Author Topic: Are they Ports or are they Keenes?  (Read 508 times)

Offline GCE

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Are they Ports or are they Keenes?
« on: Monday 16 May 16 13:00 BST (UK) »
My Great Grandmother who I believed was Emma Jane Port born in 1859 - father Peter Port, mother Caroline Keene and her brother William born about 1856 appear on the 1861 census as William and Jane Keene. Peter Port their supposed father is there as is his son Peter by his dead  first wife Eliza Cocks. Caroline Keene is listed as housekeeper!

On the 1871 census they are all listed as Ports and William and Jane ( as she is listed) are said to be the son and daughter of Peter Port.

On www.freebmd.org their births are registered as Port.

Caroline Keene and Peter Port married in Oct 1861.

I am now confused. Why were their births registered as Port but appear on the 1861 census as Keene.

GCE

Offline lizdb

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Re: Are they Ports or are they Keenes?
« Reply #1 on: Monday 16 May 16 13:19 BST (UK) »
As they hadn't married by the 1861 census, Caroline was still Keene.
So I guess if she put that as her surname and then just listed her children, they got recorded as Keene too.
I wouldn't attach any importance to it, they could well have swapped and changed between Port and Keene until the parents married and they became one Port family!
Edmonds/Edmunds - mainly Sussex
DeBoo - London
Green - Suffolk
Parker - Sussex
Kemp - Essex
Farrington - Essex
Boniface - West Sussex

census information is Crown Copyright from www.nationalarchives.gov.uk

Online Daisypetal

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Re: Are they Ports or are they Keenes?
« Reply #2 on: Sunday 22 May 16 18:47 BST (UK) »

Hi,

I think that William's birth is registered as KEENE,


William James KEEN     Mar Q 1857    Blean    2a  557   


Baptism
William James KEEN
15 Mar 1857
Herne, Kent
Mother:  Caroline KEEN 


This would fit with the 1861 census age of 4.  Looking at the 1881, 1891, 1901,1911 census it looks like William reverts to the name KEEN.

If so was Peter his father? I wonder this as Emma Jane b. Jun Q 1859 is registered as a PORT. When did Peter's wife Eliza die?



I think the William James PORT born Mar Q 1858 might belong to James and Anne PORT from Whitstable.

Regards,
Daisy
All Census Data included in this post is Crown Copyright (see: www.nationalarchives.gov.uk)