I have been having a look round the web for information on the great Irish trainer and amateur jockey Harry Beasley (the Elder, b. ca. 1852). There is a fair bit available online, but I am wondering whether anybody can help with one particular point that has so far eluded me: when and where did he die? (I have fallen at the same fence with his second wife/widow May
*, formerly wife of the Harry Peard who ran Phoenix Park race course).
Beasley certainly lived to a good age, because several sources record that he last rode competitively aged 83, in 1935. A paragraph in The Times (11 June 1935) had it thus:
Mr Harry Beasley, the father of Harry and Pat Beasley, well known as riders in this country, yesterday won the Corinthian Plate at the Baldoyle Meeting. Mr. Beasley is more than 80 years of age and was a famous rider 50 years ago. He won the Grand National on Come Away in 1891.
The article might have added that Harry had also been runner-up in the National in 1884, 1885 and 1886; and in the same decade he and two of his brothers competed against each other in that race on no less than four occasions -- his brother Tommy coming home first three times. The Beasley brothers ran Eyrefield House stud and training stables on the Curragh. Harry (as Henry) can easily be spotted thereabouts in the 1901 and 1911 censuses.
I had hoped that the LDS RecordSearch version of the GRO indexes would find me the death details; but no luck, whether under the name Harry or his full forenames Henry Herbert (as disclosed in The Times report of a libel action he brought in the mid-1920s about false race-fixing insinuations). Same problem with finding his wife/widow May, whose middle name was -- I think -- Margaret.
The annual series of printed probate calendars would likely provide the answer, but there seems to be no set outside Ireland these days, let alone online (barring PRONI's partial and ongoing project for the Ulster registries). I would love to hear if anyone happens to know better -- that would be a great resource for long-range Irish research. I have identified nothing plausible-looking between 1930 and 1960 via the Anc**try.com version of the London GRO indexes, nor on ScotlandsPeople, though I suppose I could quite easily have missed something.
I believe that I have seen it said that the LDS RecordSearch index does incorporate the overseas deaths of Irish residents. But in case the relevant events were still notified to British embassies I have tried the consular deaths via FindMyPast. Nothing. Ditto with passenger lists and online family trees. Maybe fresh eyes would do better.
I had also hoped to find an obituary or at least a death notice in one of the online London newspaper archives. If anyone has access to the Dublin papers, I would guess that the odds of finding an obit ought to be even better.
Would be most grateful for help with this.
Rol
* CORRECTION (17.07.10, 16:02 hrs. BST): May was in fact his daughter-in-law, wife of his son the jockey Harry Beasley the Younger -- whose birth was registered in the name Henry Herbert Edward Beasley, Naas RD, Q1 1899, per LDS RecordSearch. (But I still can't trace any record of her death, despite her being born as early as 1887 and being described as "the late Mrs M. M. Beasley" when a daughter's engagement was announced in 1950.)
