Delving into the family history on and off for about 20 years has left me hopelessly addicted to the following clues, hunches and inevitable red herrings that are all needed to piece together the bare chapters of someone's life. Unable to resist people's 'brick walls' or an innocent query re the origin of grandparents and those before, there's nothing better than trying to find the unfound.
This is my sudoku, my multilevel crossword, my jigsaw where most of the pieces are missing and there's definitely no picture to start from.
So - to satisfy this addiction, each week I intend to choose someone at random from the 1881 census (checking that their story hasn't already unfolded on ancestry.co.uk) and uncover, piece together what I can from internet sources their untold story.
The puzzling and the unfolding story will be told in this blog.

Saturday, 11 August 2012

Third protagonist - John Waters

John is proving to be a real puzzle prior to 1877. So meantime to finish finding the children's stories:

 James Tolley (Sarah's middle son from her first marriage) did quite well for himself by 1911 when he was a farm bailiff. 10 Years previously he, wife Polly (Mary Ann?) and daughter Violet were living at Withymore, Amblecote, Staffordshire where James was a carter on a farm. Violet was just 1 year old but had been born in Worcestershire (Violet Jane June qtr 1900 in Droitwich district). They couldn't have stayed long in Amblecote as daughter Dora (Dorothy May)was born Sept qtr 1901 in Stourbridge Worcestershire. By 1904 they had moved to Warwick where Rose Elizabeth was born and then by the second half of 1906 had returned to Hindlip for Lilian Annie's birth. James Henry was born in Hindlip 1908 and then Jack (John) was born in Bromsgrove 1910.  It's more than likely the moves were different farm jobs as James moved up to become farm bailiff. The 1911 census indicated that James and Mary (Polly) had been married for 11 years and there is a marriage for James Tolley registered in Dec qtr 1899 in Droitwich district to Polly Roberts. Checking the birth register post 1912 with Polly's maiden name for any more Tolley children, it looks like Benjamin 1912 and Elsie M 1914 were both born in the Kings Norton district (the same district as the 1911 address). Just as a point of interest after the First World War Northfield, where Shendley Field Farm was situated, was incorporated into Birmingham.

 Back in 1891 James was staying with Edward and Caroline Cotterell at the Gloster Arms in Copenhagen Street Worcester. Edward was the publican and James was described as a nephew working as an errand boy. Both Edward and Caroline were aged 40 in 1891 and had 2 daughters living with them aged 13 and 9. Checking for their marriage between 1868 and 1881 turns up the marriage for Edward Cotterell to Caroline Barton 1877 Droitwich district. Caroline was Sarah's sister, confirmed when we look back to Sarah in the 1851 census.

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