S - Sarah Elizabeth Laney

There are two people in my tree with this name. My great great grandmother, born in Nelson New Zealand in 1850 and her first cousin born in Wolverhampton, Staffordshire in 1839.

I came across the elder Sarah from a DNA match which Dad had – third cousin twice removed. Pretty faraway, but the only one at that point possibly hinting at the next generation back. Always sceptical about some of these small matches I did a bit of research of my own. Ancestry had identified the match as being on my grandmother’s side which was correct and age, place and other family names seemed to match – or look likely too. The biggest hook for me that this was right, was that her father’s name was Leander.

It isn’t a very common name, I’m not even sure where it comes from, but it sure helped to persuade me that the tree was correct and the match was valid. Leander appears through many generations of the descendants of my great great great grandfather who emigrated to Nelson in 1842 and raised a family there. I messaged the match, way back in 2020 and I am still patiently waiting on a reply.

Sarah’s parents were married in Oxford in 1827. At the time of their marriage Leander was living in Newbury, Berkshire. By 1841 the family had moved and were living in Cleveland Street, Wolverhampton. They had six children by then and none are recorded as being born in Staffordshire on the census. On later censuses the younger ones are recorded as being born there. They went on to have thirteen children, although not all survived to adulthood.

Sarah’s father is a musician on the 1841 census and in 1851 he is a Teacher of Music, and they have moved to Merridale Street. They were still at this address in 1861 with six of their children. On this census, Sarah aged 21 is a dressmaker. She married Joseph Simpson in 1868, he was a tailor. In the 1871 census Sarah is still listed as a Dressmaker despite being married with a toddler and another baby on the way.

Joseph and Sarah had a family of seven although three of her eldest children died before their second birthdays. By 1881 Joseph had become a Hardware Merchant’s Packer but Sarah was still contributing to the family’s income as a Dressmaker. Sarah continued to work into her widowhood after Joseph died in 1899. She died in Wolverhampton in 1912.

Maybe this Sarah is your great great grandmother? Or one of her siblings is your ancestor. I would love to hear from you and reconnect the branches of the tree.

 

R - Roxillanna Lawrence

What a great name – don’t you think? 

Roxillanna was born in Coventry in 1899. Her father was my great grandfather’s first cousin. They lived almost next door to each other for some of their childhood, but a seven-year age difference may have meant they didn’t know each other well.

Roxillanna was the middle child of nine although as her elder twin brothers died in infancy so she will have grown up as the third child with five sisters and one younger brother.

Her father was a Fruiterer, managing his own store in Birmingham and later Coventry. Her mother took over the business after the death of her father in 1917. Not long after his death, in 1918, Roxillanna married Cecil Payne. Cecil was a public servant on the 1921 census working at the Ministry of Labour employed at the Government Instructional Factory. In 1939 at the outbreak of World War Two he was an Assistant Production Manager.

Cecil and Roxillanna had two daughters.

But where did her name come from? Did she like it? It was quite different to her sister’s names – Nellie, Rose, Jessie, Gladys and Doris.

Do you know this family? Can we help each other? Please get in contact if you think we have a connection.

Q - Questions

Genealogy is all about questions. What do you know? Who do you remember? What was it like? Where did you live?

Some people answer willing to share, flattered that you have asked. Others don’t. Nothing to know here, what do you want to know that rubbish for? Some answers are chinese whispers with just a skerek of truth woven in. Other questions get answered with answers which create more questions.

There are so many places now to search and research, compared with what was available sixty or so years ago. But there is always a question before you begin, where can I find out about…?

Most of the records we seek are full of answers to questions posed by officials. What is your name? Where were you born? What is your occupation? When were you born? What is your father’s name? How old are you?

Slowly we can build a picture of the people we have never met and put their lives in context. See the world as they saw it, imagine their wonder if they could see today’s world (or maybe their despair).

Would the people who didn’t want to answer questions, or who gave vague answers be surprised about what we have been able to discover anyway? Would they feel that the past had been honoured, the people respected, their lives cherished?

I hope so.

P - Peternell Eastment

Peternell was born about 1733 and baptised at Hardington Mandeville in Somerset. Most of her siblings were baptised in East Chinnock which is where she married Richard Bartlett in 1760.

She and Richard raised a family of six sons and one daughter. Three of those children; Samuel, Ann and Joseph, would go on to have children and grandchildren who emigrated to New Zealand and Australia in the 1840-1850s. Samuel’s son Nathaniel came to Wellington, his grandson John to New South Wales. Ann’s great grandson George came to Auckland and two of Joseph’s daughters and a son came to Wellington, the two girls and their families settling in Hawke’s Bay. Another of Joseph’s daughters came to New South Wales and a granddaughter as well, daughter of one of the two sons who remained in England.

Perhaps others migrated too, to other colonies, or maybe some of her siblings and their descendants did.

The Bartlett line gets a little muddly, there are SO many Bartlett families in East Chinnock which by all accounts is a very small parish. A lot of research was undertaken by a cousin of my grandmother, along with my Dad and a few other cousins in the 1980-1990s culminating in a reunion in 1988 in Cambridge New Zealand and the unveiling of a plaque commemorating my great great grandparents at Hautapu Cemetery.

