Stephen Ellis - any ideas?

[JosiahS]

Thanks for your input Ciderdrinker.

The 1801 shows Thomas Bartlett who was Elizabeth's brother.  Their father had died in 1785, and their mother had remarried in 1787 and was living in Pirbright.

I think it is hard to speculate on Stephen's birth date - there must be a burial record for him somewhere unless he left the UK and died at sea, or overseas, but I can't find him on a ship's manifest.  A burial would give the age at death which would be a major clue.

I don't really have any Charleses in my side of the family.  The name Charles in the Ellis family comes from the mother's side - she had a brother called Charles Freeland.

[Lewis21]

Hi all,

Appreciate this thread was originally for Stephen Ellis, but I was doing a bit of wide searching in the hope of coming across something useful on Thomas Saunders, since it looks like the baptisms for the parish of Wycombe around 1790 still aren't available anywhere online. I noticed that there was a Josiah Saunders baptised in 1773 at the Crenden Lane Independent Chapel in High Wycombe (on Ancestry), which got me wondering, although annoyingly no parents' names are given until later years. Also what appears to be a younger sibling, William (ties in with Thomas' eldest son?), was baptised in 1781 (among others), the dates are consistent with them all being siblings. I think it's reasonable the Thomas in question could've been born around 1792/3.

I then looked at the Posse Comitatus record for Bucks in 1798 on FamilySearch and in Chepping (High) Wycombe there is a Josiah and 2x Thomas Saunders, all papermakers, which would tie in nicely with Thomas John and his son Josiah, all the same line of work.

I wonder therefore if Josiah isn't Thomas John's father, and the other two Thomas' being his grandfather and uncle? I noticed Josiah appears to have married an Ann Morris in HW in 1792, perhaps a bit of a shotgun wedding, since he'd be about 19 or so. Given the name is so unusual I reckon it merits a bit of further investigation.

Let me know what you think.

Cheers,

Lewis

[JosiahS]

Hi Lewis

I know it is all a bit frustrating not being able to get back further on this line, but I'm not happy to think that Thomas got his age so wrong in the censuses.

One line I keep checking on is that when Josiah, my ancestor, moved to Sunderland his first marriage shows the witness as John Henry Saunders.  It seems from the records that John Henry was born about 1808, and had a younger brother called Charles born about 1821 who also was in Sunderland.

Neither John Henry, nor Charles, were born in Co Durham.  Unfortunately John Henry died before the 1851 census, but he married in Richmond, Yorkshire.  When Charles married he named his father as Josiah Saunders who was a papermaker!!  Charles was alive in 1851 and living in Gateshead as he had children born there about that time but I have been unable to find him in the census to see where he was born.  He died before 1861. 

Charles also had links to Richmond as his son Josiah was born there, but the family seems to move south and Josiah his son lives his life in Hampshire.

I am convinced these chaps are probably cousins of my Josiah and may well help solve the issues we're all having with Thomas.

Happy hunting!