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Surname: Mathews     Forenames: Valentine, John, Cecil, De Vere   

These were the names on the birth certificate of the person who was later often referred to as Cecil de Vere.  He was born on 14 February 1846 at 46 Warwick Street, Golden Square, St. James's Westminster.  His mother was Catherine Mathews.  The father's name was left blank, yet, unusually, it gave his occupation (surgeon).  No baptism record has been found.

Both he and his mother dropped the name Mathews and took on the surname of de Vere, though I have found no marriage.  Later, she kept a lodging-house.  In the 1861 census, her birthplace was given as "Wales".  She died at 10 Lower Calthorpe Street, St. Pancras, in 1864, age given as 42, and was buried in Brompton Cemetery.  He became a clerk and a very strong chess player, but became ill with tuberculosis and spent his final few months in a convalescence home in Torquay, where he died on 9 February 1875, and was buried in Torquay Cemetery.  Both the death registration and the burial register entry were in the name of Cecil Valentine Brown.  These were the only occasions I know when the name Brown was used.

I have three specific questions:

1. Regarding the illegitimate birth, in an attempt to discover the father, I have searched a volume of Petty Sessions for the parish of St. James's at Westminster Archives, but I have a feeling this was not the most appropriate.  What would be the best court records to check?

2.  Is there any significance in the choice of Brompton Cemetery for the burial of someone who lived in St. Pancras?

3.  Any thoughts on use of the name Brown at the very end of his life?  Did he want to be anonymous in Torquay?  A recording error?  His father's name? 

The London Gazette carried an announcement that a partnership between William Stanton, George Knight Stanton and Henry Stanton, wool staplers and clothiers of Fordington, Dorset, was dissolved on 21 July 1842 " ... so far as regards the said Henry Stanton, who has retired from the said concern ..."

I am intrigued by HS's withdrawal from the family business and would love to know why and what became of him.  He was still in Fordington on the 1841 census, but was not named in the will of his father, William Stanton, which was written in 1843, with a codicil added in 1846, and proved in 1849.  That gives the impression that he died in the 1840s while still a young man, but I have found no evidence for that, nor any later mention of him.

 On 24 February 1829, the London Gazette carried details of the insolvency of John Howard, a theatre manager, describing him as:

"John Howard, late Manager of the several Theatres of Lancaster, Ulverston, Preston, Bolton, Wigan, Rochdale, Blackburn, all in Lancashire, Hull, Yorkshire, Kendal, Westmorland, Penrith, Whitehaven, Cumberland, Stockport and Macclesfield, Cheshire  ...  residing at Rochdale, Lancashire, Comedian."

He had had a career in Northern theatres dating back 15 years or more.  His petition was to be heard on 18 March 1829 in the Court for Relief of Insolvent Debtors.

I have lost track of him after that and would welcome any information as to what later became of him, especially concerning his death.

Michael Staunton (1788–1870), editor, journalist, later Lord Mayor of Dublin, 1847.  His wife in 1847 seems to have been born Anne Overend.

There was also a Michael Staunton who, with Margaret McMahon, had a son, Charles, baptized at St. Catherine's, Dublin, in 1811.  Was it the same Michael with a previous wife?

I want to check the birth register of the nonconformist (Baptist) chapel which was formerly at St George's Road, Manchester.  The National Archives hold RG 4/2692, which covers the years 1777 - 1836, but the period I need to search is a little later, in the early 1840s (births). Can you advise me, please, who I might contact about access to that register?  Or does anyone know if a present day chapel is the successor of the one which was formerly at St George's Road?

I've already asked Lancashire Archives and Manchester Archives and sent an enquiry to the North Western Baptist Association.

Thanks and regards.