So far, I have found one granddaughter and two great granddaughters who were named for her. Both great granddaughters lived in Australia or New Zealand. One came with her husband and young family to New South Wales and the other was born in Ngaio, Wellington after her parents and older siblings had emigrated. I wonder if there are more.

But what of the Eastments? Peternell had at least five siblings and I have not done very much to see if I can follow them forward. I believe her father was William Eastment and her mother Joan Taylor. But the early 1700s is getting near the sketchy end of parish records to be 100% sure.

Perhaps you know more? Do you have Eastments in your tree? Or Bartletts? I still have some gaps there too.

O - Olive Laura Hammond

Olive was born in Appleby or Richmond near Nelson New Zealand in 1893. Her parents Walter and Eva were first cousins. Her grandfathers were brothers who had come to New Zealand in the early 1840s with their parents who were following other members of the family.

Olive was the eldest child of the marriage, although she did have an older half brother from her father’s first marriage. She had two younger brothers and a younger sister by 1899.

She grew up with her siblings in the Waimea area where her father worked for Hon. J. Barnicoat on his estate. He was the third generation of the Hammond family to be employed by Mr Barnicoat. His grandfather had travelled to New Zealand on the same ship as Mr Barnicoat who was tasked with surveying the Waimea plains. On Mr Barnicoat’s death he was able to buy part of the estate and farmed there for the remainder of his life. He was a founder of the Waimea Dairy Company and director for twenty years. He was also well known for his pedigree Friesian herd who won prizes at shows and produced superior milk for use in cheesemaking.

Driving through that area today, you can imagine it must have been a carefree and enjoyable life in those early days in the colony, when you were fortunate enough to have a successful farm providing a good income.

Olive’s brothers all married but she and her sister did not. Olive became a schoolteacher, sitting an entry examination in 1911 when she was eighteen. Her sister Vida became a nurse, training in Nelson and in 1940 was appointed Matron at Whangarei Public Hospital. Born in the year of the 3^rd Suffrage petition perhaps she was meant to be a strong independent woman.

When she died in 1964, she left £300 to two nieces (nothing to nephews?) and the remainder of her estate to her sister.

She and Vida are buried together at Richmond cemetery, in Richmond.

I am connected to Olive through her great grandfather. He was one of the three brothers of my great great great grandmother who also settled in Nelson in the 1840s.

Do you have these people in your family? There are LOTS of Hammond descendants in the Appleby, Waimea, Richmond, Nelson and Marlborough area – maybe we can expand our trees together. Please reach out if you are a cousin no matter how distant.

N - Norman Smyth Langdon

Norman was born in Brompton Ralph, Somerset in 1887. He was the eldest child of George Washington Langdon and Annie nee Smyth.

Norman’s father was born in 1855 in Chicago, Illinois. His grandparents Robert Langdon and Harriet nee Yeandle, were briefly in America before returning to farm in England. They left England shortly after their marriage in 1855 and made their way to Illinois and later Minnesota. George was their only biological child. In about 1863 they took in and adopted Wilbur Norman Crawford. His mother had died leaving five very young children including baby Wilbur. He was raised as part of the Langdon family and returned with them to England when he was about fourteen, in the late 1870s. Wilbur would later discover his true identity and reconnect with his birth family when he returned to live in America.

When the family returned from America they went back to Brompton Ralph. George at this time was in his early twenties working with his father on the family farm. He married Annie in Stogumber in 1886 and welcomed first Norman and then three years later another son Ronald.

In the 1890’s both brothers relocated to Kent and continued to farm there. Norman married in 1926 but did not have children. He died in 1945 aged fifty-eight.

I am related in a couple of ways to Norman. His two times great grandparents Robert Norman and Jane Venn are also my four times great grandparents. In the same way his four times great grandparents Thomas Davys and Jane Helling are also my six times great grandparents. Confused? Imagine trying to keep this all straight in your head!

Do you have Yeandle, Davys, Norman, Langdon in your family? Maybe we can share information. Please get in contact if you are keen.

M - Mary Ellis

I don’t know a lot about Mary. Here is what I do know.

She was born on 24 July 1770 in Liverpool, Lancashire and baptised on 12 August the same year at Our Lady & St Nicholas. Or was she? There seem to be three Mary Ellis’s born within one year of each other in Liverpool.

I have gone with this one merely because the Mary Ellis who married Thomas Vose in 1797, was married at Our Lady & St Nicholas which seems to suggest there could be a family connection to that church. There are no clues that I have found to determine who her mother was and whether she had any siblings.

On her baptism, she is recorded as the daughter of John Ellis, Tobacconist of Hale Street, no mother’s names appear on the pages in the church record. The marriage record similarly is too early to have additional information included such as her father’s name.

Mary’s husband Thomas was recorded as a Joiner on the baptisms for both the children who have been confirmed. When their son Edward was baptised on 20 May 1798 his birthdate and birth order in the family were also noted in the parish register. It also notes that the parents place of marriage was “this Chapel”, making me feel I have followed the right Mary. At the time of Edward's baptism they were living in Cheetham Brow and Edward was numbered #1 in the family.

