the drays

[ray b]

Good evening all
Hope you can help with the dray family
David Dray 1846 wed Kate Back 1847 in Challock Lees 1871
I have children
Arthur 1866? born Challock
Rose ann 1873 british subject of American extraction?
George 1877 british subject of American extraction?
Thomas 1879 challock
Can anyone work out how an ag lab can afford to go to America between the 1871 and the 1881 English census. As far as I can work out he returned to being an ag lab so no fortune made.also how do I find out where in America the two children were born.
yours hopefully
rayb

[PaulineJ]

DRAY, THOMAS  RICHARD     BACK   1879  J Quarter in EAST ASHFORD  Volume 02A  Page 723
BACK, ARTHUR  WILLIAM     -      1865  S Quarter in EAST ASHFORD  Volume 02A  Page 589
1871 census (before the marriage) https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VF8G-265

searched any shipping/immigration records?

[ray b]

Hi Pauline J
Thank you for the reply I have tried searching for the journeys there and back but did not get on very well although this was about 5 years ago and have just returned to this family. I cannot help but wonder how he afforded the fares as an ag lab was there some scheme for emigrating that helped them. you give Thomas and Arthurs birth reg and while I do have these I tend to put more faith in the church records as I feel that most families may have been keener to baptise nearer the birth and register when convenient. And on some records the vicar has given birthdate.
rayb

[bearkat]

Frustratingly this family were not in America for any census (1870 or 1880).

I haven't been able to find any baptisms on Familysearch.

Nor can I see a likely immigration record for them.

Some parishes sponsored families to emigrate especially if it was they were likely to become chargeable to the parish. I think this was more likely earlier in the nineteenth century.  You could try looking in the parish chest records.  He would have needed to pay for his passage home.

[Christine53]

I think I've found them on the Castle Garden website :

David Dray 26 labourer  passage paid by : self
Kate Dray 25
Arthur Dray 5
arrived 3 Jun 1872 from Glasgow on the ship Columbia
http://www.castlegarden.org/quick_search_detail.php?p_id=1141887
( the above link is to David Dray , but you can search for each name )

[Christine53]

Whitstable Times & Herne Bay Herald 11 May 1878

Elizabeth Coulthard , alias Ann Wills , 15 , was charged with stealing a quantity of infant's apparel and other items worth 20s. , the property of David Dray of Chilham . Kate Dray , wife of the prosecutor , deposed that on Tuesday April 23rd items were taken from a trunk....

They were back in England by April 23 1878 . There are no records of returning voyages at that date.

[bearkat]

That's great information. 

I wonder why they went from Glasgow?  Gravesend, Southampton, Liverpool and others were all much nearer.

[ray b]

thank you all very much
Glasgow why, now all I need to find are baptisms.
you are geniuses all
thank you
rayb

[Catamaran]

Just stumbled across this and had the same question.  My great-grandfather was Job Back (b.1854), who is Kate Back's brother.  My grandfather's family arrived in Philadelphia in the early 1900's.  Kate's child, Arthur, is listed with the Back family in the 1871 census in England.  The research leads me to believe that she then married David Dray and they had three children, but I can't account for the "British Subject, America" for Rose and George.