Right, then Sluggie, let me see if I can make this as clear as I can – you must forgive us, we have been researching this family for some time and they ARE complicated.
For simplicity, I’m going to spell Corke with the e – sometimes it gets left off.
Richard Corke was born in c 1812 in Stone, Kent.
We see him first in the 1861 Census, with wife Jane, and their children. I won’t burden you with all the research, as yet (although I can invite you to see my Ancestry tree, where all the source details are attached), but we discovered a number of children, who (we think!) are:
Sarah (1837, Seal, Kent)
Richard (c 1841, Cudham, Kent)
Jane (1842, Ightham, Kent)
Daniel (1845 – place of birth not certain, but shown on records as Chelsea, Middlesex/Surrey)
James (1848, Reigate, Surrey)
Stephen (1851, Wisley, Surrey)
Eliza (1853, Seal, Kent)
Alice (1859, Seal, Kent)
Mary Ann (1862, Seal, Kent)
Richard’s wife – we can’t find trace of a marriage – was Jane COOLEY (c1820 Chertsey, Surrey).
Now then, you and Goldcoast are descended from Mary Ann, the youngest child, and Royd is descended from one of the other brothers (at least we think he is of the same family) Daniel. I am descended from Richard jnr.
It appears that the family did use the name Corke AND Cooley, as it suited. So it may be that Jane and Richard snr never married.
For example, the eldest daughter, Sarah, married for the first time as Sarah Cooley, with no father quoted. After having been widowed, when she remarried, she gave Richard Corke as her father on the certificate.
And my great great great grandfather Richard Corke married my great great great grandmother as Richard Corke, but when they separated, he married again – bigamously! – giving the name Richard Cooley, and after that his family all changed their name to Cooley.
We have tried for some years to connect Daniel, Royd’s ancestor, to the family, but cannot do so as we do not have them on a census together – although Daniel lives next door to other Corkes in various villages through the censuses. We have been comparing likenesses, and I believe that my great great grandmother, daughter of Richard jnr, looks very like some of Daniel’s daughters, and also bears a resemblance to Bertha. When you have caught up with all this, we’d love to see any pictures you have, or just hear your opinion!
One of the difficulties is that the family travelled in work – they weren’t Romany gypsies, but just itinerant workers, following the agricultural calendar, across county boundaries in Kent and Surrey, but also probably doing such things as hawking goods, repairing chairs etc. So although we know they were in Surrey in March 1851 for the christening of son, Stephen, we can’t find them in the 1851 census which is the only census which would have likely shown all the older children together, with their parents.
Anyway, let’s get back to your ancestor, Mary Ann. She was, as I have shown, youngest daughter of Richard Corke and Jane Cooley, and her mother died (as a complication of childbirth) when Mary Ann was only 5.
Mary Ann is with her father, Richard, and some of her siblings in the 1871 census, and in 1881 is still with him, this time, still unmarried aged 19, with a small son whom I believe was called Joseph Stephen Cork (but I don’t have the certificate to prove if this is the correct birth). And I don’t know what happened to this son.
By the 1891 Census, we think she is with Nathan Evenden, shown as Polly (a common nickname for girls called Mary Ann – I have several in my tree), with two children Albert 8, and Bertha 5.
Then in 1901, the family is in Wrotham, Kent, with son Albert, and other daughters Lizzie and Alice, and small son Arthur.
Now, just briefly to take you back to my own relative, Richard Corke jnr, as you will recall I said he remarried, bigamously, and then called himself Cooley – the family were based in Chatham, and although Richard died in 1896, his son Arthur Frend (Cork)Cooley, was living in Chatham at 30 Caroline Street.
Now I believe that this is where the families start to join back up, and got Goldcrest interested, as this is the address which Bertha COOLEY got married from in 1904.
So, in summary, we believe that
Mary Ann Cork was the daughter of Jane Cooley and Richard Cork, who never married – so she would legally believe herself to be called Mary Ann Cooley as her maiden name.
She lived with, but never married, Nathan Evenden, so all her children would legally be Cooleys.
So her daughter, Bertha, quoted this name on her marriage certificate. However, she didn’t want to seem to be illegitimate and therefore “made up” the name Alfred Cooley as her father.
However, on the birth certificate of Goldcrest’s grandmother, Bertha’s maiden name is shown as Evenden, which was of course the name she was brought up with.
I’ll stop there! It’s probably enough!
If you make a few more posts on Rootschat, I will be able to PM you with my details and if you then give me your email address (don’t post it here), I will invite you to see my family tree which sets this out in all its magnificent confusion.
We have had fabulous help from this site, so I do hope you continue to use and enjoy it.
