Links between Essex and Shropshire?

[M_ONeill]

Hey all,

So there is a branch of my family tree which is almost entirely from around the Shropshire/Staffordshire border. I was very surprised to discover an ancestor in that part of the tree who was born in Essex!

David Edwards was my 5xgreat grandfather, born c1771 in Essex. He married my 5xgreat grandmother Mary Kerry on the 2nd of May 1797 in Ryton, Shropshire. The couple lived there for the rest of their lives.

What I can't understand is how a poor, agricultural labourer without much money to his name would have managed to travel all the way from Essex to Shropshire before 1797. Were there any links between the two counties that could account for such a journey?

[Mike in Cumbria]

Hey all,

So there is a branch of my family tree which is almost entirely from around the Shropshire/Staffordshire border. I was very surprised to discover an ancestor in that part of the tree who was born in Essex!

David Edwards was my 5xgreat grandfather, born c1771 in Essex. He married my 5xgreat grandmother Mary Kerry on the 2nd of May 1797 in Ryton, Shropshire. The couple lived there for the rest of their lives.

What I can't understand is how a poor, agricultural labourer without much money to his name would have managed to travel all the way from Essex to Shropshire before 1797. Were there any links between the two counties that could account for such a journey?

Maybe he joined a group of drovers on their way back to Wales.

[olleym]

Ironworks?

Mark

[M_ONeill]

Well he's always listed as working as a general agricultural labourer so travelling with work is always possible.

I've just found the actual document for his and Mary's marriage in 1797. As expected, David and Mary are both illiterate (marking 'x' as signatures) - but the two witnesses are a William and Mary Nutt. Their names are actually signed - in better handwriting than the minister! Makes me wonder who these educated people were witnessing the wedding. Perhaps employers?

[lizdb]

Or just people who were around - maybe there for the previous or next wedding of the day!
Or friends, or Church warden and wife.
We can only guess.

My experience is that our ancestors travelled around a lot more than the myth "that they didnt go far in those days" suggests.

Young people were still adventurous. Maybe David, having grown up in an ag lab world in Essex, decided to venture further, ended up in Shropshire, but as is the same today, he discovered that the grass wasnt really greener on the other side so he just ended up ag labbing there instead.
Again we can only guess.

It always amuses me when people say "my family came from xxxx", because the chances are when you get back further they may actually have come from yyyyy, and even then you dont know what happened in previous generations.  I do it myself though, say my family came from xxxx, but what I ought to add is that that is where they were in  the xth century.

[ShaunJ]

The canal network provided a transport link between Essex and Shropshire