Genealogy Chat

Thank you very much for looking, BatMansDaughter, can I call you BMD?

I have Arthur's baptism already, but not the services record. Can you say anything about the context of this record, please? The background, as I understand it, is that he fought in WWI (in France and maybe elsewhere) with the Middlesex Regiment. I found an entry in the London Gazette that he was given a temporary commission in June 1918, at which time (roughly?) he transferred to the RAF which was just being created. I suspect that the record you found concerned the transfer of his record from the Army to the RAF.

He was also active in WWII but (again I think) in the Reserves because of his age.

If there are any more gems where you found this one I'd love to see them!

You probably have this too,

Historical Records
London, England, Births and Baptisms, 1813-1906 about Arthur William Parr
Name: Arthur William Parr
Record Type: Baptism
Baptism Date: 15 Sep 1895
Father's Name: Thomas Parr >> occupation! Mail Driver
Mother's Name: Edith Louise Parr
Parish or Poor Law Union: Hoxton St John
Borough: Hackney
Register Type: Parish Registers

Born 22nd August 1895
Address 45 Huntingdon Street.

Just having a nosey about on The National Archives and spotted this,


Name Parr, Arthur William. Date of Birth: 22 August 1895.
Air Ministry: Department of the Master-General of Personnel: Officers' Service Records. Name Parr, Arthur William. Date of Birth: 22 August 1895.
Collection:Records created or inherited by the Air Ministry, the Royal Air Force, and related bodiesDate range: 1918 - 1919 Reference:AIR 76/389/101Subjects:Armed Forces (General) | Air ForceBrowse by hierarchy | Browse by reference


You may already have this info, but just incase you didn't thought I'd post it :-)

Found Leonard George SHurety in 1901 in St Pancras

Alfred Shurety 47 horse keeper
Annie Shurety 40
Ernest Shurety 14
Frederick Shurety 13
Robert Shurety 11
Lilian Shurety 8
Leonard Shurety 6
Ethel Shurety 4
John Shurety 3
Edgar Shurety 1
Dorothy Shurety 6 Months

and still with the family in 1911 in St Marylebone, still spelled SHurety

It does look that 'Sherretz' is some sort of wierd misreading of the name on the certificate, which I think will come out as Shurety when you get it :-)

I think it was just misread as

S, h, er (for u), r, e, t, z (for y)

quite the merry chase just to rule out that one Florence Weston!

Thanks for the clarification, JoonieCloonie, I follow your line of thought now. I agree that name changes such as you suggest are not uncommon. Also the two Shurety children with Weston as mother support your argument. I think I'll wait and see what the marriage certificate says, the birth certificates for the two children might be enlightening too. I wonder whether there is traceable family for the two children who might be able to shed some light on the history?

Thanks for both the research and the imaginative leap. When I get the certificate I'll take up the chase.

Thank you too, Detective, you've certainly found some interesting trails. It looks to me as if my theory about Frank Weston was well wide of the mark, I think I'll have to write that one off to experience. The ER results, however are very interesting. Taken together with JoonieCloonie's thinking it traces a Florence, and perhaps the Florence very well. But if she was where the ER says, then she wasn't in Argentina.

Which means, I think, waiting for the certificate(s) to arrive and seeing what I can learn from them.

found the one onboard the Highland Heather

Passenger Lists leaving UK 1890-1960
First Name FREDERICK
Last Name WESTON
Title MR
Age Transcribed
Departure Year 1911
Departure Month 7
Departure Day 29
Ship Name HIGHLAND HEATHER
Ship Departure Port LIVERPOOL
Destination Port BUENOS AIRES
State
Country ARGENTINA
Destination Place BUENOS AIRES
Destination Place Country ARGENTINA
Gender Male
Marital Status M
Occupation ENGINE DRIVER
Birth Year

With Mrs Ada Weston (wife)
Miss Ada Weston - child aged between 1 & 12

This was probably the incoming voyage as it gives the same New Brighton address
With the same destination was Walter Henry Weston, age 55 and no occupation. His intended country of residence was England

