THE Badham One Name Society is holding its 16th AGM and conference in the Green Room at the Haverfordwest Leisure Centre on May 16. The guest speaker will be Simon Hancock, curator of Haverfordwest Town Museum. Anyone interested is welcome to attend.

If you are a Badham or have Badham ancestors with a home in south-west Wales, your family roots are most likely around Saundersfoot or Tenby where the surname still has a stronghold.

However, there has been an association with Haverfordwest since at least 1591. More recent researches indicate a Badham presence in the parishes to the north-east of Haverfordwest such as Llys y frân and Bletherston over at least two centuries.

The name, which originates from 'ab Adam' also goes back a long way in the Welsh Marches counties of Gwent and Hereford, and the ap Adams of Gwent have known family links with Pembrokeshire from the 13th century. Some of the families in Glamorgan and Gwent migrated with their coal-mining skills from the area around Saundersfoot, and especially Begelly, to help work the developing south-east Wales mines.

Most, if not all, local families originate from the marriages of George and John Badham who were both married at the parish church in Begelly on May 7, 1803. DNA evidence confirms they were at least close cousins, but probably brothers.

The Badham One Name Society is always interested to find out more about the origins of the name in Pembrokeshire and will be carrying out further researches at the Pembrokeshire Archives in the three days leading up to the conference.

More about the conference programme, the society and a book on the surname may be found on the society's website: http://www.badham.org.uk">www.badham.org.uk.

For further information or contact, please email: [email protected]">[email protected] or write to the society secretary, Peter Badham, at Old School House, Old Radnor, Presteigne, Powys LD8 2RH.