I have a long standing issue over my ancestor Emily Percival Turtle and I am rather hoping that someone may please be able to add something with a pair of new eyes.
Her baptism took place at St Mary Lambeth on 2 July 1837 with her birth date given as 5 March 1830.
Her parents were given as John and Charlotte Turtle with her father being listed as a sailor.
In 1852, Emily married James Wicken in Bethnal Green and on her marriage her father is listed as being John Turtle, a mariner, which ties in with her 1837 baptism.
However in the 1841 census Emily is with Robert Turtle (c1771/6-1842) and his wife Amy (c1783/6-1856) along with their two children William and Emma.
They resided at 10 Beech Street, Lambeth, but I can't read what Robert's occupation is there, although from other records I know he was a gardener.
Amy Turtle was too old to be Emily's mother so it would appear that Emily was presumably their granddaughter.
As Emily's baptism says she was the son of John Turtle, I assumed that John as the son of Robert and Amy.
Robert and Amy married st St Mary Lambeth in 1801 and had the following known children:
1. Maria Elizabeth Turtle (1806–?)
2. Ann Maria Turtle\Dowding (1808–1872)
3. Charlotte Elizabeth Turtle\Boldock\?Harding (1810–aft 1861)
4. Robert James Turtle (1812–1852)
5. William Henry Turtle (1814–aft 1851)
6. Sarah Louisa Turtle (1816–?)
7. Emma Susannah Turtle\Jennings (1820–1899)
I can however find no baptism for a son John Turtle to them and I can find no marriage of a John Turtle to a Charlotte either.
The gap following Robert and Amy's marriage does allow for a son in the period 1801 to 1805, but the lack of a marriage for a John Turtle and Charlotte and them not being with their appraent daughter Emily in the 1841 census makes me think that something else may be the case.
In fact what I am now rather starting to suspect is that Emily Percival Turtle was actually the illegitimate daughter of Robert and Amy Turtle's eldest daughter Charlotte Elizabeth Turtle who was born in 1810.
Charlotte married John Boldock at Stepney in 1834 and if she was Emily's mother presumably left her illegitimate daughter behind with her parents when she married.
This does seem to make more sense of things but of course I am not at all certain.
There is also the mystery of why Emily Percival Turtle was given the middle name of Percival. Where did that come from?
I have even searched for a John Percival who was a mariner or sailor in case that was the name of Emily's father, but have found nothing.
I really don't quite know where else to go with this and really would appreciate any help anyone might please be able to give me.
Emily Percival Turtle/Wicken died aged 25 in West Ham on 30 November 1855 of Phthisis (tuberculosis) which she had suffered from for ten months.
As her life was so short there are very few pieces of information I can find about her, so I really would like to try and work out her parentage.
Thank you for reading,
Jon