Woburn Baptism Lookup - Ellis

[bedfordshire boy]

.... burial records would give the age at death, by whom the ceremony was performed and place of abode at the time. I attach 2 examples from Warwickshire, one in 1860s which followed the standard form and one in 1607 in Latin I think. Hopefully at these dates we would still see the standard form with the various fields.

Ages at burial were only given from 1813 onwards, following Rose's 1812 Act. Before that it's very unusual to find an age, although an infant or child is usually, but not invariably, indicated. The ones I mentioned have no ages given - the extra detail to which I referred would be something like William Ellis, labourer or Ann Ellis widow or wife of William

[bedfordshire boy]

Sorry, I can't seem to attach images this time. Will email them to you.

The county boards on Rootschat don't permit attachments, but you only find this out when it refuses to perform the operation!

[jackhonour]

I thought it was a bit odd and perhaps just me!

[bedfordshire boy]

My problem I have is,  the James Ellis (5th gr grandfather) ]b. 1760 Woburn is correct, his father William Ellis from ,   St Mary, Whitechapel, London, England b.1730.  I am trying to substantiate this fact as we traced way back in the line from the Ellis's from St Mary, Whitechapel, London, England.. ....are there any marriage entries for Woburn around that time?

The only Ellis entries in Woburn prior to 1752 are the baptism and burial of Bridget, dau of Thomas, in 1669, so William and Ann certainly appear to have pitched up from elsewhere. But there is a marriage on 16 June 1740 between Mark Ellis and Jane Walker. Mark is an easier name to research than William, so he 's worth pursuing. But they don't appear to have baptised any children in Woburn, Bedfordshire, or anywhere else in England, nor were they buried in Beds.

I'll see what I can dig up

Why do you think William may have been from Whitechapel?

David

[jackhonour]

Hi David,

There are lots of Ellis's in Toddington, which is close to Woburn, including some of James b1760's children, the first are born at Chalgrave and then they move to Toddington.

As we said, we have William Ellis b1730 in Whitechapel, but mainly from other people's trees and we wonder if there are any alternatives to this. If there aren't, then we can assume this Whitechapel lead is correct and we have got all the ancestry details for that - well, sort of but that's for another day.

If we could sort of find all the possibilities it might help.

Thinking again, there will be more than one because we have already found 2 Williams. One marrying Ann Horsepool in Podington and the other one who we now believe to be our's. So if we could find all the possible births of William, we can do a process of elimination and find the correct one.

Jack

[jackhonour]

And did we ever find a marriage between William and Ann - now we know it isn't Ann Horsepool?

[bedfordshire boy]

As we said, we have William Ellis b1730 in Whitechapel, but mainly from other people's trees and we wonder if there are any alternatives to this. If there aren't, then we can assume this Whitechapel lead is correct

NOOOOO!!!!!! You can't assume any such thing.

Take other peoples' trees as a guide only. Some trees show William Ellis b 1730 Whitechapel as being the William who baptised children with Ann in Woburn. Others show him as marrying Mary Clark in St Katherine by the Tower in 1749, which looks to me to be much more feasible. So there's a divergence in online trees for a start. Then the laughable tree that has Woburn and Puddington as the same William is even worse.

Then bear in mind that the IGI, which I assume is what you've been using, is far from complete for England, although Beds baptisms/marriages pre 1813 are virtually complete.

And bear in mind also that Woburn is within spitting distance of Buckinghamshire, so they could have moved across the county boundary.

As I see it at the moment you have nothing on him prior to 1752, and attempts to link him to Whitechapel are wild speculation. The fact that there's such a divergence in online trees points to the fact that no-one really knows, they're all guessing, and as happens all too often, the sheep mentality has taken over with one person copying another person's tree and the speculation is perpetuated.

Start with Woburn parish register microfilm at your nearest LDS Family History Centre to see exactly what the entries say, including the 1740 marriage of Mark Ellis.

David

[jackhonour]

Sorry David. I will have to get the microfilm at sometime or Vicki will - we will certainly keep you updated. I must say, Whitechapel is a significant distance from Woburn

[Vic H]

Hi All,
Ray sorry for the typo error. Jack,  Mmmmm looks like I will have to do some deeper digging BUT its not looking so good. I will pursue the name Ellis & all the families at that time for that area. I am about 4 hours in travel (380 k's) to the nearest IGI Library so will tackle the familysearch site again.

As we said, we have William Ellis b1730 in Whitechapel, but mainly from other people's trees and we wonder if there are any alternatives to this. If there aren't, then we can assume this Whitechapel lead is correct

Take other peoples' trees as a guide only. Some trees show William Ellis b 1730 Whitechapel as being the William who baptised children with Ann in Woburn. Others show him as marrying Mary Clark in St Katherine by the Tower in 1749, which looks to me to be much more feasible. So there's a divergence in online trees for a start. David

I did notice this tree/ marriage & did a lot of searching. Hence, my raised eyebrows, confusion & lots of questions as to why our William ended up in Woburn. The interesting fact is that 4 generations later (1850's) the Ellis's which I have cert's of, stayed & lived in & around Shoreditch, Edmonton,Bethnal Green. Thanks all, Jack has this really helped us...NUH but I love the challenge & will keep digging.
cheers from a sunny but cold Oz today, Vicki