Fourteen months later they returned to Our Lady & St Nicholas to baptise their daughter Elizabeth, her place in the family is recorded as #3 – surely an error – and the family are now living in Vernon Street. They don’t seem to have anymore children, but perhaps they moved and I have been looking in the wrong places.

A burial record for Mary says she is the wife of Thomas Vose and was buried in Wigan 13 October 1810. Her recorded age is not quite right but considering that in those times many were illiterate and birthdays weren’t celebrated with all the festivities we enjoy now, its not too far out to be impossible.

Anyway, can you help me sort out the Mary’s? Or discover any more about their family? Please reach out if you think you can.

L - Lafayette Nathaniel Norman

Lafayette was born in 1868 in Winthrop, Buchanan, Iowa. He was the tenth child of Nicholas Norman and Mary nee Taylor. His parents had come to America as young adults in about 1847. Mary with her family and Nicholas apparently working his passage as crew. According to family lore, they knew each other distantly in Somerset but were not aware of the travel plans each of them had. They met again by chance when Nicholas’ ship was wrecked, and the one Mary’s family were travelling on was part of the rescue.

They married in 1849 in Bloomdale, Wood, Ohio where Mary’s family had gone immediately after arriving in America. Most of their older children were born in Ohio before the family settled in Winthrop.

A couple of years after Nicholas went to America, his brother-in-law followed him to Ohio. Once established about a year later, his wife – Nicholas’ sister – followed with their young children. Clement Warren, Lafayette’s uncle, was drafted in Bloomfield in 1863 and fought in the American Civil War which went from1861-1865. Did Lafayette’s father also fight in the war?

What prompted his parents to name him after the Marquis de Lafayette, hero of the War of Independence fought almost a century before he was born. Nicholas was a farmer; did he stay on the farm and not join up to fight in the civil war? Perhaps, naming his sons born during and just after the war was meant to be a symbol of his patriotism. Perhaps Lafayette’s elder brother Grant was named for Ulysses Grant famous for leading the Union Army to victory in the civil war and a citizen of Ohio. I have seen instances in other families of children being named for Lafayette and George Washington, possibly for a similar reason.

Lafayette spent most of his life in Winthrop and Byron Iowa. He married twice; with his first wife Lillian he had two daughters. He was employed by the Post Office and on most censuses gave his occupation as Cashier in a Bank. Lillian died in 1926 aged fifty-eight.

Just a year after her death, Lafayette remarried.  His new wife was seventeen years younger than him, just five years older than his eldest daughter. They had one son born the following year and named Lafayette Nathaniel, like his father. His new bride was also a widow and brought her two children with her into the family. In 1930 they were living at Lake Worth, Palm Beach, Florida, but returned to Winthrop by October 1933 when Lafayette died aged sixty-four.

Kind of cool that having been gifted his father’s name Lafayette Jnr raised his family in Independence, Buchanan, Iowa.

Lafayette’s grandchildren would be fourth cousins to my Dad – fourth cousins once removed to me – that’s not too distant at all in the grand scheme of life. Do you know these people? Are they in your tree? Can you help me fill in some gaps?

 

 

K - Kate Marriott

Kate was a cousin of my grandmother’s father. Kate’s mother was Mary Timms born in Rousham, Oxfordshire, she married Alfred Marriott in December 1844 in Great Berkhampstead, Hertfordshire. She had been living there at least since the 1841 census working as domestic servant. Alfred was a baker, together they had eight children, seven of whom survived into adulthood. Kate was their second child and first daughter.

At the time of the1881 census Kate was living in Enfield, Middlesex employed as a domestic servant for a widowed Justice of the Peace. Around 1884 Kate married Uriah Gardner, sometimes known as Leonard and with various spellings of Gardner. They seem to have only had one child, a son: Uriah Leonard born in Kensington, London in 1884.

The family can be found on the 1891 census with their seven-year-old son, on this record both father and son were recorded as Leonard. In the 1901 census only Kate and Uriah (Leonard) are living together. Uriah was a Coachman and Bus Driver. Their son Leonard was living next door in a boarding house working as a Painter’s Help.

But what happened next?

Their son married in November 1902. At this point he said he was an Engineer, later he was out of work and then a Printer in 1911 at the census. While he was out of work it appears he deserted his wife and children briefly to search for work which resulted in her relocating to a different parish and looking for aid. Of course, the times being what they were the church did not want to take on and support a family which was not native to their parish, and so she and the children were removed to the parish from where they had come after a brief stay in the workhouse. On these records a note in pencil says that her mother-in-law Kate Marriott was in the Kensington workhouse.

How had Kate fallen on tough times? Why was she using her maiden name instead of her married name? Sure enough, on the 1911 census there is a Kate Marriott aged sixty-one in the workhouse. But she says she is single rather than married or widowed and her occupation is recorded as “formerly Ladies Maid”. Is this the right person? Also, in 1911 Uriah or Leonard is boarding with a family.

