Thanks again. The 2 links you gave are to copies that I discovered years ago, through Rootschat, and if you decipher the witness names you will notice that Gabbett has a fairly definite 'G' and the other is indistinct as a 'G', more like a Y or S or J, hence the many interpretations. However, the other witness is William Gregston and the written form is indistinct also, as if written by someone who has only heard it spoken and not written.
Gabbett is still the favourite though I will check on all possible cases of Gilbert and other soundalikes, just in case.
John Cathcart is described as a House Servant and his father given as William, a Slater. Ann Bowles has a sister Catherine who marries in 1858 to a Butler, Robert Wilson, son of a farmer.
John and Ann move to Preston, Lancashire and she dies in 1850. John remarries in 1853 to Jane Dickinson and notes his father as a Gardener (deceased). He marries again at Lancaster in 1882 and says his father is a farmer.
Mistakes or fibs? Who really knows. John's son James marries in 1874 in Isle of Wight and claims his father is dead, but John is still alive, although by 1881 James claims to really be James Wilson, so perhaps his biological father was Mr.Wilson of Broughton where Jane Dickinson was a Nursery maid in 1851. The quest for the truth continues ... cheers, Ian
