Help with longstanding brickwall.

[jillruss]

The baptism record for my 2x great grandmother Elizabeth Simon in Moreton Say, Shropshire in 1816 give her parents' names as Mary Simon and Samuel Taylor, although an attempt (obviously not a very good one!) has been made to cross out Samuel's name.

I'd homed in on a Samuel Taylor baptised in nearby Whitchurch, Shrops in 1793 as a likely candidate. However, I've just entered his name on my Ancestry tree and one of those little green leaf/hints came up and has revealed that a Samuel Taylor born in 1793 in Whitchurch enlisted in 1811 (aged 18) in the 19th Dragoon Guards for an unlimited period of service.

Nothing to stop him fathering a child a few years later, perhaps when on home leave, I thought. However, the Ancestry document is headed "Canada, British Regimental Registers of Service 1750-1900" and then "19th Dragoon Guards". So now, I'm wondering where Canada comes into this and does it mean Samuel was most likely not even in the country when the deed was done?!!

FYI - I don't have a world sub with Ancestry, so normally when a Canadian document comes up, I'm unable to view it. So, does this mean it isn't a Canadian doc but a British one?

Help!

[LizzieL]

FindMyPast has a Samuel Taylor buried in Whitchurch Shropshire on 20 Feb 1838 age 45, so he would be born abt 1793, but not necessarily in Whitchurch of course

Added: image has residence as Newtown

[rosie99]

The reference on the image is WO25/283 (assuming that is the one you are referring to)

This is the link to that number on TNA website https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C4397030

[LizzieL]

Is this the same regiment?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/19th_Light_Dragoons

[jillruss]

Thanks, both.

It would appear that the document is British and that the 19th Dragoon Guards did serve in Canada during the American War of 1812. Worryingly, the Wikipedia link has them not returning to Britain until August 1816 - Elizabeth Simon was baptised in November 1816. I suppose its possible that not all of the regiment returned at the same time.

Yes, thanks LizzieL, I had a note of that burial in Whitchurch in 1838 for Samuel Taylor. As you say, it fits nicely with his birthdate. Although its not exactly an uncommon name, I can only find one other Samuel Taylor baptised in the vicinity and that was as late as 1798 in Stoke on Tern, and I can't find a suitable marriage for the Samuel who returned c. 1816.

I had little luck finding what happened to Mary Simon (Elizabeth's mother) after 1816. I don't think she survived until the 1841 census or beyond unless of course she married and moved away, but Elizabeth didn't move away so I doubt it. I have a provisional burial for Mary in nearby Market Drayton in 1821.

I'm starting to think this may have been a tragic love story, but that's probably just my overactive imagination!!

[jc26red]

Hi Jill,

I am assuming that you have checked Elizabeth’s birth year throughout her life and death / burial.  She could easily have been born earlier than 1816... say 4/5 years old at baptism. The young father may have joined up to avoid his responsibilities to a pregnant young lady.

Only this morning I was checking through a young lady’s details, correct birth, gro mother’s maiden name checked, yet all through the censuses, marriage, death and burial she has taken 2 years off her age. I began to doubt I had the right person but she had her sister and niece stopping with her and her husband on the 1871 census. She wasn’t older than her husband and I can’t see any reason why she had taken 2 years off her age. Who knows.

Jenny

[pinefamily]

I can't offer anything new, except don't disregard the "tragic love story" line, unless you can prove otherwise.
My grandmother was the product of a similar liason. My great grandparents either had had a relationship or a short fling (who knows?), and then he went away to the Boer War. Shot up and so badly wounded, he was even reported as dead. He was sent to England to recuperate, and was recommended to go to Canada for the climate. I'm not sure he even knew he had a daughter. He never returned to Australia.

[jillruss]

Thanks, Jenny - good idea but Elizabeth's age is pretty consistant in docs throughout her life.

pinefamily - for the time being, until I can find out more (assuming there's more to find of course) I shall stick to the tragic love story theory.

The only other new thing I've discovered this time round is that at least two of Samuel Taylor's three brothers also joined up (at ages 14 and 15!) and served abroad, mostly in North America. I have their parents as another Samuel Taylor and Margaret Ikin who married in Ightfield, Shrops in 1791.