List above them on the list was Nora Mildred Weston age 29. No occupation and intending to live in England.
Her Address –
2 Fitzjohn Mans, Hetherall Gardens, London NW

UK, Incoming Passenger Lists, 1878-1960 about Frederick Weston
Name: Frederick Weston
Birth Date: abt 1865
Age: 59
Port of Departure: Antofagasta, Chile
Arrival Date: 11 Apr 1924
Port of Arrival: Liverpool, England
Ports of Voyage: Talcahuano
[Callao]
[Iquique]
[Arica]
Ship Name: Oroya
Search Ship Database: View the 'Oroya' in the 'Passenger Ships and Images' database
Shipping Line: Pacific Steam Navigation Co
Official Number: 147202

Shipping Lists - one at least as requested. Still looking for the BA one

UK, Outward Passenger Lists, 1890-1960 about Frederick Weston
Name: Frederick Weston
Gender: Male
Age: 60
Birth Date: abt 1864
Departure Date: 24 Jul 1924
Port of Departure: Liverpool, England
Destination Port: Valparaiso, Chile
Ship Name: Oroya
Search Ship Database: Search the 'Oroya' in the 'Passenger Ships and Images' database
Shipping Line: Pacific Steam Navigation Co
Official Number: 147202
Master: A W Pearse

He was a Merchant, travelling First Class, with no other Westons listed with him.
UK address was 15 Sunningdale Rd, New Brighton
He was intending to settle in Chile

EDIT - Although this was sourced from Ancestry, the same record is shown on GR

1934 gives Leonard a middle name of George.
Florence’s middle name is Elizabeth
Still at 14 Linhope Street with the Watts family which has grown

There in 1936,

London, England, Electoral Registers, 1832-1965 about Florence Elizabeth Shurety
Name: Florence Elizabeth Shurety
Year: 1938
County or Borough: Westminster
Ward or Division/Constituency: St Marylebone

191 Clarence Gate Gdn

No ER during WW2

1947 – Still at 191 Clarence Gate Gdns along with Annie M

1952 – Florence and Leonard at the same address, but not Annie M

There are no apparent further ER on Ancestry

London, England, Electoral Registers, 1832-1965 about Florence Shurety
Name: Florence Shurety
Year: 1925 & 1926
County or Borough: Westminster
Ward or Division/Constituency: St Marylebone
Street Address: 14 Linhope Street

With Leonard & William Watts

London, England, Electoral Registers, 1832-1965 about Florence Shurety
Name: Florence Shurety
Year: 1927
County or Borough: Westminster
Ward or Division/Constituency: St Marylebone
Street Address: 14 Linhope St

As previously + William Watts Jnr.
Same in 1928

oops I missed that Leonard George Surety birth in 1895, hm, he could be a spanner in the works. But he does disappear after birth.

Maybe it's the other way around and he gussied his name up, to Sherretz. :-D

line of reasoning

Leonard G Sherretz came from nowhere and married Florence E Weston

They changed their surname to Shurety, as was very common post-war for people with 'foreign' sounding surnames, especially German sounding.

Their children were born as Shurety and both Florence and Leonard died as Shurety.

Florence Shurety's death record matches Florence Weston's birth record for age.

There is no Florence Shurety birth -- Shurety, changed from Sherretz, was her name by marriage when she died.

There is no Leonard Shurety or Sherretz birth -- he came from somewhere else.

Shurety is an existing name in England that is reasonably close to Sherretz and may be the closest they had heard, or they just preferred it to other options.

The disappearance of one person (or set of persons), followed closely by the emergence of another person (or set of persons) with identical characteristics and similar but slightly different names, of whom there is no previous trace, is a very common indication of a name change, which was itself not an uncommon event, for a multitude of reasons. :-)

so what I was ultimately getting to was ... this seems to rule out that Florence E Weston as being your Florence, unless there was an estrangement that resulted in her leaving her husband and children and running off to Argentina! Which is always possible ...

