We don't yet know where the first known Oxfordshire Brogden, George, came from but he founded a dynasty of Brogdens whose descendents are still in Oxfordshire today. He married Elizabeth Brown in the Oxfordshire village of Bampton in 1709, and his children were all born in Stanton Harcourt, 6 miles away.

Taking Stanton Harcourt as the centre for distances as the crow flies on the map, George as generation 1 and an approximate count of Brogdens and their children (but not their wives), we find that most migration was within very few miles. There were some very adventurous moves, including to New Zealand, Australia and the United States of America as well as relatively less adventurous migrations to Lancashire and to London but the majority of Brogdens moved no more than a very few miles in several generations. This is typical, as Kate Tiller reports:

"...Many people operated in a circuit of five to ten miles, encompassing their own and adjoining settlements and often the nearest market town. For labouring people this was the area in which they normally found marriage partners, work and housing." (English Local History; Sutton Publishing; 2002)

• The first three generations of Oxfordshire Brogdens, 12 in all, lived in Stanton Harcourt from about 1709 to the 1830s. No Brogdens are recorded in Stanton Harcourt after 1835.
  
  
• 59 members of generations 4, 5 and 6 lived 2 miles away in South Leigh for 100 years from about 1780 and it was from here that branches of the family moved to Wallingford and Crowmarsh Gifford in Berkshire (as it then was) (16 miles from Stanton Harcourt), *Lancashire, London, New Zealand and Australia (and from Australia, on to the USA). Some moved from South Leigh to Cogges (2.5 miles ) and Cumnor (3.5 miles). No Brogdens are recorded as living in South Leigh after 1880 although one returned to be buried there in 1923.
  
  
• From Cogges, some Brogdens moved to Oxford (6.5 miles from Stanton Harcourt): 11 members of generations 7, 8 and 9.
  
  
• The Cumnor Brogdens thrived from the early 1800s to the present day - 6 generations from generation 5 to the present 10th generation; 109 in total over the 200 years.
  
  
• From Cumnor, some Brogdens moved to Appleton (5 miles); Aston and Cote (4 miles); Brize Norton (6.5 miles); Botley/Hinksey (4.5 miles); Upton (13.5 miles) (near Didcot, then Berkshire) and Didcot (12 miles).

*The Brogdens who moved from Oxfordshire to Lancashire may have been surprised to find themselves in a county already populated with a large number of not-directly-related Brogdens who had been part of a pattern of migrations west and south from Yorkshire which had been taking place for many generations.

Updated: 08/08/2002