RootsChat.Com
England (Counties as in 1851-1901) => England => Sussex => Topic started by: sylvieme on Thursday 19 November 20 14:04 GMT (UK)
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I have been researching a female relative born 1927 to an unmarried domestic servant, who could not keep the child. However through living relatives I discovered that the Mother never forgot this child and I would love to be able to fill in all the pieces of the puzzle.
Through electoral rolls I found the name of a possible Father but have not been able to trace him with any certainty.
I know that from 1943 onwards my relative was living in Sussex but have been unable to find where she went as a baby, who looked after her and who paid for her care.
I have the name of the adoptive Mother, who was a only 10 years older than my relative and was a single woman until 1941, at which point my relative was 14 years old. I can't imagine why a single woman with no medical or teaching experience would take in another woman's child, and I haven't found any link between the two families. Did the government make any payments for unwanted children? If so are there records I can search?
Are there any hospital or nursing home records I can search? The 1939 register is inconclusive and school records for Sussex are somewhat hit and miss.
Any tips or hints gratefully received!
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I don't think it was uncommon for a single mother to adopt a child, I have seen it elsewhere
Do you know the exact date of birth of the child?
Louisa Maud
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Hi yes, I have a copy of the birth certificate. the date is 27th May 1927 (which I believe is shortly before adoption was formalised in law)
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It was quite usual for illegitimate children to be adopted. In this case, the domestic servant wouldn't have been able to keep her child as she would have to have lived in her employer's home in all probability. They wouldn't have allowed her to have her child living there.
In the event the child was formally adopted then there would be adoption records but I think these are closed for many years.
The child would have been born in a hospital, or home, again I doubt whether the records would be in the public domain but you could check. Do you know where she was born?
Jo
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I would assume she would be on 1939 unless of course she lived to a great age or even be live now
Louisa Maud
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Hi, I agree that her employer would not have allowed the child to stay with her Mother, and this is why she had to give her away.
I don't know where she was from her birth in 1927 to starting work in 1943. The 1939 register asks for location of the person at that time, which I don't know for sure if she was with the adoptive Mother that I know about or not. She died in 2018 and we are deeply regretting not asking questions while we had the chance - though as she never wanted to talk about her past, this might have been a closed topic.
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Welcome to rootschat, sylvieme.
You have put:
'I have the name of the adoptive Mother, who was a only 10 years older than my relative and was a single woman until 1941, at which point my relative was 14 years old'
Sorry, I do not understand. How could she have adopted when she was 10 years old?
Did the baby retain her birth name?
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Thanks Chempat - glad it's not just me wondering about that one ???
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So did I but thought it was me not reading it correctly
LM
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She says the adoptive mother was only 10 years older than the mother who was only 14 years old so would have made adoptive Mother 24.
>>>I have the name of the adoptive Mother, who was a only 10 years older than my relative and was a single woman until 1941, at which point my relative was 14 years old<<<<
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Sorry, suzyvan, but it does not read like that.
'I have been researching a female relative born 1927
I have the name of the adoptive Mother, who was a only 10 years older than my relative and was a single woman until 1941, at which point my relative was 14 years old.'
It does not say that the birth Mother was 14 years old.
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Hi sorry but there seem to have been some technical issues and my replies haven't posted.
Yes, I have a copy of the birth certificate. The date is 27th May 1927 (which I believe is shortly before adoption was formalised in law) which gives her place of birth in Surrey.
I don't think it was a formal adoption because her birth certificate shows her birth Mother's surname, and she kept that surname until her marriage.
Sorry for confusing about the adoptive Mother, She was born in 1917 in Sussex. The adoptive Mother's family are all in Sussex - Brighton and Horsham area.
The birth Mother's family are all in Surrey, mostly around the Chertsey area. I can't find any family link between these two families and the distance between them means it's unlikely that there was any chance they somehow knew each other.
I've looked at 1939 register and have both birth and adoptive Mothers.