Maybe someone with access could check electoral rolls for the Shurety couple to see whether they remained together, I don't really know how that is done.

I hadn't made the war connection, that makes sense!

I'm struggling to get my head around what you're suggesting.

We have a birth of Florence E(lizabeth) Weston 1894.

We have a marriage between her and Leonard Sherretz, 1919

And then nothing.

I could imagine that the transcription of the marriage might possibly have corrupted Shurety into Sherretz, or even that it was wrongly recorded in the first place.

On freeBMD I don't see a Florence Shurety birth but I see the death in 1953 Pancras.

I see a Leonard George Surety (nb no h) born 1895 and nothing further, no Leonard G Shurety at all on freeBMD.

I see Leonard George Shurety died St Albans 1971 on GR.

I see the birth Annie M Shurety 1920, and Ernest L Shurety 1921, mother's name Weston which looks very likely. This suggests the wedding was to Shurety, not Sherretz - this latter being a red herring.

Was that your line of reasoning?

If you search for Sherretz at familysearch.org you will see the clan in the US that I was talking about in Indiana and Illinois and then later on farther afield.

I suspect that a person called Leonidas (how he appears in his youth in the census with parents) would have been rather eager not to hold onto that name when he became a modern young man. He is called Leon in records as an adult in the US. Leonard might have been a name he was going by and he could have been in England via the US military in WWI ... ?

No Florence Sherretz anywhere that I could see. I wondered about a marriage in haste then repented ... and 'forgotten' about. :-)


Aha. How about

Births Sep 1920
Shurety Annie M - Weston - Wokingham 2c 826

a whole new theory arises :-) Change of surname rather than given name?

The only Shurety events in Wokingham are that birth and a child 1921 with same mother (not on electoral roll after 2006 so probably deceased -- Annie also on ER with husband to 2005).

(edit - there are also Shurety-Weston births in Marylebone in the 1920s)

There is no Shurety-Weston marriage.
But especially given the post-war timing, the mother could have been widowed and married under a different surname.

Ah, change of surname, indeed.
Florence E Shurety born c1894 died in London in 1953.
There is no Florence E marriage to a Shurety.

Leonard George Shurety born 1894 died in 1971 in St Albans.

Florence E Weston who married Leonard G Sherretz = Florence E Shurety.

Now ... that is not to say she is not your Florence E Weston, if she simply separated from Leonard and resumed her own name. But it seems less likely.

And I thought Leonidas were chocolates

What was he a serial monogamist, or worse? Gigolo? Scavenger of fortunes? Triumph of hope over experience!

What leads you to suspect Leonard of being Leon(idas)?

Is there a Florence Sherretz in the US census I wonder? It's a very unusual name, GR has only two occurrences.

I wonder whether the Sherretzes hopped on ship after the 1919 marriage?

Ah well then. :-) Very hard to tell what that initial is. Ancestry makes it an E. I would tend to agree; the B in Bromley and Burton lower down doesn't match well and all the Es in the list above Florence are similarly blurred.

And there was me muddling Edith's and Florences' birth years. Florence = 1894 Wokingham, there we are.

Just following up on that Leonidas, he is in the 1930/1940 US census as Leon with wife Janet (born 1904 Scotland), and then in a city directory as Leon B with wife Mardell (who died in 1972 in Texas). Janet is shown on a passenger list 1956 Southampton to New York. Yikes, in 1920, Leon Sherretz is shown in the US census as married to Edith born 1890 in Illinois. Definitely all the same Leon(idas)!

