Hi, I am looking for John Henry Castle born 1856, his wife Ruth Castle born 1876 and their children Alice born 1894, John Henry born 1895 and Ellen (or Helen) born 1904.
In the 1901 census they are living at 85 Mosley Road Birmingham and recorded as husband and wife but I cannot find a marriage for them until 1903. I think that John Henry was married to a Sarah Jane Horton in 1876 but have not identified her death and it seems that Ruth was possibly married to a Stephen Nelson in 1893 so it could be that Alice is Stephen's child. Baby Ruth, mentioned in this census, died later the same year. Mother Ruth is proving very hard to find prior to this census too and I cannot identify her birthplace as given.
John describes himself as variously a tin trader, a china dealer and a general dealer. They seem to move around a great deal (as did all the Castle family going by the variety of birth places listed for the children in the census). They were living in Oxford in 1895 when their son John Henry junior was born and baptised.
I have a possible death of John Henry in 1922 but cannot find any further mention of Ruth after the baptism of Helen (or Ellen) Castle at Holy Trinity Church Bordsley on the 30th Nov 1904. They are then living in Watery Lane, Birmingham.
I have found their son John Henry living as a lodger aged 14in Leopold St. Birmingham in the 1911 census and identified Ellen Castle in a 1926 marriage in Birkdale Lancashire (I know it is her as family history gave her married name and that her husband ran a cafe) and she reports her father as deceased. However I cannot find anyone else
There is a possibility that they were a canal family as I know that their niece married into the Goldingay family who were watermen and John Henry junior married the widow of another of the Goldingays.
Has anyone any suggestions as to where I could look next to find out what happened to them and what Ruth’s background may be?
