old passport applications

[2tone]

could someone please point me in the right direction, i am trying to trace a rogue relative and need to search if he left the country c.1851 onwards to around 1856, he was  George Bishop of Keyingham, but the trail has gone to a brick wall. thanks in advance.

[GrahamSimons]

It's fairly unlikely that a passport was ever issued - they were not needed until into the 20th century. A long shot, though....There is a helpful guide here:
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/passports/

[Goughy]

Article in Hull Packet 1853.  A George Bishop of Keyingham had absconded leaving wife and 7 children.  He went off with a local farmer's wife who had got money from her husband to pay for their passage to America.

Could be yours???

[2tone]

Thankyou Graham, i will look at that, and thanks Goughy, yes that  is the offending person, my gt gt grandfather

[GrahamSimons]

Have you tried the US census of 1860? Assuming he was the George found with five children in the 1851 census in Keyingham, there are only a handful of possibles there....

[jillruss]

Hi 2Tone,

I think we have been in touch before about George Bishop. He was my 2x gt grandfather as well (through his youngest daughter Charlotte).

I'm afraid, try as I may (and I have!) I can't get any further with him. The newspaper article stated he had gone off to America with a neighbour's wife. I even tried to go through the 1851 and 1861 Keyingham censuses to see if any farmer's wives were missing but there were just too many, even in such a small place.

I know there are a few people in Canada also looking for him (one of his relatives emigrated there) and I do wonder if it was Canada he went to - several of his wife's brothers (Barnetts) emigrated to Canada in the mid 1800s. Then again, he'd left their sister with 7 children and in a state of penury so perhaps Canada would have been the last place for him to go!

There's even some talk of him being something in the Mormon church but no one has ever come forward with any evidence to prove it. I don't know if you've also heard those whispers? I've no idea where/how they originated.

I think the Bishops were just that kind of frustrating family: I have never been able to find a baptism for George's grandfather John Bishop born about 1758 presumably somewhere around Laxton.

Please let me know if you ever make any progress, won't you?

Best wishes,
Jill