THE PORT FAMILY OF HERNE BAY AREA- 1851 lookup request

[kathymgf]

Can anyone help me find James Port, born about 1820 Chislet/Reculver/Herne area, he married Harriet Morris.  Their children were Mary Jane Frances Sophia b. 1846/47, Ross b. 1848, Frederick William b 1850, Randall b. 1852 and Albert b. 1853.  I have found Harriet with her children in 1861, she is now a widow, if anyone could look for the family in 1851 census it would help me enormously, also if anyone has the same interest,  thanks. 

[MANOFKENT]

Hi,
PORTS IN RECULVER,HILBOROUGH,KENT 1851.
JAMES       head 39  labourer pauper   born HERNE in receipt of parish relief.
HARRIET    wife  37                              born HERNE.
FANNY        dau    5                              born RECULVER.
ROSS          son    3                              -------------------.
RANDALL     son    1                              -------------------.
Frederick     son    1                              -------------------.
-------------------------------------------------------------------.
I also have a Hannah Port  c1827 from Whitstable father James if you see them anywhere please let me know.Manofkent

[kathymgf]

 Hi,

 Thankyou for your info, have had a look around my PORT stuff, on Ancestry and the Vital records etc but can't find a Hannah to suit the bill, I see she married a Silk, but you already know that.  Looks like we are both looking for an elusive James Port.  My interest is in Frederick Port, I'm doing my sister-in-laws tree and can  now trace her back as far as 1851 thanks to your help. 

[GreySquirrel]

Hello there!

I have these Ports on my tree -- not as blood relations though, they are very remotely connected.

I appear to have pretty much the same info as you and cannot add much. But if you don't know, daughter Mary married a John Hancock in 1871 and moved to Whitstable. The men in the family appear to have been house painters and to have moved away from Reculver. I have Frederick marrying Ellen Charlotte Knightley in Surbiton in 1879 and seemingly settling there. Randall may have moved to the Medway towns, as there is a possible marriage there in 1877 to a Sarah Howard.

Randall is a family name in the Port families from Reculver and Herne, so the name is not as unique as we might at first think.

Do you know what happened to the sons Ross and Albert?

[kathymgf]

Hi Greysquirrel

Nice to hear from you, have to say I spent a couple of evenings trying to find Ross, Randall and Albert in all available census on Ancestry with no luck.  There's not too many Ross's about in the 1800's, where did she get that from! All I did find was the registration of Alberts birth on 1837online, he was Albert Adolphus Morris Port, poor man he probably called himself John to get his own back.  When I looked for Fred Port in 1881 I found him as Fred Post, so they could be somewhere.  Harriet Port was with her daughter Fanny (mary jane) Hancock in 1881.  James Port seems to have died young possibly 1853.  What I want to find out is which family of Ports James belongs to, it could be a William and Sarah, or there was a Randall first married to a Frances then to a Sophia, and as Harriet called her daughter by 2 of these names, and her son by one, I'm thinking it could be them.  Which Port were you interested in?

Kathymgf

[GreySquirrel]

Hello again

Have you seen these webpages?

http://users.ox.ac.uk/~malcolm/genuki/big/eng/KEN/Chislet/port.txt

http://users.ox.ac.uk/~malcolm/genuki/big/eng/KEN/Reculver/port.txt

Will try to post again this evening.

GS

[GreySquirrel]

Hi again

I have the following info about the children:

Mary Jane Fanny Sophia b c 1845 [not found]
Ross b D q 1847
Randall James b D q 1850
his twin Frederick William b D q 1850
Albert A M b S q 1851

The odd thing is that the 1861 census shows Randall as being a year younger than Albert. I've checked for the possible infant death of the D q 1850 Randall but not found it. There is a Charles Randall born in M q 1854 but he would be a couple of years too young. So that remains a mystery.

My interest is more in a different Port family, namely James Port (born in 1821 in Chislet), who married a Sarah Gurney in 1845 in Reculver. One of their children was a John Randall Port.

The name Port is rare but, as often happens, there are a number of presumably related families of the surname in the Chislet / Herne / Reculver area.

[kathymgf]

Hi Grey  Squirrel,

Thankyou for the two web pages, that was a nice find.   I see on the Reculver baptisms that Ross was christened John Thomas,
he was definately registered as Ross in Dec qtr 1847 as I looked at the page on 1837online, I wonder why they did that!  I found a John Port on the 1881, 1891 and 1901 census living at Southampton working as a ships painter, says hes from Herne Bay and the age is about right.  I don't always believe the ages given on the census as they quite often rounded up or down especially with children.  My James Port must have been born about the same time as yours, do you know who your James's father is?
Its possible mine was christened in Herne Bay as he says he is from Hillsborough, Herne, but I don't know the lie of the land in Kent so not sure how far places are apart.   If I find out anything which might be of interest to you I will post it here, meanwhile happy hunting..

Kathymgf

[GazT]

Hi Kathy,

stumbled across this thread on Google while planning a trip to Kent to see the Port's ancestral places, but don't know how long ago you posted it. I can answer a couple of your questions:  Albert Adolphus Morris Port was my great grandfather. He was born on 1 Aug 1851 in Reculver and christened there on 26 October that year.
Sometime in the late 1860s or early 1870s he migrated to Victoria, Australia, probably to seek gold or work on the goldfields. In January 1874, he married Eliza Edwards (1858 - 1918) in Clunes, Victoria. They had nine children.
Albert was a labourer and lived most of his married life in South Melbourne. He passed away on 27 May 1928 in Adelaide, South Australia, of cardiac failure. I believe he had been living with his youngest daughter Amy Florence, married name Keyhoe.
His mother Harriet died in Mar 1889, with the death registered in Blean. She had been living with her daughter Mary Jane (Fanny). I don't know when James Port died.
The Ports can be gtraced back to the early 1600s.

Best wishes
Jeni Port
Melbourne