The birth Mother married (not my relative's Father) 7 months after giving birth and by 1939 had 4 children and was living in a cottage in a tiny village West of Horsham.
The adoptive Mother was working as a drapers assistant in Brighton, her Mother (then aged 66 and a widow) and brother are at the same address. There is also a 10 year old girl, whose name has no connection to my research and another child whose record is closed. I am considering sending my relative's death certificate to see if this record can be opened, but as I do not know where she was living in 1939, there's no guarantee that this is the correct record.
On the birth Mother's side of the family I've come across a number of instances of children living with other relatives (while the parents were working away in service) and some of them have taken in foundlings which I know there was a payment for. So what really puzzles me is why this child wasn't taken in by any of her own family, and how did she end up in another county?
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Hello sylvieme,
You had started off a new topic with your last reply that is why it was not showing on your topic ;) I have now merged them together for you.
Regards
Sarah
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Many thanks - I only found this site yesterday so it's all still a bit confusing!
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If she has the same name as at birth when she married, then was it an adoption, or a fostering? If she never had the same surname as the adoptive 'Mother' it is not an adoption.
As she kept the same surname then someone was a connection between the two to place her with the new family. Possibly the 'adoptive' mother took her on once she was of an appropriate age, but could not possibly do so when the the child was still a baby. So you would think that the 'grandmother' was doing the looking after for a long time.
Have you looked into the family history of all members of both families?
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Are the entries in 1939, the ones where the redacted lines have been mis-aligned with the entries?
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Yes, you're probably right, the correct term would be fostering, it's just that the family always referred to it as having been adopted.
I wondered about the 'grandmother' and am still looking into that side of the family but not getting very far. No-one seems to have had much money so it made me wonder if there was a financial reward for taking in foster children in those days and if so who paid it? Obviously she was fed and clothed and was sent to school so someone must have had to lay out something for that so where did the money come from?
The birth Mother's side of the family were mostly agricultural labourers, laundresses or in service with huge numbers of their own children, so no money to spare from them, and yet they did look after various children while parents were working so why not this one?
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yes, the redaction is misaligned and I can see the birthdate of the closed record, which is 13.5.1927 - incredibly close to my relative but not exactly the same.
Obviously it would be easy to get the date slightly wrong so I can't quite say yes this is her, or no it's not.
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I was just about to ask you to look at the 1939, as the date is different. We are not allowed to do 1939 look-ups, but you can quote.
Have you searched on 1939 by birthdate? Usually if people make a mistake it is with the year, they usually get the birth day and month correct.
Sorry, do you have the correct fostering family on the 1939?
You know what names the 'baby' used at marriage and death?
You are wondering where she is in 1939, to help confirm?
You know the baby's birth Mother - what confirmation have you that she is definitely the correct lady?
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I didn't know you could search the 1939 by birthdate will have a go at that.
All the pieces tie together for the birth Mother, luckily for me she had 3 first names and having and address for where she was when she gave birth I managed to find her marriage which led to some living relatives, who then confirmed details on that side of the family as well as telling me the Mother never forgot the baby she had to give away as well as them knowing the baby's first name.
Yes, I am trying to track where she was between birth and starting work aged 16. The 1939 is the only census type of document which is available for location, and at that time she would have been at school so I don't have much to go on.
I have names from birth and marriage certificate, which are all the same, then at death the only change was to her married surname (plus I'd known her for about 20 years by that point)
The fostering family was a little harder to track as I only had a name and place they lived from about 1955 onwards. Eventually I got a breakthrough and am fairly sure I have the right person, though they aren't big on keeping up with official records like electoral roll or baptisms so it has been a challenge.
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Good luck with the birth date search.
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Thanks. I've just had a go and no luck at all. Which leads me to think her record must still be closed, so maybe I will try sending the death certificate.
