RootsChat.Com

My grandfather was an Edward Leopold (not Leonard) Johnson Jay, and he was a tailor, so I guess he may not be this man in Waverley.

I really only have four known facts about him.

He was born in 1871 in Insterburg, near Konigsberg in East Prussia (now Chernyakovsk, near Kaliningrad, a Russian enclave).

His partner (I have seen no wedding certificate) Eliza Dunscombe gave birth to my father in 1907 in London. However, my father's birth certificate gives the father's name as Edward Leopold Johnson (not Jay).

In the 1911 census they are all living in Newport, Monmouthshire and he has a tailoring business.

He was interned in WW1 and spent the war in various camps (prisons). He separated from Eliza soon after the war and seemingly vanished. It's just possible that he settled in Liverpool, which is why I'm checking the Waverley man out. By the way, the Waverley man stayed in the phone book until 1956 (perhaps Mary Charlotte Jay never changed the phone book entry).

Thank you for your interest.

Dear Ian

Thank you so much for your Sturrock data. Two queries. I have 1786 not 1797 as birthdate for the John Sturrock married to Anne Archibald (but I can't recall my source for this right now). More curiously, I have him as the son of yet another John Sturrock who was married to a Margaret Archibald. So I'm wondering if and how Anne and Margaret Archibald were related.

Our ultimate hope is to find a photograph of 66 Regent Street near the turn of the century which shows our James Sturrock's hairdresser/perfumer's shop right next to the Cafe Royal. I have seen a 1910 photo but by then it was a different shop.

David

No,she was Eliza Fairclough and she went on to have two more children by a Parker Dunscombe in 1925/6. In family lore Johnson was the name of the family doctor who delivered my father but in reality this was the surnname Leopold gave on my father's 1907 birth certificate - "Leopold Johnson". Johnson may have been a version of his German name, posssibly. I have plenty of data on the Dunscombes.

Originally all I was told was that his name was Edward Leopold Johnson Jay and that he had been interned in WW1 and then separated from my grandmother Eliza. Later I found my father's birth certificate (London, 1907) but curiously the surname given was Johnson (no Jay). Through the Red Cross in Geneva I found where he had been interned (under the name Edward Leopold Jay) and that he had been born in Insterburg, East Prussia in 1871. Then in the 1911 census I found him (as Edward Leopold Jay) and Eliza and my father (their son aged 7) living in Newport where he was a master tailor.
But he and Eliza separated shortly after WW1 and I am wondering what happened to him. Of course, he could have gone say to the US or to Germany, or he may have lived in England. The 1940 death of an Edward Leonard Jay, a retired master tailor is intriguing but I would like to prove that it was him. He may have had another family with Marie Jay, I suppose.