This is quite long, sorry!
My 5x great-grandparents, Robert Gray and Mary Barrass, were married on April 28, 1823 in Gateshead, County Durham.
They had the following children;
1. Richard Gray, baptised at All Saints, Newcastle upon Tyne, on March 28, 1824.
2. Mary Ann Gray, baptised at St Hilda's, South Shields, on January 22, 1826.
3. Robert Gray, baptised at St Hilda's, South Shields, on December 5, 1827.
4. John Barras Gray, baptised at St Hilda's, South Shields, on March 7, 1830. Buried there December 16, 1830.
5. Jane Gray, baptised at St Hilda's, South Shields, on November 25, 1831.
6. Dorothy Gray, baptised at All Saints, Newcastle upon Tyne, on February 23, 1834. My 4x great-grandmother.
7. Ralph Gray, born on April 9, 1838 in Newcastle upon Tyne, baptised at All Saints on May 13, 1838.
Mary also had a child before her marriage to Robert. His name was Edward Dodd Barrass, baptised on February 10, 1816 at St Alban's in Earsdon, Northumberland.
In the 1841 census, this family can be found living at East Ballast Hills in the Byker district of Newcastle upon Tyne. Robert's age, considering that ages on the 1841 census are rounded up to the nearest five, is given as 40 and his occupation is described as a labourer. He is recorded as having been born in the county of Northumberland.
You're probably wondering by now why this Northumberland family has been put in the Lanarkshire, Scotland board, so here is your answer:
By the 1851 census, Robert and his wife Mary had moved to Glasgow. They were living at 78 Waters Street. The two youngest children, Dorothy and Ralph, are living with them. Robert's age is given as 51, his birthplace is described as Northumberland, and his occupation is agricultural labourer.
Robert's wife Mary died on June 28, 1854 at 78 Waters Street and was buried the following day at Sighthill Cemetery.
In the 1861 census, Robert is living at 70 Stewart Street, Milton. He is living with his daughter, Mary Ann, her husband William Forbes, and their children. Robert's age is given as 60, his birthplace described as England, and no occupation is recorded.
That is the last confirmed record I have for Robert.
A search for the death of Robert Gray in the statutory death registers has turned up nothing so far. Since Robert Gray is a very common name, it's expensive to eliminate all the possible candidates. But a search for Robert Grays who born five years before/after 1800, and who died after 1861 in Glasgow, has not turned up the correct Robert Gray. Broader searches for Robert Grays of all ages hasn't found anything either.
There are deaths for Robert Grays with the correct estimated birth year in other parts of Scotland, but with no obvious links to those areas, I'm reluctant to spend the credits to check.
Last time we saw Robert he was living with his daughter Mary Ann and her family. That was in 1861. The interesting thing is that if we try to find Mary Ann in 1871, she is nowhere to be found. Her husband and younger children can be found but she isn't with them. In 1881, she can be found living on her own at 17 Broomhill Street. She died on November 20, 1887, found dead on 9 Brown Street, Port Dundas. Her husband was the informant, so it seems they were still in contact. Robert Gray was named as her father on the register and described as deceased, so that's evidence he was dead by 1887. Interestingly, on this death record, Robert's occupation is described as 'Glass Work Labourer', which doesn't fit with what we have seen so far, although three of his children including his step-son Edward were glass workers employed at the Glassworks in Port Dundas.
If Robert was last seen living with Mary in 1861, and Mary is missing in 1871, it is possible that Robert was still alive in 1871 and living with Mary, somewhere.
It's possible that Robert didn't die in Scotland. His oldest son Richard emigrated to the United States in 1866, and he may have arranged for his elderly father to join him and then Robert died there at some point. His youngest son Ralph also emigrated there in 1863.
His daughter Jane stayed in the north-east of England and died in Sunderland in 1905. Robert may have returned to England to live with Jane and died there, in which case I will have to sift through all the Robert Grays who were registered in that region. I'd be surprised if Jane wanted him around though, as she had about twelve children to take care of!
Dorothy, my 4x great-grandmother, remained in Glasgow and applied for poor relief in 1893 which also confirms that Robert was dead by that point, which isn't a surprise as he would be in his nineties by then.
His step-son Edward Dodd Barrass also lived in the north-east of England.
Is there anything obvious that I have missed? I'd appreciate your thoughts on how I can find this death record. I really hope that he died in Scotland, as that would potentially give me the names of his parents, in which case I could narrow down a baptism for him because there are too many possible candidates at the moment with the information I currently have.
