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Thank you to all for the replies.  I'll pursue the Benjamin and Elizabeth line!

Regarding the Pinder family, I haven't found any connections to Lincolnshire or any Nathaniels Pinders.  Seems that the connection started in West Yorkshire (back to 1780) and then moved not very many miles into Lancashire.  Sorry!

Regards

Joy

Hi there

I'm researching the Brandon family from Manchester and the trail has let me to London. 

I have a Samuel Cornish Brandon baptised in St Luke Old Street on 24 June 1759, parents William and Ann.  I have also found a number of brothers and sisters of Samuel Cornish Brandon and a couple of them also bear the christian name' Cornish', so that got me looking for a William Brandon possibly marrying a Ann Cornish.

I found William Brandon (recorded as Brandom) married Ann Cornish 18 Aug 1747, which ties in with the birth of the first child, Abigail Short Brandon in 1748.  This was a Fleet marriage and no parents are listed.

Trying to get further back, I have a William Brandon baptised on 2 Oct 1720 in St Giles Cripplegate, parents were John and Grace.  However, what puts me off this one a little is that John and Grace have another William Brandon b in 1731, suggesting that the one born in 1720 died.  If this 1731 William Brandon was the one I was looking for, he would only have been 17 when his first child was born in 1748.  I don't know if this is likely or not.

However I have found a death of a William Brandon (child) with burial on 1 Oct 1831 - whch I suppose could be the Willaim born in 1720 (or the one born in 1731!).

Other family trees which I have seen online get as far as William Brandon marrying Ann Cornish, but no details apart from that, with varying years of birth.

The only other William Brandon I can find born in London at around the right time is William Brandon christened on 10 Sep 1727 in St Martin in the Fields, Westminster, parents Henry and Anne.  St Giles Cripplegate seems more likely given that future generations of William and Anne's family were christened at St Luke's Old Street, to which many St Giles families moved once it was built.

I have found an Ann Cornish baptised in St Leonard Shoreditch on 31 Dec 1727, parents Robert and Abigail.  This would tie in with the first child of William and Ann being named Abigail but that's all I have to go on.

I haven't found William's death - there are three possibilities but I can't tell which is more likely - St Andrew Holborn 27 Mar 1791, St George Southwark 14 Apr 1804 and St Anne Soho 22 Apr 1805 (from the workhouse).

Same problem with Anne's death - most likely is Feb 1786 at St John Horselydown, Southwark - but why the two burials wouldn't be connected to St Luke Old Street, I'm not sure.

I'd live to hear from anyone with any thoughts or ideas about this.  I don't live in England, so my research is all being done online for the moment.

Kind regards, Joy

Hi Brenda

Great to hear from you!  Certainly seems that my husband, Keith, and you share great grandparents, which makes you second cousins.

I will give you access to our tree on Ancestry, which will let you see what we have.  It's been very hard to get further back on Ann Eliza Smith's side of the family.  She was definitely born in Bridlington and I have a copy of her birth certificate - father Robert Smith and mother Ann Wood.  There was some suggestion from research that she might have been from a fairground or travelling family but I can't find anything so far to substantiate that.  However, Irish roots would fit in with that.

Richard Burton's father was William and grandfather was Thomas, both from Norton, Yorkshire.  We think Thomas's father was John Burton.

Do you still live in the Knottingley area?  Quite a few of Keith's Smith/Burton relatives still live there.  We live in Northern Ireland, where I'm from, but make regular trips across to Yorkshire and to Lancashire, where Keith's Mum was from.

Look forward to hearing from you!

Kind regards,  Joy

Hi Carole

Thanks for your response.  We have done some searching and have got some info from my elderly aunt.  Ernest is the father's anme on the marriage certificate, but there is no occupation - simply 'deceased'.  Robert is described as 'full age'.  The witnesses are friends from here in Northern Ireland where Robert married my grandmother, Jane Thompson, in Bangor, Co Down.

We have also found that he originally enlisted in the Hampshire Regiment in Chichester on 22 Aug 1908.

He seems to have been discharged after the war in 1919 but immediately re-enlisted on 25 Feb 1919.  He was part of the Army of Occupation on the Rhine from 7 Nov 1928 until 8 Dec 1929.

My aunt also says she thinks her father's middle name was Reid, but we have no evidence of this, as yet.  He was quite a skilled man with his hands and built a tall floor standing clock with a radiogram in it after he left the army.  My aunt still has it in the corner of the living room.

We also have the notification from the London Gazette on 13 Apr 1918 of him being awarded the Military Medal.

We'll keep searching!

May thanks for your help.

Joy

My grandfather, Robert Redman (b 9 Jun 1890 in Brighton d 9 Jun 1945 in Northern Ireland) is something of a mystery to us.  He is reported to have run away from home to join the army, but as he was underage he couldn't get into the Sussex Regiment, so he lied about his age and joined the 2nd Battalion Hampshire Regiment.  The dob may not therefore be accurate!

He is in 1911 census, age 21 as a Private in 'Mauritius and South Africa'.  We cannot find him in 1891 or 1901 census, neither can we find his birth.  His marriage to my grandmother is on ancestry as is his Medal Rolls Card - he won the Military Medal in WW1 and fought at Gallipolli ad the Somme.   We can't find anything else.  We know he was the Sergeant in the Officers' Mess after the war and we also know he was stationed in Bingen on the Rhine in the Army of Occupation, as my Dad (born 1921 d 1994) clearly remembered skating on the Rhine in winter as a boy.

He was supposed to have a sister called Dora or Dolly Redman, who may have been on the stage - born around 1889 and died about 1974.

Family seem to think his father may have been called Ernest, but there is no evidence for this.

My Mum (now 89) remembers visiting Brighton with my Dad (Robert Leslie Redman, b 18 Aug 1921 in Bangor, N Ireland) in 1946, after my grandfather's death, and meeting a lady whom she was told was 'Aunt' Bessie - Robert Redman's cousin.  We know that Bessie was Elizabeth Marie Hall (b Jan 1876 in Newington, Surrey), daughter of Christopher Hall and Maria Ann Penfold (b Mar 1845 in Brighton) and that Bessie married on 26 Sep 1898 Alfred Denniss Penfold (b Sep 1869 in Brighton), who is purported to be her cousin.  He is said to be the illegitimate son of Eliza Caroline Penfold, Maria Ann Penfold's sister.  His father was said to be unknown, but on his marriage certificate to Bessie, he put as his father someone with the same name as himself, deceased and occupation 'carpenter'.  He and Bessie were apparently living at the same house at the time of their marriage (10 Old Shoreham Road, Brighton) which was their grandparents' house (Peter and Maria Penfold). Both Peter and Maria had died by then and I'm not sure who else was living in the house at that time.  Perhaps it had been left to Alfred Denniss.

Eliza Caroline Penfold had another illegitimate child called Kate Beatrice Penfold (b 27 Mar 1875 in 47 Baker Street, Brighton) before marrying George Potter.

If anyone can help to shed some light on my grandfather's background and family, and or the connection between him and the Penfold family, through Aunt Bessie, I would be most grateful.

Thanks!   Joy