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Dear All,

Many thanks for this, unfortunately I also found a family at 24 Nelson Road, Harrow (just up the road from Pinner), also Thomas with an Ann as a 7 year old child and a Mary as a wife  . Mind you the 11 Pinner drive sounds more likely. I can't separate them in any other way (both Thomas' are labourers, farm and brick ). It seems v unlikely that one family of shepheards would move out only for another to move into the same road! Then again 

Looks like my problem is that I assumed that she would be registered as a Mary or Mary Ann, yet she is not. At least this explains why she is Annie once she gets married!

Although Ancestry have opened up their indexing for a free look (1881 only) they haven't opened the original image so I cannot confirm the location, other than to say that Slough is in Berks. Looks like a trip to Aylesbury is needed to see what Ann/ Mary Ann was christened as. The IGI can't help as I have no idea what batch number slough is under and you can't just enter the surname and year (why???).

J.

<EDIT!>
Just got my thinking head on  If she's 7 in 1881 that'd make her 10 in 1883 so scratch the stuff I typed about the Harrow Family. Mind you the 11 Pinner Drive one would only be 16 and not 20 when she was married. Then the first child was born on the 4th March 1884...

Hi Rex,

Like Chris I am no Latin scholar, but this is from my own understanding and from scanning the internet.

Roman Latin did not have a letter J, it was added, however the Germanic languages (English has Germanic roots from Anglo-saxon) do have a J, possibly pronounced as in Jam. Since English is a mangle of many different Languages - I believe that it ceased to exist for a time as a written language after the Norman conquest (Norman French) and for many years the defacto written language was Latin - you can get all manner of combinations. Also in the 9th century the country was split into AngloSaxon Wessex, Mercia (now most of Wales) and Danish Mercia (the Danelaw). Whilst this left its mark in placenames it also, I think, changed pronunciations.

In fact pronunciations change anyway. Take for instance the spelling of the word Grey. It's pronounced Gray, and the USA spells it this way. I seem to remember that this is due to the vowel sounds moving around the mouth.

The final confusion is that written English did not become standardized (or standardised) - at least as we see it - until well after the invention of the printing press. Why girl and not gerl, why house and not howse (after all cow, how, etc) ?

The last point is perhaps the most important. Many people were illiterate. They did not know how to spell their names and so could not correct anything a recorder wrote. For their part the recorder put down how they thought the name should be spelt in their dialect and accent and not that of the person who's name they were writing. Imagine for example a Cornish recorder writing the name of someone from Huddersfield.

Every region has it's own accent, and these have in the past effected (or is it affected?) the spelling of names. It can give clues as to where someone came from, but often it is a stumbling block and I guess the the best advice I can give is keep an open mind when researching. just because a name is spelt totally differently from how you think does not mean it's wrong just that the recorder thought that is how it should be spelt. An example? Rebecca Hite married a Joseph Worster (later Wooster), but is recorded as Kile in the parish register... Unless of course I have the wrong marrage... 

Hi!

Many thanks for the replies. I guess I should clarify the state of the family after Mary Ann and John married, apologies for not doing so earlier.

On the Marriage certificate the two whitenesses are William and Elizabeth Rod, both marked. The bride and groom look like they signed *but* the script is identical and looks the same as the rest of the document. So that's a bit odd.

Anyway. They lived in Horsel, Surrey. . In 1871 I have them in Twickenham Row with a son John and Daughter Ada. So this is the family that Suzard found. In 1881 they are in Cheapside Horsell, with 5 additional children ( Amelia, Stephen, Arthur, William and Fredrick) and in 1891 a new child, Ruth. Again these look like the ones that Suzard has. I don't have the 1901 census, but Mary's birth place is Truro in  1891, Trim in 1881 and might be Myrther (it's difficult to read on my copy) in 1871.

I confess that I do not know Cornwall at all well so do not know how each of the above parishes relate to each other, or even if they are parishes.

The Marrage was on Sept 30 1867 and Mary Ann states that she is 22, giving a birth date of around 1845. She's consitant in the census as well, 46 in 1891, 35 in 1881 and 25 in 1871.

There are family tales of a 'Betsy' being illegitimate and being born in Cornwall but at present I can't tie this to Mary Ann. Sadly I do not know if Mary is a 1st, 2nd or subsequent child but calling the daughter after the mother was common then so the Mary in Merther could be her mother (particularly as *her* mother is Ann). The problem is that if she is then Mary Ann would be illegitimate as if the elder Mary married she would no-longer be a Hocking (?)

According to free bmd there are 6 Mary/Mary Ann hockings born around 1845, and most of them are in Redruth. Not sure of the unnamed entries, how can I trace them?

Births Jun 1844
Hocking    Mary        Truro
Hocking    Mary Ann     Redruth   

Births Sep 1845         
Hocking    Mary Ann   Redruth

Births Mar 1846 
Hocking    Mary Ann    Redruth

Births Sep 1846
Hocking    Mary Ann    Penzance   
Hocking    Mary Ann    Redruth   

My problem is that I have tried 2 of these and neither have fathers called John. So I would expect quite a few 4-6 year olds in the 1851 census.  Unfortunately I don't have access to Ancestry so can only check by visiting the family records centre in London, till it closes that is!

I guess that the way forward would be to check all the 4-6 year old Hockings in Cornwall and try to find a match. The of course assumes that they are in Cornwall and have not moved, that John is still around, that Mary Ann hasn't been adopted (I've got adopted ancestors on other branches) and so on. Any other pointers/ ideas would be gratefully received!

J

Hi,

Many thanks for your reply. Sadly the IGI record refers to the marriage that I found. Unfortunately it is Kile in the register, not a miss-transcription of Hile or Hite. It could still be them, but I cannot work out what accent would mean that the vicar would make such a mistake, Kile and Hile/Hite sound just a bit too dissimilar.

J.

Hi Jan,

Perhaps the most famous glass works in middx was Whitefriars, which moved to Wealdstone in 1923. Although this is later than your ancestor they had been in existence for 300 years till they closed in 1980. Prior to 1923 they were based close to Fleet Street in London. There are lots of web based resources about them. If Edward lived around the Thames/Fleet area he could have worked there.

J.