Jonas Read

[peterd500]

I forgot to ask this question:

How sure are you Bobmc that William in Australia was the son of Jonah/Jonas READ & Elizabeth CARTER, so that you are not on a wild goose chase?

Some of the children you mention as their issue don't fit with their children in census data. 

It could be that you have a correct set of siblings for your William that you may have mistakenly grafted onto the children of Jonah & Elizabeth in the 1851 census because you think young William in that family, who has a brother Alfred, will be yours?  What if he isn't?

In that case the death information of Christianna proves nothing about your ancester William's parents, just about William in the 1851 census.  You still have to prove that William the son of Jonah/Jonas & Elizabeth in 1851 is your William.

If you have in fact picked on the wrong William, then that would explain why you haven't been able to find out about the BEECHEY connection described by your Alfred in his his letter to your William..

Peter

[peterd500]

I finally got into the LDS records and I see that Amelia, Harriet, Emma and George were indeed baptised to Jonah & Elizabeth as were the others.

So that leaves only the question, how good is the evidence that William the son of Jonah & Elizabeth at Cambridge is the same person as William who married Margaret MCMAHON?  i.e. what is it at the Australian end that points to Jonah in Cambridge as the father? 

[peterd500]

Here's Christiana and Alfred in the same household.  By this time Christiana's husband John CONDER had passed away.

05 Apr 1891 Census of England & Wales
@ 13 Mill Hill Rd, Acton, Middlesex
Alfred READ Head Marr 54 Laundry Proprietor b. Cambridge
Christiana CONDER Sister Widow 52 b. Cambridge
Kate CONDER Niece Single 28 Manageress Laundry b. Wandsworth, Surrey
Ellen CONDER Niece Single 25 b. Wansworth, Surrey,
Cyril CONDER Nephew 16 Learning Mech. Engineering b. Wandsworth, Surrey

Alfred was previously a School Master just like John CONDER his brother-in-law. John witnessed the wedding of Alfred and his wife Mary Judith Broome SPENCER whom he married in 1860. At this census Mary must have been visiting somewhere because she wasn't deceased till 1909, and in fact, Alfred (died 1898), Christianna (died 1901) and Mary (died 1909) are buried in the same plot at Acton Cemetery.

[Frances Heyer]

William Read parents are definitely Jonas Read and Elizabeth, formerly Walker.
The family's relationship to Sir William Beechey, is through Alfred who married Judith Broome Spencer, who was Sir William's granddaughter.  Although, in those times, after a marriage, the couple adopted each other families, Alfred carried it a bit too far, by evidently claiming his wife's relatives for all of his own family.