Bigamous marriage/divorce proceedings Lancashire WAIN v LOWE

[OzzieJoan]

Maiden Stone: I have tried both those censuses. However, it's entirely possible that as Wilfred/William left her, she could be living with another man and with another name.

Jen: Thanks, I will do that for sure so that someone else would have the whole story up to now. At the moment I am trying to find out if there is something similar to FreeBMD where I might find if Alice had a child soon after she married Wilfred. She was, after all, 38 years of age and needed to get on with it if that was their intention. But she could also have died in childbirth and thus the marriage to my Grand Aunt would not have been bigamous.

[Maiden Stone]

I did have the feeling that the marriage would have been annulled rather than having a divorce. But in that case would a marriage certificate still be obtainable?

It would only have been annulled if it was discovered to have been bigamous. Clara, if she knew, might not have reported it. Bigamy was punishable by imprisonment. There was also the scandal aspect to consider.

[OzzieJoan]

To anyone who might still have an interest in my quest, here is an update.

It took a long time for the marriage certificate to arrive; apparently the .pdf service is not available for marriages yet. And, as anticipated, there were no surprise notations to be found on it. So I now assume that Clara and Wilfred just parted and that she didn't report him to the authorities.

Since receiving the certificate and writing this, spare time to do research has been scarce due to root canal dentistry and a rather pleasant holiday in Adelaide. Anyway, I have found a few things on which I would now like the opinion of anyone who has the time, please.

I am interested to find out what happened to Alice and to that end I found her in 2 censuses and (I think) on a shipping list.

In 1900 she is living with her family in Fulton, Rock County, Wisconsin; her father is Thomas Kealy (sp.variation).

In 1920 she is 43 and living with her sisters Catherine, 47 a librarian and Margaret, 45 a dressmaker and all say they are single. Name spelling now Kiely. They live in New Jersey.

 Alice's occupation on both of these censuses is that of school mistress. However, in 1921 she is to be found with no occupation boarding with a Stephen (possibly) BARNES or BINNS, 52 year old widower and brother in law of Alice. And Alice is saying that she is also a widow and her name is now given as Alice WAIN. If anyone can help with the surname of Stephen I would appreciate it. I have been unable to find a marriage to either BINNS or BARNES to KEALY.

As I was unable to find Alice in later censuses I thought I would try Passenger Lists. On 24th June 1928 Alice is on the shipping list for a Cunard vessel “Alaunia” from Montreal to London. She has obviously made up the address where she is to stay saying it will be 3 Victoria Terrace, Nottingham, Bromley, Kent. I suspect that 'Nottingham' came from hearing Wilfred tell her that was where his father came from. Whilst her name is last on the list in the W section, and has been transcribed as WEINS she must have made it difficult for the list compiler to read as it appears as “Ewins” but age is correct.


NAME:
Alice Weins
ARRIVAL AGE:
51
BIRTH DATE:
1877
PORT OF DEPARTURE:
Montréal, Québec, Canada
ARRIVAL DATE:
24/06/1928
PORT OF ARRIVAL:
London, England
PORTS OF VOYAGE:
New York; Plymouth, Devon, England
SHIP NAME:
Alaunia
SHIPPING LINE:
Cunard Steamship Company Ltd
OFFICIAL NUMBER:
147315
HOUSEHOLD MEMBERS:
31492614


There is a marriage for an Alice Wain in England in 1938. Alice would have been 61 by this time so probably not her. Spouse is William H CLARKE. However, there appear to be no children born to this marriage so still a possibility.

First Name
Alice
Last Name
Wain
Gender
Female
Year
1938
Spouse
Clarke
Image Quarter
1
Country
England
County
Lancashire
District
Ince
Volume
8C
Page
141
Line Number
61

I will consider getting this marriage certificate at some time.

I found several Alice Keeley and Alice Wain ladies on the 1939 list but most of them were also living with a presumed spouse. Unfortunately, no ages to match exactly.

