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England (Counties as in 1851-1901) => England => Yorkshire (West Riding) => Topic started by: foundblue on Tuesday 04 August 20 11:43 BST (UK)
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Benjamin Lees and his wife Fanny (Cotton) lived in South Crosland, (Almondbury / Huddersfield) and he was born there about 1793. They had children James, Samuel, Daniel, Betty, George, Richard, Abel Hall, Ezra, Edwin and Margaret Ann between 1820 and 1847 but I can not find a single christening for any of the children.
It may be that they simply didn't baptised any of their offspring. They could have been Quakers or Baptists but again I can find no record at all. I may have missed a church that is not on Ancestry or Findmypast or any of the other websites. The records may have been destroyed in a fire or not handed in to archives. There are lots of possible reasons why they weren't christened but I wondered if there was an obvious place that I haven't looked or considered yet? Any suggestions would be very welcome as I have not come across anything like this before. One baptism or burial or marriage missing yes but not a whole family. Hopefully the answer will be so simple I'll feel a fool for asking but it will be worth it if I can find the answer!
Thanks Nick
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Nick -- is it possible that they were R.C.? Not a lot of RC records are published - although normal non-conformist ones do exist on line.
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R.C - hadn't thought of that one. I would have thought unlikely from what I know of the family as they were mainly dissenters. Other trees on Ancestry show them to be Quakers but I believe that these trees don't feel right at all.
So I'll will follow up that idea - brilliant thanks just what I hoped for.
Nick
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It was just a thought - BUT I must confess that some of the christian names sound more Baptist/Quaker than RC --- but may not be. I am thinking of Ezra and Abel - Daniel even.
It's just odd that they are not appearing in the Non Conformist baptisms. At least I can't see them -- it doesn't mean that they aren't there though!!
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Yes that's what I thought too non conformists and dissenters all the way but you've given me another idea! Ezra had a son George Robinson Lees who became a Reverend and travelled to Israel to "convert" Jews to Christianity. (I've explained that very simply possibly too simply) I need to see which Church he belonged to and what the organisation he worked for represented that may give me a clue to his (adult) religion.
Nick
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That's a coincidence - I had just come back on line when your message came through!
I don't know if it's the same George Robinson Lees -- but in 1907 there is a Reverend George Robinson Lees living at St Andrews Vicarage, Short St, Lambeth. He's on Surrey Electoral Registers.
Looks like the St Andrews which existed there at that time was C of E.
That makes it more of a mystery as to why the baptisms of his father and siblings can't be found (if it's the same person of course).
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Yes that's the one he married a daughter (Alice Kelk) of a Bishop or high up in the church I think - I haven't my research with me at the moment. Perhaps he rebelled as a child against an agnostic / atheist family. All the way through my research this line have been staunch supports of the church and being Yorkshire folk I doubt they would have risked not getting any parish relief if needed. Researching around Huddersfield I have been blessed with all church records being on line so this is a bit of a shock and with archives closed a bit frustrating.
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Yes - I agree. Have you tried searching local newspapers to see if any of their names crop up in articles which may give a clue to their religion? I may just try that.
Huddersfield family history society have a research place called the 'The Root Cellar' in Meltham, where people can go along for assistance with family history queries -- but sadly I expect that is closed also for the time being.
I am just wondering whether it might be worth contacting that Society to see if they can help, even if you are not a member.
https://www.hdfhs.org.uk/the-society/
(Although I just keep feeling I'm missing something which someone else may be able to find!)
I'll just look for the more unusual names in the newspapers - including searching for the father, Benjamin. If I find anything I'll come back to you.
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First entry I came across searching for an Ezra Lees!
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St George is on Ancestry combined with St Mary but I think I'll check with the archives in Wakefield to see if any churches in that locality didn't give permission for Ancestry to film their registers.
Perhaps it was Benjamin who was the ungodly one.
thanks for the lead,
Nick
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St George’s Brockholes was built/opened in 1861
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Thank you for that info Gibel -- so that eliminates St Georges! However the newspaper article does confirm that Ezra, at least, was C of E (or became C of E.)
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Where were Benjamin and his wife Fanny christened?
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Hi
Found the banns of marriage for Abel Hall Lees in Penistone to Elizabeth Broadhead but no GRO reference to a marriage.