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Have you already checked whether any actual adoption records exist for her? The fact she uses her birth surname could suggest there was no actual adoption and she could have been raised by her mothers relatives or even her birth fathers?
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Just checking - does that birth certificate agree with birth date on death certificate?
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Thanks for the tip to check dates on both certificates, but yes they do both agree in every detail.
I found that the legal adoption process only came into existence in late 1927 so her birth preceded that by just a few months. But please correct me if I've got that wrong and there is some way I can research it. Hence fostering is a better term to use, but I hadn't really thought about the technicalities of using the term adoption.
I've searched extensively through her birth Mother's family and can find no record of her anywhere.
The birth Father is still a mystery as all I have for sure is a name on the electoral roll at the time of the pregnancy I can't prove he is the Father without some other link, and I can't even find him for sure as I don't know his place or date of birth or occupation. The only thing I can say for sure is that he must have been over 21, and that he had no other family members registered on the same roll. Again any tips in where to look for a mystery man gladly received.
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Normally, with adoption, the name of the child changes completely, and so there is no link to the original birth name/certificate.
Your 'relative' married in her birth name, according to you, so must have known more of her background than many who are not even told they have been adopted.
Did she refer to the lady as her adopted mother, and when did she start to regard her as such, presumably there is no Father's name on her marriage certificate? If the adoptive mother married in 1941, did the husband have responsibility for her also?
Yes, if a proper adoption, then he would have been her father at marriage.
I have a relation whose father was born in 1926 in Northern Ireland (before official adoption) but was then officially adopted in 1947.
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Don't think it's been mentioned here but it's possible the father or someone on his behalf made arangements for the child's care.
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Since the birth mother married 7 months after giving birth, that would be reason enough for her to have had her baby cared for by someone else. I have seen a similar situation in my family and in that case, the illegitimate boy was brought up by his grandparents.
Another ancestor had 3 illegitimate children in Cheshire and these were found in census returns living with people who were unrelated. There would have been payment for their care I am sure.
I also wondered whether the lady who cared for the child could have been connected to the father's family. Do you have sufficient information on him to try and establish this? If you are able to provide us with the information you have, then we could try and see whether we can trace his ancestry. I appreciate you might not want to disclose this.
In view of the Brighton connection, have you searched the street and trade directories for Brighton? They have street indexes which show the names of people living in the houses etc. These are available for many years. They may be held in The Keep now.
https://www.thekeep.info/
It is possible to do a name search on their site.
Jo
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Interesting point, I haven't seen the marriage certificate but will look for this to check if there is a Father's name. I don't know if she ever referred to her as her Mother, whenever it came up in conversation she was called by a sort of nickname, which was her three initials DBF
Yes, it would seem like the Father may have contributed to her care but I don't really know where to look to find this information. That would certainly give me the link to connect them all together but for now it's well and truly missing!
I've only just found the Brighton connection, but didn't know about the street indexes, that will be interesting to follow up on, thank you.
Re the Father the only thing I have is the name of a man living at the same address as was given as the address the birth Mother was living and working at, which I found on the electoral roll. There's no proof he was the Father, he did leave that address shortly afterwards, but that could have been connected to his work rather than anything personal, I just don't know. I don't mind giving you his name but that's really all I've got can you do anything with so little information?
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Depends how common the name is.
Nothing ventured.....
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OK, here we go -
Edward James Coomber, electoral roll for Heath Cottage, Dene End, Haslemere, Surrey 1924-1926
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It is Dene Road, not Dene End, not that that helps. Can see Longdene Road on maps.
A likely candidate for him does seem missing.
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Just to add re the term adoption
In 1911 the term adopted daughter was used for two of my relatives who had different surnames to their family .
Although adoption was not legalized til 1927
I believe the distinction was made between a child who was taken on permenantly and a child who was a boarder temporarily and upkeep paid for .
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I have been unable to locate a birth registration for anyone by the name of Edward James Coomber. This is within a wide range of years. Have you searched for him in the 1901 and 1911 census returns? Do you have him in the 1939 Register?
