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Some Special Interests => Occupation Interests => Topic started by: jck1103 on Friday 14 June 19 23:01 BST (UK)
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I have a problem with my ancestor Edward Barnes, he married in St Pancras in 1827 and was a wheelwright. In 1841 he was in St Pancras but not of the parish, his wife Anna Maria was not of the parish either. Edward died in 1850. In 1851 Anna Maria stated that she was born in Bath. I have found Edwards death and burial but still don’t know where he was born. I was thinking he must have done an apprenticeship so would look for something between 1813 and 1827, has anyone got any ideas ? After 20 years of not knowing I’m getting desperate !
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Have you searched the London apprenticeship records on findmypast?
Also thegenealogist.co.uk have some I believe.
There's also this site for London guilds or livery companies.
https://www.londonroll.org/search
Not found where he was born, but is this him in a trial at the Old Bailey? Well, his son is trial, and he is called as a witness.
https://www.oldbaileyonline.org/browse.jsp?name=18451215
If his wife was from Bath, he may well have come from that area too?
(I suspect you have looked at this).
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Oh dear ! They are my Edward and James Barnes ! At least James was found not guilty ! Never thought to look for them in the courts. Thank you ! Have looked at Bath and apprenticeships no luck so far, maybe one day ....... thank you again :)
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Oh dear ! They are my Edward and James Barnes ! At least James was found not guilty !
Yes! He could have been transported to Australia as some of the others on this page were!
All for a handkerchief! :)
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That’s true ! But James still deserted his wife and child my gt gt grandmother and jumped ship in New Zealand, remarried and had a large family ! Think he was the black sheep ! His two brothers did well, sadly my gt gt grandmother had a hard life and couldn’t read or write bless her, while his family in New Zealand were well educated. I just wish I could find out where his father Edward was born ::)
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Some ideas been going through my head.
Have you found out about how Edward's two sons managed to become choristers and composers of music?
It doesn't sound like the normal thing you'd find in a family in London in the mid 1800s.
Normally sons would be off getting a job to help with the family's expences.
How did a wheelwright afford to do this? - Loss of income from them, PLUS fees presumably.
It must have cost quite a lot to go and train to be an organist and professor of music.
How did Frank come to be a 'chorister at Chaple Royal' (from 1851 Census)?
And by 1861 , Edwin is an 'organist and Professor of Music.'
Surely you couldn't just walk in and say 'I want to join the choir', or 'I want to play the organ'!
I can see how Edwin's son could then follow in his father's footsteps. Once you've got your foot in the door...... (sad story about him...)
Have you looked for some history of musical people in the family before this?
How do you get to be a 'chorister of King's College'? Do they have any records?
You never know what information might be on them.
Bios from:
https://books.google.co.nz/books?id=WSLUAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA21&lpg=PA21&dq=%22Edwin+Barnes%22+organist&source=bl&ots=RTrVLWNlYq&sig=ACfU3U3SDah8caFZfwTOzSbnpyhCDdPkHA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi-183K-PPiAhUCfSsKHcaiC9MQ6AEwBHoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false
And:
http://composers-classical-music.com/b/BarnesEdwin.htm
http://composers-classical-music.com/b/BarnesFrederickEdwin.htm
Have you got any of the music they wrote?
Have you found an obituary in the papers for Edwin? Or even Frank or Edward?
Surely there is bound to be something about Edwin's son?
And did Edward , or Edwin etc leave a will?
Again, you never know what information might be in them.
I see James was a 'seaman' (lovingly transcribed as a 'slaman' on findmypast!!).
Have you found any papers for him? Royal Navy? Merchant Navy?
Again, you never know what might be on them.
Good luck! :)
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Precisely ! We don’t know how the sons ended up doing what they did, when their father was a wheelwright ! Edwins son shot himself in Montreal while working over there. He had married Leonora Brahams a soprano with the Doyle Carte company. It’s a real puzzle. We think maybe there was a well off relative ? Or maybe their musical talent was recognised by the church ? Would love to get to the bottom of this enigma. We know it’s correct, we have letters supplied by James descendants in New Zealand that Edwin wrote to him, they mention our gt gt grandmother. We also have certificates, we have proved the connection but haven’t been able to answer all the questions. Any suggestions would be most welcome !