Do not know much about Quaker but I think the main Quaker House was in the Penistone area, there was a small meeting house in Paddock, Huddersfield
Interesting another Abel Hall Lees was born Cheshire a few years earlier could be worth a look.
John
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Gibel - That's the question that started me looking at the children first. Fanny was daughter of James Cotton and Martha Sykes christened at Slaithwaite and East Scammonden. Benjamin I assume is son of Benjamin Lees and Martha Sykes christened same place.
But there are some 30 family trees on Ancestry that all say Benjamin was the son of Benjamin Lees and Esther Roberts who were Quakers. Esther was from Wooldale and Benjamin from Oldham / Saddleworth / Royston area. Much of this line is well documented and fits nicely although Benjamin snr goes from being a Cotton Manufacturer to a coal miner but perhaps he was just an entrepreneur and not two separate people. However nothing seems to fit to the family of Benjamin & Fanny and it doesn't feel right to me. Hence I thought I would look at all the children's baptisms and marriages for clues say an aunt or uncle possibly being witnesses. Then I discovered no baptisms.
John - That's the sort of thing I mean I will look into Abel Hall a bit more. The Quaker records for Benjamin and Esther above are variously in Liverpool & Pontefract. The Quakers seem to have a hierarchy of "offices" and from Marsden (in Lancs not nr Slaithwaite) it goes to Oldham then Liverpool. Their marriage in Wooldale ends up being recorded in Pontefract. So at first glance its easy to ignore a record like the Abel Hall in Cheshire as too far.
Thanks for the ideas. I think I need to contact the Quakers.
Nick
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Almondbury was a huge parish, if you look on the Huddersfield exposed website there is a list of the townships included and the OS map with the parish boundaries superimposed. Within the parish there would be a large number of daughter churches.
Benjamin appears to have been baptised at Slaithwaite chapel (a chapelry of Almondbury )with his family given as living in Linthwaite. He was buried at South Crosland Church in 1865.
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I used to live in Penistone and have a book on the Quakers of Wooldale, High Flatts and Midhope, I will dig it out and have a look.
As your Benjamin is buried in South Crosland churchyard I doubt he was the Quaker Benjamin.
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Where were Benjamin and his wife Fanny christened?
There are actually 2 children named Benjamin Lees both baptised in 1793 -- both, at what appear to be, Chapels of Ease of Almondbury All Hallows.
One was baptised on 3 March 1793 -son of John Lees of Mirj? Lane a Clothier baptised at Honley? Chapel.
One was baptised on 21 April 1793 - son of Benjamin - abode Heygate? - Linth. at Slaithwaite Chapel.
Both baptisms are in the Almondbury All Hallows Registers under their respective Chapels.
However Benjamin persistently shows his birth place as South Crossland.
Fanny Cotton
The only baptism I can see is on 30th August 1800 daughter of George and Mary - but unless she was baptised late - she would have been underage at marriage - I cannot decipher the 'abode' but baptism was at Slaithwaite with East Scammonden. Her birth place on census records is consistently Linthwaite. This is probably the incorrect baptism going from what Nick has said!
The marriage was at Almondbury All Hallows on 30/6/1817 - both bride and groom 'of this parish'.
I don't know the area well enough to decipher the 'abodes' in the parish register.
It certainly seems odd that we find NONE of the childrens' baptisms. However certainly the son Ezra and HIS son became C of E - even if Benjamin and Fanny converted from that faith at some point before their children were born.
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I had missed that first Benjamin and South Crosland fits much better with Honley. But Fanny from Linthwaite would be more likely to meet Benjamin from Linthwaite (Slaithwaite Chapel). The Fanny 1800 is a half cousin once removed to "my" Fanny as far as I have been able to tell. I think she was from Netherend.
My Fanny was from Clough and baptised on the 1oth Nov 1979 but transcribed as Catton on the 11th Nov.
The Abel Hall Lees in Penistone is too young to be the son of Benjamin.
I would be very interested in anything in the Quaker Book about where births were registered in the district.
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I’ve found Heygate, it’s a farm above Linthwaite and on the road just west of Blackmoorfoot reservoir and about a mile and a half, it that, from South Crosland. Hopley would involve going down into the valley and up to Honley. I think the Benjamin christened in Honley is the one living in Honley in the 1841 census.
Clough where Fanny was born is about a mile from Heygate and the same distance from South Crosland.
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Oh well done Gibel on your geographic research. I never find that easy - I don't seem to 'get on' with maps!
