Family Records Centre

[Bruce609]

Dear Denis,
Thank you for your input. Your explanation certainly fits. Nor can I identify James parents. I have Sophia Hill's baptism in 1779 St Marylebone, but not her marriage which I expect would have been 1802-1803 given Susanna was born September 1804.
William Morris married Mary Ann 9 July 1834 in Colombo according to his military record. This is also noted in Find my Past. Unfortunately I cannot identify in which church that they were married . They do not appear in the Kabristan Archives [ that I can see].
I cannot link James Austin and Dr William. However Dr William is linked to to Morris family with his marriage to William [1808-1883] sister Sidney Sophia Morris in Newfoundland 1806
Regards
Bruce

[dmollison]

I have the marriage of James Austin and Sophia Hill noted as 1803 St Martin in the Fields, but have mislaid the exact date. If I find it I'll post it here.

[Bruce609]

Thank you Denis. That would be appreciated. I have been through the Marriage Banns on  Family Search  but could not find the marriage. Perhaps it was by licence

[mckha489]

Banns 2nd 9th & 16th October. At St Martins But at the moment cannot see the actual marriage,

However, on the 6th of October a couple of the same name were married by licence at Eastbourne. Are they likely to be one and the same?  Or just a coincidence?

[LizzieL]

Banns for a JA and SH were read at St Martins in the fields on 2, 9 and 16 Oct 1803. They could have started the process of Banns, then decided they wanted to marry more quickly and got a licence to marry in Eastbourne on 6th October. Or could be a complete co-incidence.

[Bruce609]

Eastbourne was a military post of some importance during the Napoleonic  wars. Given James occupation  of sutler, it is quite possible that he followed his regiment there. The marriage date is between the dates of his banns published at St Martins. Would the banns have been publishes automatically even if the couple had decamped ?

[LizzieL]

If they forgot to tell the vicar, then I expect he would carry on reading the banns as originally scheduled.
Ancestors of mine had banns read in Norfolk (all three) but did not marry there. Then almost immediately had the set of three read in Essex. I had wondered if one was from Norfolk and one from Essex and the banns reading was out of sync in their home parishes. But in both sets they were both of the parish. He was in the army and although I haven't got his service record the regiment did move between the two places at around the right time. They did marry in Essex after the 3rd reading of second set. I wouldn't be surprised if they had already left Norfolk by the time the readings of the 1st set were finished.

This was very late 18th century, not much earlier than your couple

[Bruce609]

Thank you, LizzieL. Given the limited means of communication at that time, it is indeed likely that the vicar was not advised

[dmollison]

Has anyone found/looked at the marriage licence? Many of these are on ancestry.com - to which I don't currently have a subscription. These usually contain some extra info of interest.
And do the Banns contain any extra info? - likely not?
It's James for whom some extra info would be useful.

And it's not certain James was connected to the army before his marriage.
His father-in-law Adam Hill was "many years Mess-master to the Officers of the Brigade of Guards", so it may have been through him that James got the job of sutler to the 1st regiment of foot (later Grenadier Guards).