There are some marriages registered in Southwark District for an Edward J Coomber. This isn't certain to be an Edward James Coomber.
1912 to a Mary C Newstead.
1921 the entry shows: Edward J Beckett married Margaret A.M Griffiths.
Edward J Coomber married Margaret A.M Griffiths.
It is possible he was a married man in 1924-6.
Jo
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Thanks to Brigidmac for the comments on adoption re fostering. It seems that adoption could apply to my relative but it just doesn't have the same legal standing we think of today.
Re Edward J Coomber it's reassuring that you can't find him either!
In the end I drew up a spreadsheet with all the possible options. I started with a time-frame from 1867 to 1903, those being the extremes I thought he had to be born within. I looked in all the census from 1881 to 1911 as well as 1939 register and considered that he might not enter his full name so also looked for Edward J or just Edward. Geographically I stayed mostly within Surrey and Sussex as that seemed the most likely but of course it doesn't rule out him travelling more around the country. This has given me approximately 20 different possibilities.
Most of them seem to do manual labour type of jobs, which I don't think quite fits the idea of being on the electoral roll of a fairly remote cottage outside of a town, and if they had a wife and children also doesn't feel quite right though of course not impossible.
The only one who jingled my antennae was on the 1911 census and that's the only place I found him so far is Ed Coomber b1885 Tonbridge Wells. Lodging @ Bury St Edmunds occupation Manual instructor for Borough Education Committee. Which fits the idea of someone who could travel to different parts of the country for employment and possibly be more meticulous about registering to vote. In 1926 he would have been 41 years old and as no wife was registered with him possibly more than interested in a pretty young servant.........................
Then after finding the Brighton connection I looked more closely there and found something else. Between 1924 & 1930 an Edward Coomber was registered at 36 Luther St just a few streets away from the adoptive Mother's family. In 1927 he was joined on the roll by Louise Coomber. And finally I found a marriage in Brighton in 1923 between Edward James Coomber and Lousia A Piper.
Which on the one hand gives me a person who could easily have been in contact with the adoptive Mother's family, supporting my relative financially but conversely how could the same person be registered in two different places at the same time?
Who knew family history research would be such a rabbit hole to disappear down!! Any thoughts??
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I can sympathise with you as I have a mystery in my family history which is centred on Brighton and Hove. There have been a number of people searching trying to resolve this for 16 years but we have all been unsuccessful to date.
I think the Edward Coomber who lived in Luther St, Brighton, might be worth researching further. His marriage is registered as James Coomber to Louisa Piper. Have you obtained the marriage certificate? That would give his age, address, occupation and father's details. The fact he lived in such close proximity to the adoptive mother' s family makes this curious. I think Coomber is quite an unusual name.
The other Ed Coomber is also in the frame as Tunbridge Wells is within easy reach of Brighton. He may have stayed there at one time.
The other thing I wonder about is whether the name of Coomber could have had a variation, or variations. Comber would be the most likely and I noticed there was an Edward James Comber whose birth was registered in East Grinstead in the June quarter 1894.
I will do some more digging and see what I can find.
Jo
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Bless your heart, I really wasn't expecting to find anyone else to be interested enough to do research themselves!
16 years! Good grief, that is a long time to still be searching for answers. I'm looking at it as worst way I have to wait for the 1921 census to be released before I've got any certainty about who was where and what the connections are.
Thanks for the encouragement, it's hard to know sometimes what leads are worth pursuing.
Funny you should suggest a variation in spelling. There's a timber merchant in Haslemere which goes under the name Coomers and got me all excited for a while. Then I found that in 1925 the owners were Jesse Mann & Sons who owned it until at least the 1970s so that was the end of that idea!
