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Kipps was a butcher for some years and then suddenly started appearing as a labourer, and I must admit I'd just been thinking whether some accident had happened....

Hi all

I have just been following up the family of my greatx3 grandmother Mary Ann (Clifton) Miller in terms of her siblings and their offspring.

I've known for many years that Mary Ann and her husband James and a number of her children (though not my gx2 grandmother) emigrated to NZ in the 1870's at some point, and tracked down a fascinating family story where two of my great uncles, in the Merchant Navy, visited 'their mother's aunt' in New Zealand in the 1930's.  I was helped by some NZ Ancestry contacts to track down some of the details.

However, in my extended family researches I've been astonished to find that several of Mary Ann Clifton's siblings' families also made their way to NZ - or at least Ancestry 'hints' (yes I know), and other people's trees suggest they did.

I don't suppose there are any passenger lists which will help me find when they all left the UK, are there?  Or should I just look for first appearance on electoral rolls to try and pin it down?

Thank you for any suggestions

Hi Joanna - many apologies for extremely late reply to your post, which I didn't see an alert for.

I've been staying away from home during refurbishments and the email may well have been ignored in the midst of other domestic things, sorry!

In true form I can't take myself back to why I was researching the Frederick George Pay who is your ancestor, back in 2019.  I do have a Frederick George Pay in my tree, but it's not the same one - possibly I was trying to pin mine down by excluding yours.

So I am not directly connected to your Frederick George, or to you, but I do have an extensive Pay family history in Kent, which may have links further back to your family.  Although the name is - perhaps surprisingly! - very common in Kent.

My family history, so far as I've pinned it down with certainty, starts with John Pay and Ann Revel(l).  John was born in Swingfield, Kent in c1757 and may have been the son of William Pay and Margaret Streeting, though given the common nature of his first name, I cannot be wholly certain.  Ann Revel(l) was born in Adisham in 1764. 

The family seems to have moved to Nonington, Kent, where the majority of baptisms took place, including my gx4 grandmother Henrietta Pay.  I am descended down an illegitimate line from her son John, born c1806 in Nonington and baptised in nearby Womenswold.

So none of it is very far from your own Pay family close to Sandwich.

Thank you for attaching your tree, which I've looked at carefully, but there seem to be no connections.  And to think that I thought, when growing up in North London, that PAY was a very unusual surname.  Most definitely not so.

My Dad (the handsome fellow in my avatar) had all his teeth out at the age of 26 in 1941, presumably because they'd been troublesome previously.  He had to do quite a bit of 'practising' with his new set of choppers.

On the other hand my Mum never had hers out, and was very very proud in her 80's that she was possessed of a full set.

My brother and myself - though both still with a full set of gnashers - were affected by the poor nutrition of my mother during pregnancy and her earlier life (or so I was told by a dentist once) and both of us have quite twisted teeth, especially at the bottom.

Brother had considerable difficulty with his embouchure as a professional clarinettist.

With the lack of NHS dentists/treatments presumably teeth will continue to be problematic for many people.

Thank you for that death, I'll have a look out for it.

My heart really bleeds for them, coming across from hunger and penury in the Irish Famine and landing in the horror of the worst bits of East London.

Ancestry has just popped up a possible baptism for Patrick Donovan in Cork, son of Denis and Honora....