Going back to Wilfred and his Army Service, I have yet to find out where to look for his Records. There are images of 2 pieces I found for 'a' Wilfred Wain but at present have no confirmation that this is my Wilfred.One is the record of the Victory and British War Medals awarded to Pte.60077 Wilfred WAIN of the Notts and Derbys Regiment and the other has revealed something I missed on first reading it. It is the Roll of Individuals Entitled to the "War Badge". The same Wilfred (No.60077) is on that list as receiving the Badge but what I missed earlier was the date of his enlistment - it matches that on his Papers of Attestation referred to earlier, so must be the right person I was looking for - yippee! But there is an anomaly on this Roll as his age is given as 21 when he would, in fact, have been 41.

 Discharged on 11 April 1919  he just missed out on seeing his daughter Gertrude Ellen married on 29th March 1919 at St.Catherine's Church, Wigan to Enoch ASHURST, 23, an Engine Tender and Fireman of 71 Smethurst Lane, Pemberton.

Attached are relevant documents for your comments, please. Sorry, I can't get the Help page to load to find out how to add files as attachments. Now read that. No matter how many times I click on the Attachment arrow, it doesn't give me an option to attach anything. So here goes without attachments.
OzzieJoan

[Maiden Stone]

There is a marriage for an Alice Wain in England in 1938. Alice would have been 61 by this time so probably not her. Spouse is William H CLARKE. However, there appear to be no children born to this marriage so still a possibility.


Going back to Wilfred and his Army Service, I have yet to find out where to look for his Records. There are images of 2 pieces I found for 'a' Wilfred Wain but at present have no confirmation that this is my Wilfred.One is the record of the Victory and British War Medals awarded to Pte.60077 Discharged on 11 April 1919  he just missed out on seeing his daughter Gertrude Ellen married on 29th March 1919 at St.Catherine's Church, Wigan to Enoch ASHURST, 23, an Engine Tender and Fireman of 71 Smethurst Lane, Pemberton.

Marriage of Alice Wain & William Clarke 1938 was at Ince registry office or registrar attended. There's no indication that Wain wasn't her maiden name. (Lancashire BMD).
There may have been several women named Alice Wain in the area, judging by baptisms on LANOPC.
A possible reason for there having been no children of this marriage is the war. Have you looked for the couple on 1939 Register?

The marriage of Gertrude Ellen Wain was posted by Heywood reply #12.
Another source to search for William Wain is Absent Voters' List 1918.

[OzzieJoan]

Hi,
Thanks for your reply. No, I haven't searched for that couple yet on the 1939 Register but will do so. There are several Alice Wains in various places throughout England who are shown on the 1939 register but all appear to be accompanied by a spouse of the same surname. If the 1938 marriage turns out to be 'mine', there would be no children as she would have been 61 years of age.
Thanks for the heads up on the Absent Voters List 1918 - I had forgotten about that.
It's a nuisance that he wasn't consistent with his first name - sometimes Wilfred, others William; makes him more difficult to find.
I still can't see an option to add files to this posting so will need to look into how to achieve that from the Help file.
I will continue to nibble away at this.
Joan

[mckha489]

I still can't see an option to add files to this posting so will need to look into how to achieve that from the Help file.

it is because you have posted it in a “Look up” area.  For some reason you can’t add images to those threads.

[OzzieJoan]

MCKHA - thanks for that. What a blow not to be able to send attachments.
Joan

[OzzieJoan]

This topic was started and continued in the Lancashire Look-Up Requests Forum
Threads merged and placed on Lancashire board.
However, I just discovered that I can't attach files whilst on that Forum and hope that, if anyone from those pages of help would like to see the attachments, it will be OK for me to post them here. I will post a message to that effect on the Look-Up Forum.

They won't all fit on this posting so I will do a second one.

Thanks for all the help
OzzieJoan

[OzzieJoan]

And here are the 2 censuses for Alice after Wilfred had left her and enlisted.

OzzieJoan