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We have seen Edwins will, haven’t found one for Edward and James had a large family in New Zealand. Just wish we could find Edwards birth. He married Anna Maria Harris in 1827 in St Pancras she came from Bath. There is a theory that maybe it was her family that were not impoverished, thank you for your reply it’s much appreciated, have only been looking for 20 years ! Lol ::)
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Just looked at Find My Past, nothing on the apprenticeships for Edward. Looked at newspapers no mention of Edwards death. Have a copy of newspaper reporting Fredericks death and know what James was doing. Have photos of Edwins gravestone in Hampstead, we just have so much on the family except the one thing we need to push further back. Edwards birth grrrrrr :)
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have only been looking for 20 years ! Lol ::)
Never give up hope!
I broke a brick wall of over 30 years just a few months ago, to which I thought I would never know the answer.
With more and more records coming on-line, or organisations realising records they have may be of interest, plus more and more people becoming interested in tracing their family history,you never know what might turn up! :)
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Thank you, that’s what I’m thinking, hopefully something will turn up which will make the jigsaw fall into place ! We were fortunate to have New Zealand relatives find us on the internet and supply a lot of information which we have been able to build on. Don’t know where we’d be without the internet ! Hours spent in the local library again I guess ! :)
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Precisely ! We don’t know how the sons ended up doing what they did, when their father was a wheelwright ! Edwins son shot himself in Montreal while working over there. He had married Leonora Brahams a soprano with the Doyle Carte company. It’s a real puzzle. We think maybe there was a well off relative ? Or maybe their musical talent was recognised by the church ? Would love to get to the bottom of this enigma. .................... Any suggestions would be most welcome !
Here's a suggestion for you :)
Cathedrals, Oxford and Cambridge colleges, and other church-related organisations often run their own schools where their young choristers and musicians are trained. Many of them go back centuries, and have a long history of providing scholarships ('free places') for poorer youngsters with outstanding talent.
Carol
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The wheelwright could have sung in a church choir, where he would meet at least one organist, and arranged some form of music education for his sons.
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Thank you for your suggestions, I will persevere ! :)
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https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/c/F266028
This is a long shot.
These are records of the Chapel Royal (as in the 1851 Census). The precis says not just births, marriages and deaths but 'other records'.
Might be pretty difficult (and expensive) to search unless you know somebody who can actually got to The National Archives at Kew.
Have you been in contact with the Chapel Royal to see what records they might keep?
https://www.chapelroyalhamptoncourt.org.uk › contact
Can't hurt to ask.
I have done a lot of groveling to organisations in my time! :)
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Haven’t looked at those ! Thank you very much, got to be worth a try. :)
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I’ve been giving this some thought, and wondering what I'd do if I was in the same position - most of which you have probably covered and discarded!
Have you found the birth of Edward’s wife ‘Anne Maria Harris’?
As they were both born ‘out of County’ in 1841, they may have come from the same place, so if you find her, you might find him
On the other hand, they could have come from totally different places, and met in London.
But it’s somewhere to start.
I see there are several ‘Ann Maria Harris’ baptisms around Bath around 1795 - 1805.
I notice on the 1841 Census, she is given as just ‘Maria’, and she is also ‘Maria’ on the burial entry for her and Edward’s son Edward on 30.10 1831, born 7.11.1829.
So not only looking for ‘Ann Maria’ or ‘Ann’, but also ‘Maria’, or even ‘Maria Ann(e).
(And I think on one of the baptisms she is given as ‘Hannah’ too).
Aged ‘40’ on the 1841 Census would make a birth date of around 1797 - 1801, but then again, that may have been an estimate on the part of whoever was giving the information to the enumerator, or she may have been unsure of the year she was born herself, (many people were), so best to give a wide lee-way of dates.
Interestingly. at her marriage in 1827, she signs her name. Quite unusual for this time. So she had had some education. Perhaps from a somewhat higher class then your general agricultural labourer’s family.
Amongst the births is this one;
Maria Harris baptised 17th March 1805 at Bath of Matthias and Maria.
It seems Matthias Harris was an alderman, silversmith and watchmaker, property developer, sheriff of Bath in 1848, and all round big cheese in Bath at this time.