But going from his registration to vote in 1924 in Haslemere, the spelling was Coomber so it would seem prudent to stick with that for now. It's unlikely that he would change the spelling of his name from that time forward (though what would happen a century or so early is anybody's guess)
Do any of the websites release marriage certificates? Or do I have to apply to some government agency? I've only just succumbed to paying a subscription to findmypast specifically to dig into the 1939 register. But so far I've been looking at free sites or using the library (but that's obviously more difficult just now)
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I, too, could not see him, named as in the ER's, and was considering Comber (think I even tried Scotland).
Order from here:
https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/
you should get enough details from here to help fill it in:
https://www.freebmd.org.uk/
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Maybe a silly.question but as well as surname differences
have you searched for first name as Ted or Teddy
Its quite a common.abbreviation
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I know that Find My Past does have some marriage certificates on the site. I have searched these for my own family tree. You could look to see what they have for Brighton Registration District in the 1920s.
Another possibility is that he is using an alias, or aliases. Remember that marriage I posted on the 21 November? There were two entries for what appeared to be the same marriage. Edward J Beckett and Edward J Coomber, married Margaret A.M Griffiths. That looked strange and I wonder whether the Edward in question had two different surnames. I wonder whether any other Roots Chatters can give their opinions?
I wouldn't rule out the Edward James Comber born in East Grinstead Registration District. It isn't far from Brighton and the Edward James Coomber births registered were non existent in my searches.
I did a search on The Keep site for the name of Coomber and it produced 221 hits. These are the results:
https://www.thekeep.info/collections/search/?s=coomber&qa%5Bkeyword_reference_type%5D=0&qa%5Bpartner%5D&qa%5Btitle%5D&qa%5Bperson%5D&qa%5Bplace%5D&qa%5Bsubject%5D&qa%5Bformat%5D&qa%5Bidentifier%5D&qa%5Bdate_from%5D&qa%5Bdate_to%5D&cbav=2&cbadvsearchquery
It appears to be quite a common name around Brighton and Eastbourne. There are some marriage details but I cannot see anything for the 1923 marriage.
Has anyone considered a DNA test to see if there are any matches?
Jo
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Yes I have examples of people taking step parents surname ..even in adult hood
Also using mothers maiden name
All sorts of reasons doesnt necessarily mean they are hiding
The two surnames on marriage certificate is interesting ...wording is mportant
My grandma grew up with her adoptive surname but her marriage has birth mothers surname and otherwise known as ....adoptive name .
Her birth fathers surname was also given as a middle name
There are two entries for her too
So that could be a possible explanation definitely worth following up the Beckett surname too
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Hi there !
Thank you so much for looking into this that certainly gives me enough to keep me quiet for a while!
Meanwhile I've got a couple of updates.
I tried to get a closed record open on the 1939 assuming that my relative was with her adoptive Mother in Brighton and it came back as no, not correct. So I'm still baffled as to where she was from birth to 16. It's a bit annoying that you have to know where a person is before they'll open the record that's the whole point of searching for them isn't it??
Then I started thinking about her birth Mother getting pregnant who was she working for in Haslemere and who was around her. Edward J Coomber is the obvious one as he was registered at exactly the same address, but it was a cottage in the grounds of a big house well out of the centre of town. I would like him to be a tutor of some kind (the Tonbridge guy) so I was looking for families with children of an appropriate age. Luckily I'd noted the neighbours names from the ER when I first started doing this research so it was a matter of going back to that.
The residents of the big house married in 1924, so any of their children would be too young in 1926/7. (though both their Father's were listed as 'gentlemen' which was a thrill as I haven't come across anyone with money so far ha ha! )
Likewise the next ones I looked at married in 1920 and the husband came from a family of bankers so I thought a child born before marriage would be unlikely.