Meanwhile, their son is living back with his wife with two children and another arriving shortly after the census. At the 1911 census it is just three years until the outbreak of war. Leonard enlisted in September 1914, leaving his wife and four children to go to fight in France. Eighteen months later his only son would arrive. Sadly, three months after that in May 1916 Leonard was killed in action. In his service record one document records all living relatives of the deceased soldier. They are all marked as none (siblings, parents, and grandparents) apart from his wife and five children.

When did his parents die? Did Kate die in the workhouse or was she reunited with her husband?

Is Kate part of your family? Please contact me if you know more then I do or are keen to see if we can find more together.

J - James Cording

James was the third son of Edward Cording and Mellony, nee Townsend. He was born in Carhampton, Somerset in 1834 and baptised a month later at Timberscombe St the Bible Christian Chapel. 

According to his obituary in The Pantograph (Bloomington, Illinois) he emigrated to Canda in 1858 and moved to Illinois, USA in 1862. I have not found passenger lists to confirm that arrival date, but on 1 January 1859 he married Eliza Norman whose family had also emigrated to Canada in the 1850s. The Normans were from Luxborough in Somerset, about 5 miles from Carhampton. Were James and Eliza an item prior to emigration, did they form a relationship on board ship, or after arrival in the new colony?

James and Eliza had a family of eight children. Their first daughter was born in Hamilton Ontario, but the remaining seven arrived in Illinois; in Centralia, Marion County and then mostly in Livingston County in Strawn and Forrest. As in England, James was farming in Forrest.

By the time of the 1870 census his elder brother John had also emigrated and was living with is wife and children on the adjacent farm. It would see that John had arrived between 1863-1870. A couple of years later in 1872 a younger brother Albert emigrated and around the same time Eliza’s brother William travelled back to England and married James’ younger sister before returning with her to Illinois between 1872-1874.

By the late 1890s James and Eliza’s siblings’ families had spread as far as Michigan, Canada and California with the majority remaining in Illinois. Their own children lived mostly in Forrest.

Eliza was badly injured in the major rail disaster at Chatsworth on 10 August 1887. Her sister Emma was one of the victims. She died in 1912 and James in 1925 and are both buried at the Forrest Township Cemetery.

I am connected to James’ family through his wife Eliza. Her father Richard was a brother of my great great great grandfather William Norman.

Are any of these people your people? Let me know if you think we might have a connection.

 

 

 

I - Isaac Fidler

Isaac was born in London on 7 September 1772; he was the eldest son of Robert Fidler and Ann Elisabeth Dupree. Robert was possibly a grocer or a hairdresser, not too many records have been found for him. His father’s family had been living in London since at least the early 1700s. His mother’s family had arrived in Spitalfields in the early 1600s. Isaac was named for his maternal grandfather who was a silk weaver.

Isaac’s father deserted his family when Isaac was about seven years old. Poor law records show the family being removed from parishes in 1778 and 1780. By the time his mother applied for settlement in Shoreditch in 1782 only her two eldest sons were still living.

I am not sure what Isaac did for work, he married Elizabeth Thomas on 15 August 1796 at St Martin in the Fields, Westminster.

In 1812 in the Land Tax records Isaac and his family were living in Drury Lane in the parish of St Martin in the Fields, Westminster. He appears on earlier Land Tax records, but not all of those include an address. Three of Isaac and Elizabeth’s children were married within three months of each other (the two girls on the same day to brothers – cos why not?) at St James Westminster in 1823. One of these girls was the mother of my great great great grandmother.

I have not been able to find a death record for Isaac or Elizabeth yet and as far as I can tell they were not on the 1841 census. I think his mother may have died in 1831 aged 89.

Have you ever come across this family? Can you unravel some of the unknown? Please let me know if you can.

H - Hannah Boddington

Hannah and at least one of her sisters were baptised at Steeple Aston, Oxfordshire but seemed to live in Rousham. Hannah was baptised on 31 March 1799; her parents Richard and Mary nee Simons were married at Rousham on 8 July 1798.

Hannah married James Timms in Rousham on 5 July 1819. They had nine children all born at Rousham where James like most there was an Ag Lab. Eight daughters and one son. Three of their daughters were baptised Elizabeth, the eldest of the three died just a few weeks old and of the two others (who confusingly grew up to marry brothers) the elder one became known as Eliza instead.

Hannah was part of the sandwich generation, when the concept of such a thing was nothing to write home about.

In January 1839 when her youngest child was thirteen months old her husband James died from an inflammation of the bowel. Was this the origin of coeliac and Crohns in the family? In 1841 at the census Hannah and her five youngest children and her father-in-law, William Timms, were in the Woodstock Union Workhouse. Fallen on tough times you would imagine after the loss of her husband. The older three girls were married or living away in service.

I’m not sure how long they were in the workhouse, but William died there in April 1842. By 1851 she was living back in Rousham with her youngest two children, a grandson and her widowed father. Her daughter Hannah had died three months before the census aged 20.

In 1861, her children all married or living and working away, Hannah was still caring for her now ninety-five-year-old father who was recorded on the census as infirm. Richard died six weeks later. Hannah remained in Rousham until her death in January 1880.

