Hi Paul,
Thank you for adding the link to my 'Jones family from Gwernaffield' post. I’ve done a lot of research on Robert Jones’s family since I posted that and I am convinced that Ann Jones, youngest daughter of Robert Jones and Eliza Owens, married William Edwards and lived at America Farm, Gwernymynydd.
My reasons for this are as follows:
My father in law (who still lives in Gwernymynydd) knows that his grandmother, Ann Jones, came from Gwernaffield.
He also grew up with his ‘Morris cousins’ to whom he was related through this grandmother. I have traced the link between the Morris cousins and this Jones family:
Robert Jones and Eliza Owens had at least 9 children: Mary, John, Ellen, Sarah, Elizabeth, Margaret, Thomas, Robert and Ann.
Sarah Jones (born 10 Jan 1843, baptised 28 Jan 1843 in Mold, Robert Jones was living at Gwysaney, occupation miner at time of baptism) married John Heyes (also spelt Hayes and Haze) on 23 Dec 1867 at the Bethel Chapel, Holywell. One of the witnesses was her sister Ellen.
Sarah and John Heyes had at least 6 children, one of whom, Elizabeth, was born 6 May 1878 in Pantymwyn. By the 1891 census, Sarah had died and Elizabeth was living with Sarah’s sister Ellen and her husband Edward Phillips, a blacksmith in Waen, Gwernaffield. Ann Jones was a witness at Ellen and Edward's marriage in 1878.
Elizabeth Heyes married George Morris on 30 March 1901 in the Bethel Chapel, Mold. Their son John Charles Morris, born 9 March 1903, was my father in law’s ‘Uncle Jack’ and father of the Morris cousins.
Llyn Y Pandy, Bellan, Gwysaney, and Pantymwyn are all close to Gwernaffield.
William Edwards and Ann Jones married in Liverpool in 1883 at the Welsh Presbyterian Chapel, David Street, Toxteth Park. William had moved from America Farm to Liverpool a couple of years earlier. Ann Jones gave her address at marriage as 15 Alton Road, Oxton on the Wirral. Looking at this address on the 1881 census, it was home of the Watson family, a retired merchant and his Chilean wife, so Ann would have been a servant there. Many young, unmarried Welsh girls from this area went to work in service in the Liverpool area at the time. Ann Jones wasn't resident there on the 1881 census, but there is an Ann Jones, born 1855, Mold working as a housemaid at 28 Croxteth Road, Toxteth Park, for the Uppleby family, which may have been her. On the marriage certificate, Ann’s father was given as Robert Jones (deceased) miner. A few years after their marriage they moved back to America Farm and lived there the rest of their lives.
The problem with names in Wales is that there are a much smaller pool of surnames than in England and the range of first names wasn't that huge either. There will have been several Ann Jones born in the Mold area around 1856 and probably more than one of them had a father called Robert. As to his occupation, this was a mining area and a large proportion of the population would have been miners. Most of my husband's ancestors were miners when young and became farmers in old age, if they hadn't died before that.
I hope this is of some help.
Buffy