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I love maps and fortunately had an OS map of the area and on the Huddersfield exposed site they had a very helpful map.
I’ve been ferreting around and it seems that around the South Crosland/Netherton/Linthwaite there was quite a strong early Wesleyan/Methodist presence. I wonder if the family became involved in this and later reverted to the Church if England. Unfortunately there are no surviving records of these chapels for the time you want.
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That's great Gibel I will look at the 1841 census again to check that I had covered that. Do you use the National Library of Scotland for maps or oldmaps? I find the NLS easier to use and they have OS of the period. https://maps.nls.uk
Do you know of any of the names of the chapels you refer to? Or should I just ferret around the Huddersfield exposed? I read a history of Honley on there and found it very useful, I seem to remember a history of Dissenters in Huddersfield too but wasn't thinking about this problem when I read that.
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Just found The History and Topography of South Crosland, Armitage Bridge and Netherton (1938) by Philip Ahier - I think I also found the chapel you were referring to. They met in the Oddfellows Hall?
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I found about 3 in the area ( not Armitage Bridge) and checked them all on the Non Conformist records list for West Yorkshire Archives and none had early records listed so presumably they have been lost and they didn’t send them to the Registrar General in 1837 as those would also have been listed.
It may have been for convenience on the part of the Lees family. The children I found all married in the C of E ( I didn’t look for them all) and some appear to be buried in the local C if E like their father.
I think you may have to accept that you won’t find baptisms but maybe concentrate on tracking them down and finding other descendants, you never know someone may have a family bible.
I’ve found the Quaker book but it refers to Wooldale, High Flatts and Midhope. The Quakers kept good records and they are available online. I will have a read through the book over the weekend.
I like NLS maps too but I used Huddersfield Exposed website to find Heygate and my 1987 1:50,000 OS map Sheffield and Huddersfield to get an overview of the area. It’s extremely battered from having spent a lot of time in my rucksack with my Dark Peak 1:25,000 maps from my Peak Park Ranger days
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On nls if you find Black Moor Foot Reservoir and go left ( east) along the lane on top of the reservoir wall you will see Hey Gate and it’s still there today.
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Hi
I will try & clear up what was in each parish but it could just confuse you a little.
South Crosland & Netherton was in the Almondbury Parish and had it's own chapel. Slathwaite, Linthwaite & Marsden are in both the Huddersfield & Almondbury Parishes & had their own chapel, so depending on which side of the valley they lived would depend on which parish they where in. Crosland Moor & Lockwood was in the Huddersfield Parish. Wooldale was in Kirkburton Parish.
It is complicated you can have people living a couple of yards from each other who would be in different parishes & it was then further complicated by the Luddite movement.
John
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Many thanks for the information and advice from you all but I think you are right I won't find the baptisms. I will have to find other routes to Benjamin's line and evidence his father was the Quaker from the Oldham area or the Benjamin who married Martha Sykes. I suspect that all Lees come from the Oldham area at some point (my Y DNA does some 25 generations ago with some surname changes along the way) because of the place name Lees.
Thanks again for your help.
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Thought I’d have a ferret around for your family I found the following siblings to your Benjamin born 1793 with a father Benjamin. All have a variation of Hey Linthwaite in the abode. The baptism are in the Almondbury registers and the Marsden registers but they took place at Marsden
Betty 18 Jan 1784 d Benjamin of Height Linthwaite
James 4 Aug 1785 s of Benjamin of Hey Linthwaite
John 23 Sept 1787 s of Benjamin of Linthwaite
Martha 7 Aug 1790 d of Benjamin Of Heighgate Linthwaite
Benjamin 21 Aug 1793 S of Benjamin of Heygate Linthwaite at Slaithwaite Chapel
Joseph 10 Aug 1795 Son of Ben of Hey Gate Linthwaite at Slaithwaite Chapel
I’ve not yet found a marriage for Benjamin but did find this possible baptism for Benjamin Which looks very possible to me.
Marsden Register
18 May 1553
Benjamin s of James and Phoebe of Hey in Linthwaite
However just found
15 June 1793 Ben son of Ben Lees of Hey Linthwaite buried At Slathwaite Chapel
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Actually the township of Lees is within Oldham.
However people only tended to be given a place name as a surname, way, way back in the 13th Century when surnames were introduced.
So - if a chap called Thomas moved from Lees to another settlement he would be given the name Thomas a' Lees or similar - to differentiate him from the other Thomas's in that settlement.
