Hi Arty
I recently visited The National Archives and had a look at the muster rolls of the Durham Fencible Infantry, plus a few other Fencible regiments. As you suggested, there is no trace of John Smurthwaite in the musters of the Durham Fencible Infantry, but in searching through the musters what jumped out at me was the name John Whitesmith. A John Whitesmith attested for the regiment on 26 May 1795 and was discharged on 5 June 1802 when the regiment was disbanded. Smurthwaite is a fairly unusual surname, concentrated in Co Durham and parts of Yorkshire, and is a variant of the surname Smithwhite. The surname Whitesmith is even more unusual, and it seems more than coincidental that a John Whitesmith was serving in a regiment of about 300 men in which one might have expected to find someone with the name John Smithwhite, or a variant. This leads me to suppose that perhaps John Smurthwaite enlisted in the Durham Fencibles under the assumed name of John Whitesmith. John Smurthwaite was baptised on 8 January 1778, so had probably been born in late 1777. If John Smurthwaite and John Whitesmith were one and the same person, he would have been about seventeen and a half years old when he enlisted and presumably had a good reason for enlisting under an assumed name.
The discharge date of 5 June 1802 at Liverpool fits with the first recorded event known for John Smurthwaite (apart from his own baptism) being the baptism of his second daughter, Jane Smurthwaite (who had been born on 3 June 1802) on 8 July 1802 at St Nicholas, Durham. His first daughter had been born on 11 August 1799 in Ireland (date from the baptism record; location from the 1851 census) but was not baptised until 2 January 1803, at Durham. It seems probable that he met his wife, Agnes Latta, who had been born in Irvine in Ayrshire, somewhere in Ireland in 1798.
I have found various references (from books on the history of Ireland that have been digitised on the Internet) to the Durham Fencibles and their involvement in the Battle of Arklow in June 1798, and have also noted the places mentioned in the muster rolls, but was wondering whether you have any further information, or have compiled a chronological listing of the regiment’s locations in Ireland.
Kind regards
John
