn copy of Burke's Peerage, the Brits' "Snob's Bible." The conversation never lagged for a moment. I could've listened to Robert talk for hours. Very posh and aristocratic, don't you know.

By the time lunch was over, Robert and Little Margaret (who by now had morphed into "Lady Margaret") had pretty much agreed to claim kin with one another whether there is firm evidence or not.

Even if we hadn't had the opportunity to meet these charming people, we would have loved Great Chalfield.  Robert Floyd's grandfather bequeathed the property to The National Trust in 1943 with the understanding that his heirs could live there as long as they chose to do so. Robert and his wife, Patsy, have made it their home for most of their marriage, raised their three boys there, and continue to manage the property for The Trust.

One of the key features of the moated seven-acre estate is the Arts & Crafts garden, which is Patsy's domain. It's absolutely exquisite. Adjacent is the tiny Parish of All Saints church, which has occupied its prime spot across the manor's courtyard since 1316.

A delicious lunch, lively conversation, a glimpse into the lives of genuine English aristocrats -- and their dogs -- in their own kitchen, a stroll around a beautiful garden on a warm sunny day, and making new friends: Days just don't get much better than that!

And if my cousin turns out to be kin to these good people, doesn't it follow that I can claim kin, too? If it's between a drafty, unpainted shack in the Flat Swamp township of Davidson County or Great Chalfield Manor, guess which one I'd select as my ancestral home?