DNA suggests links to the descendants of potential sisters of Hannah, I am yet to confidently say I have researched enough and found good evidence. Did she just have sisters, or where there some brothers as well? There are other Boddington families in the are who are possibly connected somehow yet to be unravelled.

Do you have Boddingtons who came from Oxfordshire in your tree? Some descendants seem to have emigrated to America and Australia, and likely other colonies as well. Please reach out if any of this sounds familiar to you. 

G - George Kelsey

For a long time, the furthest back we were able to confirm in the Kelsey family, was Thomas Kelsey born about 1808 in Hinnington, Old Forge, Grindle or Shifnal, Shropshire depending on which record you read. Back when we started census and parish registers were not available online – we didn’t even know what “online” was.

Mum and Dad had a copy of his marriage certificate, to his second wife which had been purchased mistakenly when trying to find the marriage of his son with the same name. We found Thomas and his wife on the 1881 census, because thanks to a couple of other certificates we had a location to look around. From the marriage certificate we also knew his father’s name, George.

Slowly records came online, we looked for other family members at each record release. Finally in the 1861 census there were two people who we hoped and guessed might have been brothers. They too gave their birthplaces as Hinnington or Shifnal.

Much more recently, church records for Shropshire became available online, an alternative way to research than finding a Family History Centre or affiliate library to read microfilm. These linked them all together, three sons and later possibly a daughter or two born and baptised between 1800-1810 in Ryton, Shifnal and Hinnington. After poring over old maps there even appeared to be a building or locality called Old Forge as well.

Their parents were George Kelsey (or was it Kelshaw, Kelsal, Kelshall or Kilsey) and Catherine Buckley. They were married in Ryton, Shropshire on 4 Mar 1798. They used all the spelling variations for their children’s baptisms, and their children perpetuated the variations in marriage, death and census records. Thomas even kept the variations up for the births and baptisms of his own children.

George’s parents are suspected to be George Kelsey (or Kelshaw) and Mary. They were married in Shifnal on 10 April 1766 and had a daughter, Mary, in 1769. George’s baptism is yet to be found or confirmed. George Snr was 93 when he died in Grindle in February 1821 – a pretty good innings for those times.

George Jnr died in January 1830 at Ryton. Now that we had a myriad of alternate names to search, I began looking for their children as adults in censuses where we had already tried and given up. William and John did not marry and worked most of their lives at Hinnington Mill where they were labourers. John died in 1862 at Kemberton which was where his brother Thomas lived with his family. William died of “senile decay” in 1885 in the Union Workhouse. What became of their daughter Mary and who was Ann Dulson the informant on Catherine’s death certificate? Could she have been a married daughter? Catherine died in Hinnington in May 1851.

Now with DNA some matches are suggesting there could have been another son, James, born about 1798. Could this be right? Has anyone found documents to support this? When I look at the suggested pathway there isn’t any evidence, but they ARE matches, on the right branch of the family, so there must be something somewhere – right?

Do you know? Is George’s family your family too? Please get in contact, perhaps we can collaborate.

F - Frances Jane Selleck

I’ve picked a random person here. I don’t know too much at all about Frances except what I have found on official documents. I only just realised now that she is related in two ways!

Frances was the eighth child of James Selleck and Ann, nee Palfrey. She was the second cousin of my great grandfather Francis Davys. Her maternal grandfather Joseph Palfrey and James’ grandmother Anne Palfrey were siblings. But she was also related the same way on her father’s side of the family. Her paternal grandmother Mary Selleck, nee Norman was a sister of James’ grandfather William Norman.

It is a tangled little web for sure, this part of the tree. 

Frances was born in 1867 in Clatworthy, Somerset. She would not have known my great grandfather because by the time she was born, he had been living in New Zealand with his parents and siblings for five years. Her father was a farmer, and they were living at Sedgeborough Farm in the 1871 and 1881 censuses. By the time of the 1891 census, although they were still at Sedgeborough, the farm had now passed to her brother Tom as their father had died in January of that year.

Frances married in 1900 to another strong contender to be the subject of todays blog, Fenwick Charles Clatworthy Greenslade. They lived at Parsonage Farm, Luxborough where they had three children. In 1921 at the census in June, they had moved next door to Westcott Farm. Frances died in 1926; she didn’t live long enough to see her children marry or to meet her grandchildren.

Do you have any Selleck, Palfrey, Norman, Greenslade or even Davys’ in your tree? Maybe you are part of my tree too. Please contact me if you think we might share some connections.

E - Emma Timms

My Nana’s father was the youngest in his family. He had five older sisters and one older brother. His mother died when he was about nine months old. For five years or so his eldest sisters probably cared for him along with their grandparents who lived nearby.

Nana didn’t talk about her aunts or uncle or cousins though, apart from one. Most of them were a lot older than she and her siblings, so it is possible she didn’t even know them.

