The tree I have been building for SO's data has grown nicely.
Gramps tells me I have:
689 people
2080 events
1130 citations
862 pieces of digital media
Impressive, eh?
Sadly...
On one line, the BICE family, I hit a roadblock with an direct ancestor born in 1862. John Thomas Bice (only the great grandfather of my partner, so not even super distant).
Now, this man is sort of famous (in a small way) in genealogical circles.
When I first encountered him, I hit google, and found:
2004 -
http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/BICE/2004-08/10919618272004 -
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=14860.0 (Shanko)
2006 -
http://boards.ancestry.co.uk/surnames.bice/277.1/mb.ashx(follow-up came there none on that last one)
Now, his data in baptism, census and wedding records is fine, all the way back to his presence (as a lodger) in his father in law's home, (1881 census) age 17. (Class: RG11; Piece: 1385; Folio: 49; Page: 21; GSU roll: 1341337.)
His claimed DOB is 1862, Stoke Newington. Sadly, there is no record in the ENTIRE country of a John Thomas Bice anywhere near that date, let alone in Stoke Newington. His wedding shows a father called "John", a bricklayer.
I also cannot find him in the 1871 census, when he was 7.
I deem is "quite likely" that he (or his father) moved to London from the massive Bice cluster in Cornwall.
The only approach I have considered that holds out hope is to "simply" build a genealogical tree for all the male BICE lines in Middlesex, since it's rather a rare name and hope that J T Bice shows up "by implication", but that's a lot of work for no guaranteed result.
I don't want people to do my research for me, but if anyone can suggest approaches, even laborious one, I'm all ears.
BugBear