Elizabeth Gallichan Jersey

[rusted]

Edward Collas married Elizabeth Gallichan on 15 Aug 1816 at St Martin Jersey, he was baptised at Grouville 4 Feb 1781, I have not been able to find a death.
The bigger question is which Elizabeth Gallichan did he marry and who were her mother and father? They had 8 children the earliest was born in 1818 and the last in 1835. The 1841 census puts her birth at abt 1793, which if it is the correct year makes her illegitimate. There are quite a few Elizabeth Gallichans in the records around this time though. If she is the illegitimate one tracking her father is probably an impossible dead end. Her mother is also Elizabeth and there are again lots of possible Elizabeth Gallichans so even tracking her mother is difficult but thats what I am attempting.

[PeppermintPatty]

Hi there rusted,

Can you tell me if Edward Collas & Elizabeth Gallichan's first child was Marie Anne, baptized 27.12.1818 in St Martin?  If so, there are massive clues in the Godparents listed for this child.  It shows them as being Reverend William Charles Gallichan (uncle of the baby) and his mother Dlle Marie Pellier and also Anne Gallichan (aunt of the baby).  I believe these people are Elizabeth Gallichan's siblings and mother.

Delving further back into St. Martin Baptisms for Gallichan, I found:

27.12.1785  William Charles son of Mons. Thomas and Dlle Marie Pellier
07.10.1792  Elizabeth daughter of Mons. Thomas and Dlle Marie Pellier
29.01.1795  Anne daughter of Mons. Thomas and Dlle Marie Pellier

Also, in Marriages for St. Saviour for Gallichan:

29.11.1779  Mons. Thomas of St. Martin and Dlle Marie Pellier of Trinity

Does this help you at all or am I barking up the wrong tree?

All the best,

Peppermint Patty 

[rusted]

Spot on Peppermint Patty.
That is exactly the right line, I had already spotted aunt Anne as a person of interest from the 1851 and 1861 censuses, my great grandfather Edmund Henry Collas was staying with her. Mind you I was almost on the point of tossing all that because I had just found him arriving in Sydney Australia on the Saladin in late 1852, I think he didn't turn up on the Victorian Goldfields until 1856 and there's no concrete evidence of that until his marriage in 1866. I think now he may have continued his sailoring occupation. The harbours were full of ships whose crews had jumped ship to go gold digging and his brother was a master on a ship doing Australian coastal and Pacific Island trade at the time so he probably found it easy to get work.

I will go over what you have found today (its early tomorrow morning here.) and see how it all looks, but with a very quick check it is fantastic.
Channel Island research is very different to anything I have done before so I am struggling with it. I did not notice the significance of the godparents, I did try, but just couldn't see it.
Thanks for that
rusted

[rusted]

Hmm I just had a look in Jerripedia and that record for Marie Anne is one of the ones that they very helpfully have stripped the Godparents info from. No wonder I didn't notice it. Where did you get that information?
rusted

[PeppermintPatty]

Hi rusted,

I am lucky enough to have copies of many of the Jersey Parish records as my husband's family is from Jersey and I have been over there many times to aid my research.  Jerripedia is a fabulous resource but not having the Godparents shown on the Baptism records is a let down for me.  I have found that piece of knowledge often crucial to proper identification of ancestors.  I still think that the best way to trace your Jersey ancestors is by going to Jersey and using their resources.

I'm glad I could help you and please let me know if you need anymore Jersey info.  By the way, your Gallichan and Pellier relatives were of reasonable standing in the community as indicated by the "Monsieur" and "Demoiselle" titles they had.

All the best (from a fellow Aussie living in England),

Peppermint Patty 

[rusted]

Thanks Patty
I will leave this thread open until I have verified the information, I know there are a few things where I was going in completely the wrong direction, so will need a bit of tidying up first.

rusted

[la grande-méthe]

Patty is absolutely right when she says that the godparents are often crucial in untangling Jersey families. Not only has Jerripedia failed to recognize that fact but their records are by no means complete so don't think that because it's not on their site that the record does not exist.

Let me know what facts you need verifying and I can look in the records for you, I am at the Jersey Archive at least once a week.

[rusted]

Thanks for your kind offer la grande-methe
I am becoming more and more aware of the shortcomings of Jerripedia. Its a good site and they don't hide the fact that records are incomplete, and for a person like me on the other side of the world the information they do have is much preferable to the alternative, nothing. But in a pursuit where any information could be crucial, leaving off the godparents is a strange thing to do.

In attempting to get past that little brick wall (Multiple Elizabeth Gallichans) I built several lines following Collases and Le Brocqs and Gallichans which I probably need to seriously prune now. But in exploring those lines it helped me get past another couple of oddities with their immigration to Australia, so really not a waste of time at all.

There is one thing that you may be able to do for me, In the 1851 Channel Island Census, Edward Nelson Collas is described as a prisoner, I am curious to know what that was about.
Son of Edouard Collas and Elizabeth Gallichan, he was my Great grand Uncle.
I imagine it would be a shifty scheme rather than theft as he seemed to be a bit of an entrepreneur when he got to Australia, owning a string of pubs and gold mines,  at least one of the pubs was at his gold mine, so he was paying his miners then taking it back off them at the pub.
Do not go to any trouble though, just curiosity.

cheers, rusted

[la grande-méthe]

I'd say he was in prison because of bad debts,

"Register of décrets includes lists of creditors and acquisitors of bankrupt individuals, gives history of their financial debts. Livre 39 (index) (D/Y/F3/39)  1850 - 1850"

www.jerseyheritage.org - Search under Advanced Search with Surname first followed by comma, space, christian name, he's listed as Collas, Edouard Nelson