Genealogy Chat

Well again, I just looked up the registration districts for Wales and I think Ive put the final nail in the Brigit/Peter theory - Holywell, the cert you ordered for Thomas, son of this couple comes under Flintshire. Your Thomas was born in Ruthin, Denbighshire a different registration district!! So, first thing to do is look for the first Thomas (Brigid/Peter) death between 1875-1881.

Nope, you arent a clutz, this is the fun of this hobby, its like a detective story you have to find all the pieces and they have to fit together properly, not forced together! And by the way, my boss is my husband, so I wont get sacked hopefully. I am 99.9% sure now that we have the right family in Mary Jane Williams and Peter Devins. What did the marriage cert give as Peter's occupation. He should be shown as deceased (but not always the case) and he was a Builders Foreman. If that info is right, you have it. Thats good, you will have a proper line, not a false one! You are going to have a lot to tell your relative who contacted you!! But I really do recommend you take out an ancestry sub for about £60 a year 24/7 usage, it is well worth it. Good luck finding first Toms death and Mary J and Petes marriage. The best site for the 1866-1920 period is definitely familyrelatives.org as you can search by name, area and date. Find that death cert! And let me know PLEASE that you have. Otherwise I shall have nightmares about this lot!

yes, yes, yes On Thomas' mar.cert. it says his father Peter Devins was a Carpenter!!!! so that does make sense! So it looks like you were right, Mary J, obviously gets together with Peter Devins (married or not) and he then adopts or takes on Thomas who has a name change? Theatre wardrobe - yes that sounds an interesting line doesnt it! I cant thank you enough for all this enlightenment! it certainly now starts to tally up. Thank god i dont have to go down the other peter & bridget route cos they were both born in Ireland, and I thought i would be stuck as they are hard to find! Did you just get all this from Ancestry? is this the best place to subscribe. I never know which sites to subscribe to there are so many! Thanks once again!

BRILLIANT, done and dusted. Its a great feeling when you are sure, isnt it. Yes, must be him, as Thomas was an apprentice carpenter at 15. He must have dumped that job after dad died. You could also use familyrelatives.org to look up dads death must be between 1881-1891. Yes, all from ancestry - tried freebmd but not got the info you need. Always be aware of possible mistransciptions - how many did we have on this investigation - about 6 wasnt it? And also dont worry about ages being out a bit. It can depend on when the census was taken and if someone was born in the early months of that year or late ones of the previous year. You mentioned Thomas born 1875 not 1876 - but it may be he was born in December say of one year and not registered til Jan of the next year (the registrations fall into quarters of a year, so can be entered in the next quarter). Definitely subscribed to ancestry uk - you will love it and it is worth every penny. In a few months time you will have got used to looking up things and tying them together and be doing this for someone else. By the way, if you subscribed today, you now have the right people to look up on the 1871 and 1861 census on there. Also check out the bmd and lots of other stuff. Have fun.

Gosh youre really good at this searching lark! and I am so grateful for it!! When I looked up Thomas it was on the rootsweb site and it gave one Thomas Devin, born Holywell, when I asked the man at the family records centre, he looked it up and said it was the same area, so i ordered the cert - but now we know different!!!!! I always knew there was something not right about a 5 year old not being with his parents on the 1881 census! Can I ask another question - how do I find out about districts etc so that I dont get the wrong ones again?

No it doesnt say Peter Devin deceased on the marriage cert, so still alive in 1894.

and Thomas register as you prob know in 1901 as printers assistant. Also can I ask: when I get peoples occupations - where do you go to find out where they worked etc.

Hi, well, as I said it doesnt always say deceased when fathers are and I reckon he was! Mary J is shown as head on the 1891 so check out his death between 1881-1891. And no, I am not particularly good at this, there are some fantastic people on here who are MUCH better. But I do get obsessive and I knew this wasnt the right Thomas somehow. Registration districts - GENUKI website has them. But just put in a google search - say London Registration Districts or Wales or whatever the area you are looking for and it will come up. The jobs are shown on the census image. On ancestry you get a transcribed (typed info) and then you can click on the actual image from that date - handwritten -this wasnt handwritten by your ancestors! either they would have filled in a form or the enumerator would have done it for them, taken it back to the office and then it is written out again - so plenty chances to be mistranscribed - hence all the weird and wonderful names that come up when you look for someone. Not sure how you would find where they worked unless it is something like the GPO, or one of the utilities, railways etc which would probably have pension details somewhere! Often you have to search by just putting in a first name, date and area to find someone whose name has been mistranscribed as in your Devins, Desvins, Devons etc. When you look at the census image you can note the address they are at which is a help.

By the way, dont expect to find an 'official' name change for Thomas as kids then were just absorbed into the family and took on the name of the head.

Hi Sherry I will be visiting the local record office on Thursday, if you send me the full names of the parents/grandparents I will follow them forwards from 1902.