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« on: Saturday 20 August 16 16:53 BST (UK) »
I’m trying to help a cousin with her maternal grandmother. Leah Birch married Francis Milton on 19 May 1923 at Aston Hertfordshire “Francis Lionel Milton bachelor 39 Greenkeeper, of Aston, father John Milton (dec'd) labourer & Leah Birch 32 spinster of Stevenage father unknown.” So I thought she was probably illegitimate.
In the 1939 register living in Knebworth Herts, Leah gives her date of birth as 8 July 1890, which ties in with her death age of 65 on 24 July 1955 in Hitchin Herts, residence still Knebworth.
There are birth registrations of three Leah Birchs in 1891, in Birmingham (Aston, but not the Aston where she married), Nottingham and Bolton, all of whom I’ve eliminated as not being “my” Leah.
I’ve found who I believe to be her, living in Acton in 1911, a servant, age 20, born Faversham Kent, indexed on Ancestry as Leah Borch but it looks like Birch to me. I have a copy of a baptism entry of a Leah Birch in Adisham Kent, 16 miles from Faversham, on 5 Apr 1891 but with no parents mentioned. In the 1891 census taken on the same day in Adisham there’s a Birch whose age of 7 months was first entered in the female column, then added to the male column, with the name transcribed on Ancestry as Scath and on FindMyPast as Seath which looks to me like a transcription error for Leath ie Leah. She was a nurse child with the Linkin family, with birthplace not known. The Linkins also had another nurse child living with them who was still with in 1901. But I can’t find Leah in 1901.
I have no idea what sort of records may have been kept by the parishes, but presumably someone must have paid the Linkins for taking in children. My next step will be to contact the local archives to see if there’s anything in Adisham parish chest.
It’s been suggested that as no parents were mentioned on her baptism entry she may have been a foundling and the name Leah Birch may have been a made up name, which would stop my research dead in it’s tracks!
Is it coincidence that there were other Birchs living in Adisham in 1891?
Any flashes of inspiration will be gratefully received.
David