For the marriage certificate, you can just go ahead and order it from the GRO. It will likely show a local address for both spouses. Leonard's occupation will be interesting to see ... I am suspecting him of being Leonidas as you can see. :-)

Sorry, JoonieCloonie, that reference was misleading. I believe the E has been mis-transcribed as a B, her middle name was Elizabeth. The GR version of the record is:

England & Wales marriages 1837-2008
First Name LEONARD G
Last Name SHERRETZ
Gender Male
Year 1919
Spouse WESTON
Image Quarter 4
Country England
County Berkshire
District WOKINGHAM
District Number
Registry Number
Volume 2C
Page 1237
Line Number 148
Entry Number
Category Births, Marriages & Deaths
Record set England & Wales marriages 1837-2008
Collections from Great Britain
Spouse MatchSpouse Match: Leonard G SHERRETZ married Florence E WESTON
First Name FLORENCE E
Last Name WESTON
Gender Female
Year 1919
Spouse SHERRETZ
Image Quarter 4
Country England
County Berkshire
District WOKINGHAM
District Number
Registry Number
Volume 2C
Page 1237
Line Number 96
Entry Number
Category Births, Marriages & Deaths
Record set England & Wales marriages 1837-2008
Collections from Great Britain

Apart from that, I have a reference to her birth:
Births Sep 1894
Weston Florence Elizabeth Wokingham 2c 378

I'll order a copy of the certificate if that's possible when I hear from the local records office. For Sherretz I'm rather expecting notp (not of this parish) .

But I find it difficult to understand why Florence is not in the 1901 / 1911 census, unless she was out of the country with her father on a trip? Or maybe the family lived in another country and it just so happened that Florence was born on a trip to the UK.

Florence Weston the artist was born c1868 and died in 1942, according to the BBC:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/yourpaintings/artists/florence-weston

hard to find specific info about her.

I wasn't sure what you meant by the 'the' either, but there we are, not that 'the'. :-)

All the Florence Bs born in England were Florence Beatrice, and the artist Florence was one of them, born 1868 in Cricklade dist.

Is the Florence Beatrice registered in Camberwell in March quarter 1890 'your' Florence? There was a plain Florence registered in March quarter 1889 in Basingstoke. Just assuming that you know yours was a 'B' since you're looking at that marriage. Two people have the Basingstoke Florence in their trees at this site.

Various US records at familysearch show a concentration of Sherretz-s in Illinois and Indiana USA in the 1900s but nothing else of interest. There was a Leonidas Brandon Sherretz born 1894 who did register for the WWI draft ... he died in Texas in 1960.

The certificate is the only way to go for that marriage I think. Do you know anything else about your Florence?

Just to note also that there wasn't a Florence B Weston born in the vicinity of Wokingham but the plain Florence in Basingstoke is not far off. Given the date of 1919 she could have been a widowed wife of a Mr Weston; the only notable marriage in that regard was Florene Beatrice Hardiman to Weston in 1908 in Aston, not too likely.

Florence Beatrice Weston born 1890 Camberwell was in Islington with parents William and Martha in 1911. She was a cigarette maker and her father was 'druggist traveller and tobacconist'.

I've asked Berkshire Local Records about getting a copy of the certificate. I see I should have added a smiley to the last message, it was intended!

I'm puzzled that - as far as I can see - Florence doesn't show up in the 1901 & 1911 census records, Of course I may have missed it, so if anyone else can put me right I'd be grateful.

Thinking laterally, I note trips by Frederick Weston to South America, for example this one:

FREDERICK WESTON
Passenger Lists leaving UK 1890-1960
Collections from
Australasia, Great Britain, Ireland, United States
Country
ARGENTINA
Title
MR
Ship Name
HIGHLAND HEATHER
Ship Departure Port
LIVERPOOL
Destination Port
BUENOS AIRES
Departure Year

and there is another to Valparaiso. I wonder whether someone might be able to see any more details on these passenger lists, ie whether he was accompanied by a daughter? Or indeed whether it is the same Frederick Weston.

ooops, I hadn't realised the wider connotations of THE Florence Weston. I meant THE as in "the one referred to in the rumours". I have no idea whether she was an / the artist or not.

I wonder whether Parish Records might be a possible source? I don't have a problem with buying the certificate apart from the hassle and delay , but in these days of the internet and instant gratification I want the answer NOW .