He was born 31.7.1781 at Walcot a suburb of Bath. Father Matthias, mother Anne.
(Some of this info is from a tree on Ancestry. I’m always very sceptical of these, but a lot of the information would be able to be checked).
Matthias (the son), was married 24.9.1798 to Ann Job at Bristol.
Ann died 1800.
He then married a Maria in 1802. She died 1822 in Bath.
Children of Matthais and Maria:
Deborah born 1804 died 1821
Edgar Matthias born 1808, died Jan 1873 in Bath, and Alfred 1820, died 1821.
He then married Mary Higgins in 1837 Walcot Bath, He was a ‘widower; ‘aged 69’ on the marriage entry (he was actually only 56!)
Matthias died in 1874 aged 93.
(Interstingly, the information on Ancestry misses out the birth of Maria in 1805, so they have either not done all the research they should have done, or have not included her because she was not important to their story, or they didn’t know what had happened to her).
It looks as if the Maria ch 1805 was the daughter of his second wife, Maria
It’s also possible he had a daughter Ann with his first wife Ann Job, which is not recorded, She may have died in childbirth.
Matthias Harris, the father of Matthias, died in 1825 ‘of Southgate Street, Bath’. He was born about 1745.
He was of Lyncombe and Widcombe, another suburb of Bath, right next to Walcot as far as I can tell.
He and Anne had several other children all baptised at Walcot.
Joseph 24.3.1776
Etty 15.5.1779
Thomas 26.3.1786
Edmund 8.3.1788
Hannah 4.4.1790
I looked up Edmund on the Census.
He never married
He died 11 May 1871, aged 83, of 13 Queen Square, Bath.
He was a ‘professor of music’! :)
I wonder if this is how Edward Barnes’ two sons came to be in choirs and composers? It’s an idea.
It looks as if both Matthias in 1874, and Edmund in 1871 left wills.
There are short entries for them in the Probate Calendar, but you would need to send for the wills to see what is in them. Both have executors of a John Stone, (bit difficult to make out the first name on one of them, but I think the same person), who may have been a solicitor at a guess.
Edmund was buried in Bath Abbey no less.
There looks to be obituaries in the Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette for them, but I can’t get to access them to see what they say.
How does this help with Edward Barnes?
There is a burial of an Edward Barnes 18.9.1789 at Walcot - the same small place as the Harris family baptised their children , but this is too early for your Edward who was possibly born around 1800 - 1808. Grandfather?
I have not checked if this Edward Banes, or any other Barnes from Walcot, left a will.
Might be worth a shot if you haven’t already done so.
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Regarding John Stone, above,
There is a person named John Frederick Matthias Harris STONE. Gent being posted to sub lieutenant
14 March 1874 - Volunteer Service Gazette and Military Dispatch
The obit for Matthias is a speech at the council meeting. No mention of family.
THe regular death notices are similarly lacking
Added John Frederic etc was the son of the Town Clerk of Bath.
Added Mr John Stone (the town Clerk) died 1899. Obit says he married first to a daughter of Matthias Harris.
Lots of details in his obit if only we wanted to know about him
19 January 1899 - Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette - Bath
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Oh dear
27 April 1843 - Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette
only daughter
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Thank you for your replies it is really appreciated. A researcher suggested that Anna Maria was born 1801 in Walcot, parents were William and Elizabeth. He thought there may be a connection to the Matthias Harris family but we haven’t found one yet. We thought Edmund maybe the answer as a professor of music, Edwin and Franks musical talent and then Fredericks (Edwins son ) May have come from him. We haven’t been able to find Edward Barnes birth, but we have a family in Swinbrook Oxfordshire who look quite good. Father Edward mother Jane. They had an Edward (the wheelwright) ? Edward called his first born James Edward (my gt gt grandfather) if it’s right this Edward had a brother James, my Edward called his only daughter Jane, as did Edwin when he had a daughter. When James skipped off to New Zealand, he named his house Swynford, and when his first daughter was born he had the birth put in the Gloucestshire and Oxfordshire papers. We know that James’ second wife came from Gloucestershire. He also told his new in laws that his father was a QC called Edward Fobert Acton Barnes ! Would love to hear all your thoughts on this please