Thank you so much, it’s amazing to wake up to all that information, I really appreciate the time you have taken to look for me.
So it sounds like this is definitely not Florence the sister and chances are the Stephanie St address is some sort of boarding house. I will look though the census for it to try to answer that question.
I also wasn’t aware about the ticket numbers, fascinating, will look at that too and see if Elsie appears to have bought her ticket with someone.
It seems so bold to just buy a ticket to an unknown country and go off to start a new life in days when communication was so much more difficult. I know so many people have done it but it never fails to impress me.
As I am currently researching this family generally I found another very tragic piece of information last night.
In the 1881 census the parents of these sisters just have two sons - William and Tom. I found the sisters by looking at the GRO birth indexes and then looking in the 1891 and 1901 censuses for other family members and came across the sisters. (This was inspired by a DNA match to Elsie May’s descendants
I couldn’t find mother Margaret on any further censuses and father William only reappears in 1911.
I assumed Margaret had died before 1891 and that is why the children became scattered, maybe William went to sea (he was a ships carpenter/shipwright). Anyway yesterday I was searching different family addresses on Wales historic newspapers online (fantastic free site) and I found a family tragedy in 1890. There was another child, Arthur, born 1886, and he died tragically at the family home when he nightclothes caught fire. This still doesn’t tell me what happened to the parents but I wonder whether the mother became unwell after this horrific tragedy.
I remain amazed how much it is possible to find out about the lives of ancestors.
You are very welcome. If your Elsie May lived on Bathurst Street in 1921, then our families were neighbours. One of my ancestors lived two blocks away. The Toronto Library has historic photographs of “downtown” if you are interested. I found Bathurst and Bloor (the cross street) but you can search for any image:
https://digitalarchive.tpl.ca/search/Bathurst%20bloorI’ve found some of the photographs to be amazing but then I’m a 4th generation Canadian so I have family scattered all over the Toronto area.
- I think one possibility for Florence to be Elsie’s sister is if she married a Babbage and then married Fisher? Of course her birthplace would then be incorrect. I don’t remember if I saw the actual marriage document (stating if she was widowed or single).
Update: Marriages and Banns, Florence Ada Babbage, Spinster. Father: Charles Henry Babbage
- The English passenger (outbound) list is in numerical order - I didn’t notice anything helpful but then I don’t know anything about the family.
- My ancestor’s uncle had a similar death in their family. According to the death certificate, the toddler was scalded and didn’t make it (to put it a little nicer than the actual wording).
Some of the bits of information we uncover are so sad.
- A fire started at the back of my ancestor’s Toronto property. It eventually grew in size to be one of the largest fires (at that time) in Toronto. The wife helped lead their horse away from the area. She died “shortly” (a year? I don’t remember) after. Like you, I also wondered if the fire had something to do with her early death.
If you need any other Toronto help, please ask.