Alice was fourteen when her youngest brother was born, almost fifteen when her mother died. She was born in Mason Street, Milverton, Warwickshire. In 1881 on the census, she is recorded as a Scholar even though she was eighteen. After this census though each time she is recorded as an Inmate or Pauper living in the Warwick Union Workhouse (later known as the Warwick Union Institution and the Warwick Public Assistance Institute). She died in1944 at Shipston Hospital in Shipston-on-Stour.

May was eleven when her brother was born and twelve when their mother died. In 1881 on the census, she is recorded aged fifteen, living away from the family (but still in Milverton) as a housemaid for a retired Army Major General and his family. She was married in 1887 to William Byford and they had five children, one of whom died in infancy. This is the family Nana sometimes mentioned, they were Green Grocers in the early 1900s. May died in 1946.

Mary was nine when her brother was born and their mother died. Before 1889 she moved away from Milverton to Birmingham. Most likely for work as Birmingham offered many opportunities not found in Milverton. She was married in Birmingham in1889 to Henry Edward, a Pork Butcher and had four children. Sadly, Mary died eight days after the birth of her fourth child and her husband returned with his young family to live in Leamington and Milverton. One of Mary’s daughters lived for a time with her aunt May.

Fanny was six when her brother was born and their mother died. Fanny possibly moved to Birmingham at about the same time as Mary. In 1891 on the census, she is lodging with a family in Kings Norton and was employed as a Metallic Bedstead Decorator. Two years later in 1893 she was married to John Ashford a Cycle Polisher, in Birmingham. They had five children and spent the rest of their lives in Birmingham. Fanny died in 1941.

James was the first son in his family; he was two when his brother was born and their mother died. He became a Cellarman in a brewery but later was a much-respected inspector for the RSPCA. He married Ellen Newey and they had three children. They lived in Emscote and Leamington. James died in 1943.

George, the baby of the family was born in 1877 and his mother died in 1878. His father remarried when he was five years old to a widow with no children who lived across the road. She died in 1932, thirty years after their father. As far as I recall she was never talked about by Nana, though surely, she knew her as they lived almost next door.

But this blog is about Emma – I have shared briefly what I know about all the other members of the family. We have DNA matches with the descendants of most of them. But what about Emma? 

Emma was four when her brother was born and their mother died; her fifth birthday was the day after her mother died. Her full name is Emma Jane; she appears aged seven on the 1881 census although she was eight. And that is it! She has just vanished. By the 1891 census she would have been eighteen, she could have married, emigrated or died, but so far (over probably 20-30 years) I have not been able to find one little clue.

Are any of these people your great great aunts or uncles too? Or great great grandparents perhaps? Do you know anything about Emma? If you do, please share I would love to hear from you.

 

D - David Hall

I have a bit of a conundrum with my great great great grandfather David Hall. He was born about 1800 most likely in Cavan, or Monaghan, Ireland. He married about 1820 to Margaret Pritchard and they had about thirteen children.

But who were his parents? 

There are a few challenges unravelling this.

·         There is at least one other David Hall born around the same time and in the general area.

·         The family is likely an Ulster Plantation family – because let’s face it, Hall is not a very Irish surname. They lived in the same area for generations, went to the same Presbyterian churches and intermarried A LOT.

·         David’s daughter Anne, my great great grandmother, married another Hall. Just a coincidence? A cousin or second cousin?

William Hall, Anne’s husband was the son of Samuel Hall and Sarah Bailey. We knew this, as well as who Anne’s parents were from their death certificates in New Zealand. For a long time that was the extent of our knowledge.

Then along came DNA and the discovery that other branches of Samuel’s tree had also come to New Zealand. Surely people at the time knew one another and the family connection – but overtime the knowledge was lost.

Contacting other DNA testers in an endeavour to unravel the Irish branch of our tree, research all seemed to point to Samuel’s parents being William Hall 1769-1833 and Arabella Reilly.

Certainly, there are a lot of DNA matches where you can see the connections to each other through Samuel’s siblings. Researchers had found records for the children of William and Arabella – at least seven – including a David.

We have DNA matches to William’s family including descendants of his aunts and uncles (Samuel’s siblings), so it seemed quite resolved there. We also had good matches with Anne’s family going back into the past a little further and following her mother’s maternal line. For most of the descendants of William and Anne everything made sense, they should have matches to both families. But then some of Anne’s siblings’ descendants appeared to have matches to William's family!

The only way I can see this being possible is if “my” David Hall born about 1800 and died on 26 February 1883 at Coppenagh Mills is the son of William and Arabella Hall, born in 1797 at Lattacapple. This would mean that my great great grandparents William and Anne were first cousins. Or is it just an endogamy effect living in the same community for so long?

What do you think? Do you have a David Hall in your tree too? Is he this guy, or another one altogether? Please contact me if you think you can help.

 

 

C - Charles Vose

Charles (sometimes recorded as Charles Augustus) was most likely the 3^rd child of Edward Vose and his wife Elizabeth, nee Weller. He was an elder brother of my great great grandfather. Born about 1824 he was baptised on 7 November 1824 in Gillingham, Kent.

