Phillips of Hand Hotel,Llangollen

[Relative Stranger]

Am following this topic with renewed interest as I am no further on in my research since my last post 4 years ago. John Joseph Smith the grandson of Amey Phillips (nee Richards) has proved impossible to find. I have his birth cert (parents Amey Phillips & John Smith 8th Dec 1850) and he is in a boarding school in the 1861 census. I think that the John Smith in Tranmere Cheshire, with Land Property income is the last record I have for him. With the name John Smith, he is a mystery man. Help!

[Kloumann]

There were 2 deaths of a John Smith recorded in Ellesmere, Shropshire in 1862 & 1863. But other than that, no trace on subsequent census.

[rosie99]

There were 2 deaths of a John Smith recorded in Ellesmere, Shropshire in 1862 & 1863. But other than that, no trace on subsequent census.

From GRO index   https://www.gro.gov.uk/gro/content/certificates/indexes_search.asp

SMITH, JOHN       age 0     
1862  June Quarter in ELLESMERE  Volume 06A  Page 437

SMITH, JOHN    age 75     
1863  June Quarter in ELLESMERE  Volume 06A  Page 509   
 

 

[Relative Stranger]

Thank you Rosie. John Smith would have been aged about 12 in 1862/3. So that's not him in either death cert. Back to the drawing board!

[Kloumann]

Have you been able to trace his father, John & sister, Abigail?

[Relative Stranger]

Yes insofar as John Smith lived in Ireland and died in 1866 (I can't find any other death cert that would match) and Abigail married and died following childbirth in 1880. Some of her children were taken into care and sent to Canada as their father became unemployed and could not look after them. My great grandmother Mabel stayed behind, married and had one daughter my grandmother. I have an original letter written to Mabel by an uncle on her father's side in 1906 explaining the family history to her. In it he mentions John Smith but doesn't know what happened to him. I've hit a real brick wall. My gut feeling is that he remained close to the Phillips family and that they are the key to solving the mystery

[Kloumann]

There is a John Joseph Lawson Smith, born Hackney, London 1873, married a Sarah Elizabeth Crabb 1900 in Bebington, Tranmere. His father is listed as John Joseph Smith. I thought it might be a link as JJ was on the 1871 Tranmere census.

[Relative Stranger]

Thank you Kloumann. I will definitely follow it up.