There may be other places called Lees - but I'm from Lancashire so I know of that one and you have mentioned Oldham.
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Gibel - Many thanks for doing that you have just actually possibly destroyed my theory! Still that's what I wanted to do either prove the Oldham Quaker theory or my Benjamin from Linthwaite theory. I just liked my theory better.
You have found the same ones as I but I also have Samuel 1776, William 1778, Mary 1780, Thomas 1782, a Joseph 1785 (? typo). I assume these are to a Benjamin who married a Martha Sykes 8 Jan 1776. Some things there for me to check and compare place names with. The last two Martha and Benjamin fit with naming after their parents. So all good.
What I hadn't found, didn't look for infact because everything was fitting nicely, was a Benjamin son of Ben dying which would mean he couldn't be "my" Benjamin and therefore the tree with the Quaker Benjamin son of Benjamin and Esther Roberts was possibly the answer.
Benjamin whoever he is would be my 4x great grandfather so I want to get to know the right one.
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Sorry Gibel I think the heats got to me today - I've just had a good look for that burial Ben of Ben 15th June 1793 but can't find it in the Marsden, Slaithwaite or Almondbury records.
Which chapel was it?
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It’s in Slaithwaite St James in the West Yorkshire collection on Ancestry
For a search put
Ben Lees died 1795 Slaithwaite
It’s the very last entry on the page.
I destroyed my own theory too and I’m sorry but I see I put 1793 on my post and it should be 1795, my apologies.
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To try and help can you post the name, date of birth etc of your ancestor who you are 100 percent sure is correct. I imagine it’ll be someone born post 1837 who you have their birth certificate.
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Post 1837 would be Walter Allen Lees born 9 Jul 1862. He was the son of Ezra who was the son of Benjamin and Fanny Cotton. Unfortunately Ezra just escaped the 1837 changes. Realistically I am very confident about Benjamin and Fanny and as well as records such as Census and Christeneings etc I have a number of DNA matches that confirm the relationships. They married 30 Jun 1817 Almondbury. I can trace the Cotton family but Benjamin is my mystery. There is another possibility that I wasn't too keen on till Benjamin of Hey died early in his life yesterday but it lacked any other evidence and I felt depended upon the location of Miry Lane. That is a Benjamin son of John 3 March 1793 (from memory) but I am sure I found him in the census later in his life and therefore dismissed him. I need to re do that research again.
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Having had a quick look I completely agree that Ezra belongs to Benjamin and Fanny, the family in South Crosland and as you say the sticking point is Benjamin the father.
I’m just wondering whether another Benjamin son of Benjamin of Heygate was born a couple of years later. I know I have a family that tried 3 times to have a daughter Ann.
I’ll see if I can find Benjamin son of John.
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Found a Benjamin Lees christened 17 Nov 1798 at Slaithwaite. He’s the son of James of Lingard. Lingard appears to be about half a mile or so from Heygate.
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There seem to be 2 John's marrying Sarah's circa 1788/89 - one being Quaker (again!) but whilst they married in Wooldale he was resident in Bolton and his parents and bride from Raistrick/Brighouse.
So I think the John Lees marrying a Sarah 2 jun 1788 and possibly having a Sarah, Ann, Mary, Tommy, John and Benjamin but the churches for the christenings vary too much for my liking.
The Quaker records though are so full of detail names of the in laws and everything. But many of the children of the other John and Sarah were christened as "of Netherton" which would fit nicely with South Crosland.
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Just seen your James comment - the date doesn't fit with Benjamin but it is certainly another other option. Benjamin is reasonable consistent in 1841, 51 and 61 only slipping a year and 2 years older when he was buried but given he was dead at the time the vicar must have asked someone who wasn't quiet spot on. I assume he died in 1865 aged a supposed 74. I will obtain that death cert to see who is named on it as I haven't got it.
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I see you have some earlier comments or questions about George Robinson Lees, who was my great grandfather, therefore Ezra my great, great, grandfather etc. George Robinson Lees, after his wanderings in Syria etc, came back to London, studied and eventually became vicar of St Saviours, Brixton Hill. He was also a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society so there could be some info from that avenue. I would be very interested to know if you solved the mystery of Ezra's parents and grandparents. All I know was that Ezra was involved with the wool trade or a mill in West Riding. I believe he was a land owner of some sort.