Richard Sowersby Buried At Whitby 1858

[jaywit]

I'll explain the background to this.

I have been talking to a friend today who is in the process of moving house . He is a very keen photographer and he is sorting through his old photographs.

He showed me a photograph he took about 30 years ago in St Mary's graveyard at Whitby. It shows a gravestone with the inscription
Richard Sowersby of Leavening Mason Whitby 28/2/1858 age 22


He has been back to Whitby recently and the gravestone is no longer there, it appears to have been one of the graves that has eroded away.


Finding the photograph has aroused his interest in who Richard Sowersby was and he asked me to see what I could find out about him.


I have found he was the son of John ( a Schoolmaster ) and Esther Sowersby who lived in Leavening . Richard was baptised at Winteringham ( his mother's birthplace ) on 9/3/1835.

He is with his family in 1841


By 1851 Richard is an apprentice mason lodging with a Carr family in Malton.

Apart from his death date that is all I can find at the moment.

There are other Richard Sowersbys around at the same time making it awkward picking out the correct one but I think I am on the right track.

Yorkshire isn't an area I have researched, does anyone have any ideas if I could find any more about  Richard?

[JJen]

Richard Sowersby was buried 1 March 1858. In the burial register his abode is Sandgate and his age was given as 23.

JJ

[tillypeg]

JJ you beat me to it!

From Parish Register on FindMyPast, he was buried on 1st March aged 23, "of Sandgate".  This is one of the narrow streets on the old east side of Whitby.  Looking at the Whitby Gazette, some editions of which are on FindMyPast, there is a gap for 1858.  It is a weekly paper and I can see Saturday 6th Feb then nothing until 3rd April.  Perhaps the missing ones were too damaged to be digitised?  If Richard died in an accident etc, it would have appeared in the Whitby Gazette.  The library in Whitby holds microfilms of the Gazette but I don't think they do look-ups.  (I was there only last week to do some research, if only I'd known then!)  The originals are held by the Whitby Literary & Philosophical Society and the general public can't view them.

Not sure how you will find out much more about him.

[jaywit]

Thanks for the replies, at least I have some more information to give him next time I see him.