RootsChat.Com
Beginners => Family History Beginners Board => Topic started by: AnnieBard on Monday 30 December 24 22:46 GMT (UK)
-
I know a lot about Lizzie Smith and yet for the life of me I can’t discover who her mother was or more about her father than his name and his occupation in the year she married. And I have scoured all the data bases I have access to and run so many searches on birth records and censuses my eyes are boggling. Now hoping someone can help please.
I arrived at Lizzie via her husband Alfred Ernest Barry. He was born to English parents in Dublin in 1877 and in August 1901 he married Lizzie Beatrice Smith there.
Alfred Ernest Barry 21+ Bachelor, Coachbuilder, Howard’s Cross f. Joseph Barry, Carpenter and Lizzie Beatrice Smith 21+ Spinster, Cook, Foxrock f. Joseph Smith, Clerk. I’ve had no luck linking the two witnesses to the couple although one has almost the same name as the housemaid where Lizzie is employed
I found Lizzie on the 1901 Census working as a cook in Kerrymount (Foxrock), Dublin … she’s 21 and was born in England (no further detail given). She’s also described as Church of Ireland but I’m guessing that’s because she’s not Catholic and that that’s the church she attends with the family and other household staff.
By 1911 Lizzie and Alfred have recently returned to England along with their five children, all b. Dublin (I have all the children’s birth records, mother’s maiden name Smith), and are living at 21 Membury Road, Saltley, Birmingham, where they will stay until their final years. Alfred is still working as a Coach body maker. Lizzie Beatrice Barry is 32 and was b. in Ipswich (no county given)
In 1921 however, still at 21 Membury Road and with two more children born since they arrived there, Lizzie Beatrice Barry is 41 yrs and 2 months and was b. in Kilburn, London (adding to the fun Kilburn is of course not an administrative district and instead spans a number of them). One daughter is away from home visiting a couple called Wallace but I’ve not been able to find any connection between the two families.
1939 and the family is still at 21 Membury Road and Elizabeth B. Barry has a birth date of 10 Apr 1879
Elizabeth Beatrice Barry dies at 42 Membury Road, the home of one of her daughters, on 12 Mar 1950 aged 69 years.
Obviously there’s a little discrepancy when it comes to her birth year there but I simply can’t find a birth record for an Elizabeth or Lizzie Smith that fits the above. Could anyone suggest anything else I might try ?
-
Just adding a few links to records to aide those looking into this.
1901 marriage
https://civilrecords.irishgenealogy.ie/churchrecords/images/marriage_returns/marriages_1901/10319/5756574.pdf
1901 census
https://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Dublin/Ballybrack/Kerrymount/1316784/
1911 census
https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:XWZ6-SQV
-
It is a shame that Lizzie’s place of birth is so conflicting. Ipswich or Kilburn?
I have had a look at this today, but not made any progress.
She had a very good domestic service position with the Hingston family. I see the Hingstons in Dorset in 1881, but I think they must have been in Ireland from at least 1891.
I wonder how Lizzie got the position. If she was sent from England, this suggests she was known to the family. If she was already living in Ireland when she was hired, this suggests her family may have moved from England before 1901.
-
I wondered if the witness Mary Pratt might be this woman, but have not yet investigated further.
https://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Dublin/Drumcondra/Lr__Drumcondra_Road/1272534/
-
Just adding a few links to records to aide those looking into this.
Thank you so much. I should have thought to do this myself.
-
I wondered if the witness Mary Pratt might be this woman, but have not yet investigated further.
https://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/pages/1901/Dublin/Drumcondra/Lr__Drumcondra_Road/1272534/
The housemaid where Lizzie is working as a cook is Margaret Pratt and I’ve assumed that the connection’s there. I’ll take a look at this though, thank you.
-
What I notice about the marriage record (see link) is that it is all written in the same hand - that of the rector who wrote it up at few months later, in October.
So we don’t have the individual signatures of bride or groom or either witness.
One wonders what errors were made by the cleric when he wrote out the record.
Did the witness “Marg Pratt” become Mary Pratt? Margaret Pratt would be a very obvious witness.
If that is an error, were there other errors made? For instance, were both fathers named Joseph or was this an error?
It would be interesting to compare it with the original church record.
This post was edited.