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I am researching my Shropshire ancestors from Australia and have hit a brick wall. With the help of the Shropshire Archives I have located parital records of the trial of Benjamin Palmer, MARGARET JORDAN and WILLIAM JORDAN on 28 September 1841 for housebreaking/receiving stolen goods. Benjamin was found guilty and sentenced to 10 years transportation. Margaret was sentenced to 7 years, and William (then only about 13 years old) was found not guilty.

I have not been able to locate MARGARET JORDAN in the convict records of Australia, and I think she must have ended up in KINGSTON, as that was the only other colony receving convicts at the time). William ended up in Tasmania a couple of years later after being found guilty on another charge.

On Williams' records it states that Margaret was his mother, and that Benjamin was his step-brother. I know from other Australian records that the Jordans' came from the Cleobury Mortimer district, and were associated with various places, including Stottesdon, Farlow, Hopton Wafers and Cleobury Mortimer itself.

Margaret's surviving children were:
George birth unknown
Ann birth unknown
Samuel born circa. 1830 (transported on the same charge as William)
William birth date between 1822-1829 (Convict records at variance with marriage & death records)

Margaret was described in the trial records as being the wife of JOHN JORDAN, labourer of Stottesdon, but in other Australian records he appears as George. I can find no record of a marriage between a Margaret (maiden name unknown/Palmer/Jordan) and either a George or John JORDON or an unknown PALMER

On FreeBMD I have found a possible marriage between an ANN JORDAN and a JOHN PALMER in the district of Cleobury Mortimer in 1841, but I do not know if this is the same Ann. If anyone has any ideas of where I could go from here it would be a great help. Alternatively, anyone with a 'disappearing' child/sibling in their family tree might just have found a dancing skeleton in their family closet.

For the record, William and Samuel JORDAN served their time at Point Puer Boys Prison at Port Arthur, Tasmania. After their time was up they made their way to Melbourne, and eventually to the gold fields around Creswick in Victoria. Samuel operated a brickworks (the trade he learned at Port Puer) and William became a miner working for one of the gold mining companies. They don't appear to have got into trouble with the law again!

Hi, I tried to reply to this in more detail but crashed.

If you get this, drop me a line

I live in Farlow that you mention and was researching a Walter Jordan who was in WW1.

Best

David

David

The thread is 10 years old and it's highly unlikely that Jennifer is still a member

You could try and make contact by clicking on her name and sending a message. If her email is still the same she will receive it and can then reply

In the meantime you should remove your email address as it's against T&C,s of the site to post personal info

:-)

Hi, thanks for responding. Unfortunately, when I click on the name it comes up with a blank address to the message. Does this mean that you're hunch that they've gone is likely right?

David

ps changed my first post ;-)

David, yes unfortunately Jennifer has deleted her account so can't be contacted via the messaging system. Leave your post here and there is just a chance she may return to the site at some point and contact you.