1900's railway occupations help needed

[colinjohn]

But may be he wasn't the engine driver but the man who coupled and uncoupled the trucks as required during the shunting operation. I can see him now, with his long hooked pole, lifting the chain off the coupling hook.

Colin

[ricky1]

Hi Wookietoo
They also used horses for shunting
When wagons needed to be moved and no locomotive was shunting the yard it was common practice to use horses to pull the stock about. The horses wore a special harness with trailing lengths of chain fitted with hooks on the end. The hooks on the shunting harness were attached to metal loops (on wooden chassis) or hooked into holes in the solebars (on metal chassis), these loops and holes were all referred to as 'horse hooks' although the hook was actually on the chain not the wagon. These horses worked either singly or in pairs (one ahead of the other).

Horse shunting required two men, one to handle the horse, the other to deal with attaching the chains to the wagons. To get round the problem of building a working horse you could have the men fitting the harness to the horse in a corner of the yard close to the stables (if any).

ricky

[wookietoo]

Now that is very very interesting ricky.
The family legend is that the older George came from a farm in Iver Heath...so may well have been familiar with horses.
It casts doubt on the two Georges though as the elder was a railway guard for 30 years.......

I'm beginning to think I will never get to the bottom of this.
I was up until 2am trawling through every George Cooper in the country on the 1901 census.....   

[trellisick]

there were many, many grades on the railway but you would usualy get a job if your father worked there and went to the right church, you would normaly start doing the most lowly job that was available, either a lamp boy call out boy etc etc but a shunter would have directed the shunting movements of train wagons in yards and sidings, he would normaly progress from this job to a guard or yard forman or even a guards inspector, he would not progress to driver as this was an entirly different line of promotion i.e. cleaner, fireman, driver. that is if a driver died or retired and made a vacancy for you, and then possibly a drivers inspector the shunter would travel around with the engine driver and fireman picking up wagons and shunting them into the sidings required. kali.

[wookietoo]

So somebody wouldn't be a guard for 30 years and then drop back to being a shunter then, or be a parcel porter, then a shunter, then a railway porter all within 3 years.
I didn't think so. That's that possibility thrown out of the window then.

I've got a horrible feeling that my two Georges were living seperately in the 1901 census, and that I am not going to be able to pick them out...........

[trellisick]

i would think not, but there is a small possibility that this could happen through illness or disiplinary proceedures,   kali.

[wookietoo]

I'm still struggling with this one, although the 1911 census has turned up some interesting possibilities.
I realise that this is now off-topic, so please tell me if I need to re-post it elsewhere.

I am fairly certain that I have found the 1904 birth that I was looking for, living with grandparents as his mother is in hospital.
I still haven't found his father or sister in 1911.
However, going back to the 1901 census I found him as an 18 year old with his parents.

My dilemma is that he is too young for the wedding certificate that I have just one year later which says he is 21.
Nowadays we have to supply a birth certificate to get married....     Could anybody tell me whether he could have lied about his age in 1902?
I know that you could lie about your age to join the army at that time, and even in WW2

Occupation-wise 1901 is general labourer, 1902 shunter, 1904 railway porter.
Father is butcher 1901, shunter 1902, unemployed butcher 1911 - stretching things I know but would he have wanted to put father unemployed on his marriage certificate?

Any help appreciated as I have very little hair left to tear out..

P.S. His father hasn't signed the marriage cert as a witness, it is some unknown name, possibly best man. Her mother has signed

[duckweed]

They don't seem to have had to supply birth certificate or anything from my experience. One of my Ancestors never had his birth registered as far as I can tell even though they should have legally done so. In any case if you were marrying without your parents consent you would have to persuade Clergyman you were 21 or above or he would seek their consent. Was the marriage by special licence by any chance or away from where his parents lived? Were any of his family witnesses? If yes to first 2 questions and No to third, chances are he eloped.   

[wookietoo]

I can't see anything on my copy marriage cert that says special licence, and it says after Banns.
None of his family have signed or witnessed, and it is not her parents but a relative who has witnessed her signature.
Both bride and groom gave the same address.