A record of Merchant Seaman found at Find My Past states he was born in Plymouth, Devon on 30 June 1824. This still could be correct as his father was in the Army serving with the Royal Sappers and Miners (later Engineers) and could have been stationed near Plymouth. Gillingham, where he was baptised was the birthplace of his mother, so not illogical to think the family may have returned there to baptise their son.

The 1841 census shows Charles living with his parents and younger siblings in Woolwich, Kent. I have not been able to find him in the 1851 census, but he may have been on board a ship outside of British waters. His Merchant Seaman record states he first went to sea as a boy in 1842 (he would have been about eighteen at this time) and had not served with the Royal Navy or foreign services.

On 24 April 1853 Charles married Lucy Mary Berry at St Peter’s church Walworth, Surrey. They had three children in the next three years although one died a few months after birth. At some point after the birth of their 3^rd child in early 1856 the family left England and emigrated to Canada, settling in Toronto by the time their fourth child arrived in September 1859.

In Toronto Charles became a painter. He and Lucy welcomed seven more children. Charles died in 1888 and Lucy thirteen years later in 1901. One daughter appears to have moved to Illinois, USA after her marriage but the rest of the family seem to have stayed in Toronto the whole time.

Do you know Charles and Lucy or any of their children? Are you my Canadian cousins? Please get in touch.

B - Benjamin Davys.

There are several people by this name in my tree, most I don’t really know how or where they fit in.

Benjamin Davys was born about 1718 if the age on his burial record is correct (maybe 1728 is more likely though), and was buried in the churchyard at Raddington, Somerset on 16 February 1801. He was the son of Thomas Davys and Jane Helling of Hagley Bridge, Somerset.

His father was self-styled “Lord of the Manor” having bought the manor of Raddington. I believe he also held part of the manor of Hagley Bridge with his father, another Thomas.

Thomas, the Lord, died on 21 June 1783 in his late eighties. He was intestate and left the manor encumbered with debt. His son Reverend Thomas Davys was his heir; an elder son John had predeceased their father. Sadly, Thomas died less than a year later, thankfully with a will which divided the manor between his three surviving brothers Benjamin (of Raddington), James and George (both of Milverton). Each was to have their own messuages and discharge their father and brother’s debts.

George died in March 1786. He and his wife had no children. Although I have not seen his will, in 1798 in the Land Tax Redemption records his wife was the owner and occupier of property in the parish of Raddington required to pay £2 2s 4d. In her own will all her belongings were shared amongst her sisters, nieces and nephews, but no mention was made of the property.

Benjamin died in 1801. In 1798 on the Land Tax Redemption record he was an owner and occupier of property in Raddington parish required to pay £3 6s 6d. I believe he married Elizabeth Prescott in Exeter, Devon on 17 February 1755. They had at least five children all baptised at Raddington, including two Benjamins, one dying in infancy. Again, I have not seen a will for Benjamin, but what happened to his property? Did he need to dispose of his messuage and property to discharge his share of the debt?

On the Land Tax Redemption records in 1798 James appears at least twice, once as the occupier of property owned by the Reverend Edward Webber and again in his own right as owner and occupier paying £5 5s 0d for each. His son James also appears with two properties paying £1 6s 0d for one and £1 2s 6d for the other. How does James, and consequently his son, appear to have a larger share of property than his brother and widowed sister-in-law? What happens to Benjamin and George’s property after their deaths and the deaths of their widows? James also died in 1802 leaving his property mostly to his son James.

I am supposing that the level of tax payable is reflective of the value and size of each property.

By 1841 at the time of the Tithe Apportionments and England & Wales Census we seem to be related to every family living in the parish in one way or another (aunts, uncles, cousins etc). But who is the family of John Davys (Davis) and his wife Mary Kemp who are living at Blackwell Farm on the census, where John is recorded as a labourer? We have some DNA matches to this family – are they connected to Benjamin in some way? And if so, how have they become tenants or labourers rather than owners of land? Or maybe it’s just a bit of endogamy – you know, from being related to everyone in the entire parish.

Are you a descendant of Benjamin? If you are please contact me.

A - Annie Harriet Richards

 First noticed on the census way back when we ordered microfilm to read at LDS family history libraries and then revisited when the internet and Ancestry were fledgling new options to research from afar.

We (my Dad, Mum and I) were trying to find out more about Mum’s maternal line and specifically my grandmother’s maternal line. In about 2001, we managed to reconnect with my 3^rd cousin in the USA who was also researching this line (though it was her mother’s paternal line in her case).

Annie appears on the 1881census in Dudley. She was 15, listed as a niece of the head of the house, in transcriptions her name was recorded as Amnie. But who was she?

The head of the household, Henry James, was 64 a market gardener born in Leintwardine, Herefordshire. He was my great-great-great grandfather. Others in the household were his elder unmarried daughter Elizabeth who was a dressmaker and two grandchildren Albert and Laura Kelsey. Laura was my great grandmother and Albert was my 3^rd cousin’s great grandfather. Their mother was Henry’s younger daughter who had died shortly after Laura’s birth. Perhaps Annie was a clue to help us make a step back to earlier generations. How did she fit in though?

