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I don’t really know where to start but please bear with me
My GGrandfather David Cannon’s first wife was Eliza Eleanor Sophia Figon. They married on 18th February 1866 (1c 607) at St Philips Church, Bethnal Green. She is 25 and he is 26, so born 1840/41. His father William and her father John Figon, sugar boiler. Witnesses were the curate and one Sarah Frienseiner, and after investigation find that Sarah’s maiden name is Stanton. From what I can see on census returns Sarah and Eliza are related ie sisters/half sisters.
On looking on census returns I find that Eliza is down sometimes as Eliza (especially when married to David) and other times as Eleanor. On all except one she is down as being born in either the West Indies/East Indies or Jamaica.
The “parents” are James and Mary Stanton who married in September 1845 in St Georges in the East, just before Sarah was born!
James is living with his parents, James & Sophia and brother Charles, on 1841 census. HO107 703 folio 15 page 3. Cannot find Eliza or Mary Matthews, but it means nothing as they could have been mis-transcribed! Or are they in the West Indies?
On 1851 census I have
James Stanton b1818 coke dealer born St Leonard’s, Middlesex
Mary (wife) b 1818 charwoman, b St George in the East
Eleanor (daughter) b 1840, b JAMAICA!!!! BRITISH SUBJECT!
Sarah (daughter) b 1846, b St George in the East
James (son) b 1849, St George in the East
HO107; Piece: 1550; Folio: 388; Page: 45; GSU roll: 174780.
55 Shakespeare Walk, St Paul, Shadwell
Then 1861 census 4 Philip Street, St. Paul St. George in the East
Mis-transcribed as Hanton
James Stanton 44 Dock Labourer
Mary Ann wife 43
ELIZA dau 20 Sempstress (their spelling)
Sarah Ann dau 15 "
James 12 Scholar
Mary Ann 1
Eliza Walker lodger un 21 dressmaker born Wapping
RG9/278 folio 102 pg 15
Now when she marries she calls herself Figon and puts her fathers name as John Figon and not as James Stanton with whom she has lived with most of her life.
On investigation the Figon’s are possibly Creole slaves in Jamaica in Clarendon Parish, owner possibly James Chisholm. Slavery was abolished at the end of the 1830’s and would have been free by 1840. Neither I, or my friend who is helping me, can find Eliza/Eleanor’s birth on IGI for Jamaica; I have also looked at overseas military births and cannot find anything on there.
On investigation of the trade of John, which is sugar boiler, this is quite a responsible job, was he employed at the Tate sugar refinery in Silvertown, which is fairly near to Stepney or could she have been left with the Stanton’s and he worked in their Liverpool refinery?
I assume that either the Stanton’s were foster parents or that she was Mary Matthews’s illegitimate daughter – unless you know any different?
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