Grandfather jailed for bigamy - missing link

[ljuk]

He got the DOB from the GRO index entry for his death ...

Name: MARKINSON, Gordon Richard
Registration district: Leeds
County: Yorkshire
Year of registration: 1971
Quarter of registration: Jan-Feb-Mar
Date of Birth: 9 December 1900
Volume no: 2C
Page no: 731

[M3D1C_Dan]

"He served his prison sentence at Armley Jail in Leeds, I am suspecting sometime between 1947 and 1951"

Please elaborate on that ... right now I'm having a laugh and sharing it too.

Where did that come from?

The man is innocent and I don't believe he was ever proven to be guilty.

Dan, I think you are taking us for a ride here?

Paul

I'm actually quite offended by this response Paul and sorry you feel this way. I can assure you that I am not trying to take anyone "for a ride", but quite simply trying to trace my father's family tree. short of inventing a time machine and going back to gather your 'hard evidence', all I have to work with are stories and this I have been passed on from my relatives. if this is to be your response to my adding for help, perhaps you should focus your attention on someone with more 'hard evidence' than I unfortunately don't have.

[giblet]

My grandmother's first husband committed bigamy in the 1940's in Scotland and did 6 months in jail for it. He had used his proper name on both marriages  I have newspaper articles and some of his prison info but with him having used his proper name it was all very easy to track down.

Family stories can change as it gets passed down so its not always easy to trace but in time it all gets sorted 

I did notice that Nora and Margaret both married a little older than the usual age for a first marriage.

[giblet]

Am i right in saying that for now it is only assumed that he was born in the London area?

Just another thought was if his mother was infact French maybe his parents married in France and the kids were born there, hence not finding them on a UK census.

Also if you havent already maybe see if there is a death notice or obituary for Gordon Richard. Sometimes they might have little bits of info in them that can lead to somewhere.

[M3D1C_Dan]

Am i right in saying that for now it is only assumed that he was born in the London area?

Just another thought was if his mother was infact French maybe his parents married in France and the kids were born there, hence not finding them on a UK census.

Also if you havent already maybe see if there is a death notice or obituary for Gordon Richard. Sometimes they might have little bits of info in them that can lead to somewhere.

Yes indeed, unfortunately a lot of the points I have listed have been (what is appearing to be) Chinese whisper tales which may have indeed been altered or even made up. unfortunately for me, this is all I have to go on until proven impossible.

[avm228]

Sometimes it is the "Chinese whispers" which provide the clue to solving a difficult puzzle.  I spent years hunting for records of my gg-grandfather in Scotland.  It was a chance (and almost entirely inaccurate) remark by a very elderly great-aunt which set me on the right track to finding him - on the run from the authorities, using an alias, in the Amazon basin.

Noting down every piece of oral history, with its source, is absolutely the right thing to do - hope we (collectively) can help you make a breakthrough on this one.

[Milliepede]

If he had a complete name change (first, middle and last) then we are never going to find him from birth indexes.

Plus if those are made up names then the fathers name on the marriage cert must also be made up. 

One can't be true and the other false if you see what I mean. 

Newspapers, newspapers, newspapers is the only thing I can see that might give us some info.

As I said before if he was busy having a family after marriage he can't have been in prison at the same time - unless he served a less than 9 month sentence (I don't know how long he would have got)

Have to confess I was disbelieving about this one as well but it could be the way the info has been coming across.  I do understand with very little fact to go on one has to turn to bits of family rumour as that is all you have 

[M3D1C_Dan]

Thank you for this positive response, I really appreciate this, and yes, I hope of what stories I have been passed, some will lead to a positive result.

[dawnsh]

I'm sure there will be elements of truth in this once we get to the bottom of it.

I'm puzzled though by the choice of surname if he was using if this is as an alias.

Looking at the birth, marriage and death indexes, Markinson is almost unique to Leeds and Yorkshire uUntil the later parts of the 20th century) in its distribution. Of all the surnames, why chose this one?

I'll have another look through the newspapers and the later bigamy reports, the papers are transcribed using ocr software and they aren't always accurate.