Henry was illegitimate, his baptism on 17 August 1819 had only his mother’s name; Elizabeth James. For Annie to be his niece she had to be the child of a sibling, or of his wife’s siblings. His wife had another great surname - THOMAS! Her siblings all lived relatively close geographically but Annie’s place of birth on the census was Mold in Flintshire – not remotely close to the family as we knew it.

We purchased Annie’s birth certificate and discovered her parents’ names and that her father was a gardener, possibly on a farm or estate. I started trying to follow this family through censuses and baptismal records. I managed to follow the family back (and forward a little) through the next few decades. Although Annie’s father John mostly gave Leintwardine as his birthplace, his family seemed to be living close by in Mocktree near Kinton, Herefordshire. Was this the clue? Were the Richards family connected to the James family somehow. I wondered what the likelihood was that Henry’s mother had married after his birth. If she had and he had half siblings, he would be an uncle to their children.

Sure enough, Elizabeth James had married 12 July 1821 in Leintwardine, when Henry was about two years old, to John Richards. He was an Ag Lab at Mocktree. It was there that they raised their family of at least seven children, including Henry. Their son John was baptised 17 November 1830 in Leintwardine. On the 1851 census, John aged 20 was listed as a gardener, lodging with a family in the township of Brakes, Herefordshire not far from his childhood home. There are several estates and farms in the area where he may have been employed.

He married Catherine Stacey in Aston, Warwickshire on 18 March 1859. Catherine’s father was a Game Keeper on an estate near Meriden, Warwickshire and had held that same position for at least 20 years. Nothing is known about how they met, although there are many hypotheses that could be suggested. By the time of the 1861 census John and Catherine had one daughter and were expecting their second child. They were living in the Gardeners Cottage at Coton Hall near Alveley, Worcestershire. (Unrelated but interesting, turns out to be the ancestral home of General Robert E Lee of the American revolution fame).

Offley Francis Drake Wakeman inherited Coton Hall on his fathers death in 1855 but did not come of age until 1857. His uncle 2^nd Baronet of Periswell Hall in Worcestershire managed affairs until he reached majority. His birthday was celebrated at Coton Hall and in Alveley. He sadly died aged 29 on 20 July 1865 at Coton Hall after exerting himself playing cricket. (Information from houseand heritage.org)

Perhaps his death, and uncertainty about employment was the catalyst for the Richards family move to Nercwys. Two months later, by 11 September 1865 they had relocated to Nercwys, Flintshire where Annie was born. Catherine died there on 1 February 1867 aged 25 from tuberculosis and John moved back to England with his four young children.

John remarried ten months later in Shrewsbury, Shropshire. Whether he was living there alone or with the children is unknown, however to continue working it would have been more manageable had he been able to leave the children aged 18 months to seven years with family. John and his new wife Jane had seven children. The birth certificates of the first three give their place of birth as Gravel. I think this is a farm. Sometimes the location was given as Leintwardine and others as Downton. They were all baptised at Downton though. Both places (Downton and Gravel Farm) are very close to Brakes where John had been living in 1851 on census night. There are a couple of estates Downton Hall and Downton Castle very close to Gravel Farm. We can surmise that John may have been employed at one of these, or at Gravel Farm.

On census night 1871 the family were living in Ludlow itself at 97 Old Street. On that census, John is not home and Jane is recorded as the wife of a Gardener (absent). So far, I have been unable to find him, possibly at a place of employ. Shortly afterward they moved to Market Street, and by the time of the birth of their youngest son in July 1878 they were living in Caynham, Shropshire. John died at Hopton Wafers, Shropshire on 29 November 1879 from Febris Recidiva which is a tick-borne bacterial infection causing relapsing fevers. His death was likely the reason Annie was sent to live with her uncle in Dudley, as Jane seemed to have “rehomed” her stepchildren and moved to Nottinghamshire by the time the 1881 census was taken. Annie at thirteen or fourteen might have been just the help her Uncle Henry and cousin Elizabeth needed when they had just taken in the young grandchildren in May 1879 after the death of their mother.

Annie went on to marry John Henry Jolly in Walsall, Staffordshire in early 1887. They remained in Walsall for the rest of their lives and had a family of ten children, three of whom died within a month of each other in 1903. John Jolly died in 1925 and Annie in 1947.

Have you come across Annie in your tree? Or perhaps some of her aunts, uncles or cousins? I would love to hear from you.

 Well hey - it's been a while since I have been here. Life has just been a little busy but I am always thinking I need to write something. So here I am - hopefully completing the A-Z challenge for Family History Month 2026 Down Under.

It runs like this, you choose a topic for every letter consecutively in the alphabet and post one a day through the month of August, except for Sundays. I have done this before with different themes. This year my theme is FANS. Friends, Associates and Neighbours. Instead of concentrating on my direct ancestors I am going to choose somebody else in the family or maybe a neighbour and tell you what I know (or dont know) about them. Perhaps that person who I have researched a little is someone you have come across too, or someone you are more closely connected to than me. Maybe we can collaborate and find out more.

I am already running behind because I should have uploaded "A" yesterday...but it's still the 1st somewhere in the worls I thgink, so I might just be okay. Here goes!