It could possibly be that William Potts and William Poots are the same person. We are descended from his second marriage to Eliza Anne Mckeowan.
Right on my family tree so far, we've found Thomas Poots (1876), Annie Poots (1879) and Margaret J Poots (1879) and William John Poots (1867) so it's helpful to see we've missed a couple out.
Cathy52, do you have a marriage certificate for your William John Poots and Mary Scott? Because we are pretty sure he married this Mary Lannigan at Seapatrick church, the geneologist at Banbridge tourist information agreed with us, as the occupation and name of the father matched up and the family church was Seapatrick church for a few generations. So when it came up that he was fathering children with a Mary Scott, I was getting a bit confused as to whether Mary Lannigan and Mary Scott were the same person or not.
Aghadowey, you haven't by any chance come across a marriage record for Mary Scott and William John Poots have you?
Cathy52, I don't know if it helps but this is the information I have on my William John Poots, which I'm fairly sure is the same person you are researching. Btw, I know you shouldn't go by family lore but according to a relative of mine (who may not be the most trustworthy) the joke was the he was a bit of a dodgy character and was a bigamist, hence part of my interest in trying to unravel how many wives etc. I have that he married Mary Lannigan on 27th March 1864, witnesses were Adam Mercer and Anne Curry. His occupation at that time was a hotel servant. The Banbridge geneologist told me that there were only two hotels in Banbridge at that time and one of them was pretty close to his house, so it was probably that one...his possible place of work is still there btw, but I can't remember the name of it right now.
On 10th October 1893 he remarried, to Eliza Anne Mckeown. I've seen the original marriage certificate but don't currently have a copy. The Minister was John E Browne, witnesses were Henry John Harris and Mary Jane Russell. In 1893, he was a labourer in Banbridge. In 1901 his address was 11 Mary's Row in Banbridge - you can find this information on the census. The house he lived in is no longer standing, it was rebuilt into a newer council estate in the 1970's. In 1901 he was an agricultural labourer. He couldn't read or write according to the census.
He went on to have seven children with Eliza Ann Mckeown - Eliza Ann Poots (1870), William John Poots (1895) died in WW1, Robert Poots (1897) died in WW1, Olive Poots (1899), Margery Poots (1900), David Poots (1902 - we are descended from him) and Andrew Poots.
He died in 1908 aged 63 and we think he was buried in an unmarked grave in Banbridge town cemetary with two adults and one infant. When I had an appointment with the registrar at Banbridge council office they found that he had purchased this particular unmarked grave and the addresses added up, but they couldn't find the specific record in the book so I had to go by the cemetary record which just has the surname Poots and how many adults and infants are in the grave. It was row F, but I can't remember the number right now. If you are planning to visit, I can try and hunt it out for you but there's nothing to see there. Just in case you are interested, I know the grave for Thomas Poots is there as well, so it's not him in the grave.
I hope some of this information helps, if you want further back I have some more information on previous generations but as I'm researching the generation back at the moment myself, I'd rather verify everything before I pass it on as fact.