However the third one I looked at threw up some interesting possibilities. He's the wonderfully named Weatherill Abbot Strickland born 1898. His Father was from Natal, so maybe that has something to do with the name but thank you all the same! It appears he served in WW1 then qualified as a dentist in 1922, and was in practise in 1925 very close to Dene End house. Then in 1927 he went to Algiers and 1929 to Genoa ( both boats were South African and it might have been a honeymoon trip). He died in 1948 and probate gives his beneficiary as Kathleen, his widow, but I can't find a marriage for them could they have married abroad? And if so do any websites cover South Africa?
He would have been 28 years old in 1926 and a dashing young dentist might steal anyone's heart so is this my mystery man??
Thoughts please ??
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My 1st step would be to obtain her marriage to see what it reveals as there are too many 'could be's' even if the marriage cert. doesn't throw any light on the subject of her father?
Annie
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? How about this for your pile of notes . . . . .
Marriage Sep 1922 Brentford 3a 275
Kathleen HAYTER / Weatherill A STRICKLAND
Ray
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that looks fabulous! Did you see a location for the marriage?
Thanks Ray.
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sorry just saw the Brentford - I was so excited I missed it!
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It may be worth exploring the place(s) the baby would have been born in 1927. Am I right in thinking it was around Haslemere? There was no NHS in those days and I think mothers gave birth in cottage hospitals, or other maternity homes. This may be a help:
http://www.haslemere.com/hospitallof/history.pdf
There may be records for these places and you could establish if it is possible to see them. I am not sure if they would be closed for 100 years though.
Records might give information on the circumstances of her pregnancy and name of the father.
This has proved to be a successful line of approach in one case in my family. We found the maternity home the child was born in (in 1905) and they had records for this event. The records had quite a lot of detail, including the circumstances surrounding the baby being born and name of the father.
I am puzzled about the time the child lived with her adoptive mother. Do you know which years she was with her and where they were?
I think I would concentrate on finding the whereabouts of the child for the time being. Unless you have some evidence on the identity of the father, you may spend hours going along false trails.
The DNA test is another thing to pursue.
Jo
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Hi Jo,
Have you been practising telepathy for long? I had exactly the same thought about hospitals this morning.
I found out a little bit about the cottage hospital, which some of the facts are duplicated in the article you sent but the League of Friends gives a lot more information, thanks for that - League of Friends hadn't even crossed my mind and they might be more willing to discuss the social aspects of it's history or even know if I can check any records or not. Brilliant.
I also went back to the address given on her birth certificate and found I may have made a mistake in my original thinking. There's a Heath Cottage (grade 2 listed since 1977) much closer to the town centre. Dene Road looks like it's now called Midhurst Road, with the end closest to Haslemere town (where the cottage is) being known as Shepherd's Hill. The cottage is one of those impossible to tell the exact age of (by an amateur) but is pretty old so probably would have been a bit ramshackle in the 1926. Purely by coincidence the Cottage Hospital would have been well within walking distance!
The splendid article you linked me to also mentions a St George's maternity home but the dates on this might not be so good as for the cottage hospital. Still, it's a thought.
Who did you approach to enquire about the records for your relative?
Sadly I have no idea as to when she started to be cared for by the adoptive Mother. I know that from age 16 (1943) her first job was nearby to Southwater (near Horsham), and that when she took her own children to visit the adoptive Mother from around 1960 onwards she (the adoptive Mother) was living in Southwater. So if I've got the right person - although the adoptive Mother was living in Brighton, married and had her son registered there for some reason they left shortly afterwards and settled in Southwater. I've still got research to do on the husband's family to see if their roots lie in Southwater 1939 register does give a family of the right surname living there so it's possible, I just need to work out all the generations/connections.
Yes, finding the biological Father is very much a needle in a haystack job, and without any obvious connections (like financial support of some kind) I think I'm unlikely to find him.
The only thing which might give me a clue is if the possible Father has twins running through his family it could be a link to my relative as she had twins herself I've researched extensively through her birth Mother's side as well as her husband's side and the only twins I've found go back to the early 1800s on her husband's Paternal Grandmother's side so it's all a bit remote. But until I've found the link in the first place I'm not sure what DNA would tell me. (not that I actually have and DNA from my relative or anything to compare it to or am I missing something here?)
