The mother of all brick walls!

[ShaunJ]

No Tim....I was just searching for your Henry Butler, found this other one in a similar line of business, and wondered if there was a son.

There is a birth announcement in The Era 19 January 1851.

11th, the wife of Mr Henry Butler of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, of a son, at his residence in Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn.

The house in Great Queen Street was the home of his in-laws the Sherwins.

The birth of Thomas Henry Sherwin Butler was registered in St Giles in 1Q 1851.   

[ShaunJ]

Here's someone who is researching that family http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/THEATRE-UK/2006-12/1165608452

[Timbottawa]

Thanks Shaun, I've emailed the originator of that thread.  He's obviously found the family in 1861, but I can't!

You obviously have access to The Era - is this through the Gale Newspapers group, or do you have some other source?  My fellow died in 1909, and I thought there might be an obituary in The Era or more likely The Era Almanac and Annual which might provide useful information.  I was one of the many whose enrollment in the Gale offer was terminated after only one day, but in any case, they only covered the Victorian period.

Cheers
Tim

[ShaunJ]

Yes Tim I have online access to the Era via my local library, but only up to 1900 at the moment. 

I'll see if I can find them in 1861.

[ShaunJ]

1861:  RG9/167 f 45 p 23

26 Bloomsbury Street

Indexed as Buller

[Timbottawa]

Wow, Shaun, you are much better at discovering census entries than me, and I've been looking for Butlers for ages - Butter is another common mis-transcription!

I was interested in seeing whether there were any siblings whose names might have been reflected in my fellow's children, but he seems to have been an only child!

It is interesting that they had a French drawing master lodging with them, as my fellow was also an artist.  But this is a whole lot of highly circumstantial evidence.  I think I really need to locate an obituary! (Which takes us back to how I think you located this thread ... the value of death certificates!)

But thanks ... this is the most convincing family I've come across.
Tim

[ShaunJ]

Re your hand-me-down story about Margaret and the D'Oyly Carte ...there was a successful  opera singer by the name of Annie Tremaine who performed for the D'Oyly Carte and would have been a contemporary...do you think a wire got crossed somewhere along the line? I saw nothing in The Era to connect Bella Tremaine with opera.

[Timbottawa]

Well, of course it is possible that some wires got crossed ... but there are references to Bella and opera in The Era.  For example, an advert in The Era for 16 April 1876 says "Bella Tremaine, Singing Walking Ladies, available for Burlesque or Opera Bouffe".

To be honest, I'm not sure what "burlesque or opera bouffe" is!

So, she sang, she was associated in some way with opera, but there is no record that she sang for the D'Oyly Carte, and she wasn't Annie Tremaine, who was much more famous, and who did!

So I think the assocaition is a family legend, but whether it arose simply from an inflation of a mother/grandmother's career, or from a mix-up with someone with a similar stage name, we can probably never know!

Cheers
Tim

[ShaunJ]

have you searched The Stage's online archive? https://archive.thestage.co.uk/