Let’s start with what we know with reasonable certainty about Louisa Gertrude Simmons.
Place of birth: she was born in Great Yarmouth (1911 census
https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X75V-PDR ), and was married there in 1909 to George Charles Underwood.
However there is no record of her birth registration in the GRO index.
Date of birth: In April 1911 she was aged 21; in late 1909 (marriage) she was 20. So a birthdate in 1889 seems likely. However the GRO death index (1974) shows her date of birth as 5 May 1887: 2 years earlier.
Father: James Thomas Simmons, a labourer, per her marriage certificate.
Other known relatives: Daughter Nellie Underwood born 1910; and probable relative
John James Simmons who witnessed the 1909 marriage, and presumably gave permission for her to marry (she was a minor).
Now we go back in time. Next stop the 1901 census: there is only one Louisa Simmons born Great Yarmouth in the 1901 census. She is listed as Louisa H Simmons, aged 12 and she is with her sister Nellie Haggata, aged 28, born Chatham, and Nellie’s husband Frederick Haggata aged 28, born Great Plumbstead. Residence 133 Blackfriars Road.
I have not been able to find a record of Frederick Haggata’s marriage to Nellie.
Going back further, there's this family in the 1891 census in Great Yarmouth (Row 48):
Thomas Simmonds 51 labourer Gt Yarmouth
Ellen 42 wife Inniskillen, Ireland
William 20 son Smacksman Chatham Kent
John 14 son scholar Gt Warley Essex
Alfred 10 son Gt Yarmouth
Edward 7 son ditto
George 6 son ditto
Harry 5 son ditto
Louisa 1 daur ditto
[EDIT this was cut and pasted from Word and the formatting has been lost!)
Again this Louisa is the only candidate in this census. The age ties in perfectly with the information from 1909 and 1911. Sister Nellie does not appear with the family on this census but she is with them in 1881:
Warley Road, Hammonds Lane, South Weald, Essex
Thomas Simmons 40 army pensioner Gt Yarmouth
Ellen 28 wife Ireland
William 9 son Chatham Kent
Ellen 7 daur Warley Essex
James 3 son ditto
Elizabeth 1 daur ditto
Note that the son born circa 1877/8 is referred to alternately as
John and J
ames in the censuses. The daughter Ellen listed in 1881 is presumably "Nellie".
Per the birth certificate posted online by another researcher, John James Simmons was born on 6 January 1878 in South Weald (which is adjacent to Great Warley), father John Thomas Simmons a private in 56th Regiment, mother Mary Allen Simmons, formerly Walker. Informant father John T Simmons, Warley Road, South Weald.was born in Warley, Essex on 6 January 1878.
[NB this tallies with a Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve record for John James Simmons at The National Archives.
http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/D8553968 ]
The same researcher has also posted a marriage certificate. John James Simmons, a mariner aged 22, married Alice Rosina Adams in Tottenham on Christmas day 1898. His father is named as John Simmons, a mariner. It would be interesting to see Louisa’s 1909 marriage certificate (if it is a copy of the original register entry) to compare the two signature of John James Simmons, albeit that they are 11 years apart.
There is an army record for Thomas Simmons of 56th Regiment, born Great Yarmouth circa 1840, a
mariner, enlisted March 1859, served 8 years in the East Indies, discharged at Warley in August 1880.
Thomas Simmons appears to have died in Great Yarmouth in 1893 aged 53 so Louisa would hardly have known him. There is also a death record for Mary Ellen Simmons aged 45 in 1900 which may be her mother.
Despite the discrepancies in the father’s name on various records (was he Thomas, John, John Thomas or James Thomas?) and the absence of a birth or baptism record for Louisa, I think the circumstantial evidence that she is the daughter of Thomas and Mary Ellen Simmons is very strong, and is reinforced by the presence of a John James Simmons at her marriage. There is no record that I could find of any other Louisa or Gertrude Simmons born in Great Yarmouth circa 1889.