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Quick answer re the dna .
Your dna would link you to descendants of shared great great.grandparents
If your relative had a dna test you would see mutual matches
Then youd have to look at their matches which.did not match.you
Its a long slow process and only works if descendants from the other side have tested but people have been successful in calculating their birth.father
Parents birth.parents
Or even grandparents birth parents
My aunts dna did seem to prove that her great grandmothers birth father was the man named on scottish birth certificate as she.has matches with.people of that surname
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hmm, interesting. If I had DNA from a bunch of people I could maybe find the connections, but as you say it even sounds like a long process. And most of the people I'm looking at are long dead so I can't even think how I'd get hold of a sample for testing.
So my main objective still seems to be to find a strong possibility through all the usual research processes before I can consider this option.
But thanks for the explanation, I'll put it on the back burner.
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For DNA to be successful it would need to come from a child/grandchild/g grandchild of your female relative born 1927
Annie
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The Surrey History Centre might be able to assist with hospitals etc and these links for this are:
https://www.surreycc.gov.uk/culture-and-leisure/history-centre
https://www.surreycc.gov.uk/culture-and-leisure/history-centre/online-records
I don't know if it is feasible for you to visit there when it reopens but they will give advice by telephone if necessary. It is possible they hold records for some of the places where she may have given birth.
The source of information for my relatives child was The Salvation Army as it was in their maternity home she had the baby. They kept records and the amount of information was quite staggering. It included the identity of the father, a solicitor in Brighton, plus the circumstances of her situation that resulted in her having the baby on her own. This child was placed in an orphanage and details of that were there along with much more.
Are you in touch with any living relatives, or descendants, of the lady who had the baby? Is it possible that information would have been passed down to them? Would anyone in the family have any old photos that might contain clues?
I presume the adoptive mother is deceased now. You mention she had a son, have you tried to trace him, or his family? It is highly likely that he/they would know something of the history here.
It would be possible for us to search for more information but we would need names and dates to go on. I appreciate is is tricky and you may not want to disclose these.
Jo
Jo
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I did visit the Surrey History Centre when I first started looking into this. Admittedly I only went there once so probably didn't really get as much out of it as I could. In truth I was a bit overwhelmed as I hadn't got a clue about how it was organised or how to look for what I wanted, or even what kind of records they hold. At the time I was looking into the birth Mother's family to see if my relative had spent at least some of her childhood with them but they didn't have much on school records but I did also see the electoral roll for Haslemere.
I see from the links you sent that they are able to allow some digital access during the shutdown so I might be able to dig around a bit more from home.
The Salvation Army is another one of those things I hadn't thought about, they've done a lot of good works over the years, I'm glad they were able to help you.
The adoptive Mother's son seems even more elusive. I've only found a birth record for him, no marriage and obviously no census is applicable. The usual websites threw up a possible connection in Scotland as a company director which seems a little unlikely. I tried a trawl on Facebook but got nowhere with that possibly because I have so little to go on.
The birth Mother went on to have 7 more children and I traced one of her Granddaughters, we're now Facebook friends. She is pleased to hear any bits I manage to confirm but her own family has no interest in family history. Her Father (not a descendant) is still alive and may have photographs up in the attic but he doesn't want anyone digging around. I find this rather sad as the stories he could pass on now will be lost forever when he goes, but of course I must respect his wishes and those of the family.
For this reason I don't want to publish any family names and dates on the public chat forum but would be willing to share in a private chat, if that works for you?
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Hello sylvieme,
Yes we could send details via PM, or another way if you prefer.
It is a shame you cannot persuade the widower of your relative to speak about the past and her life. Is there any way you could ask her granddaughter to broach this with him? She would be an ideal candidate for a DNA test too. Her daughters could be asked for information, have you tried this?
Jo